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Democracy and infant mortality within India: from whether to why

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 June 2016

Nisha Mukherjee Bellinger
Nisha Mukherjee Bellinger*
Affiliation:
Department of Social Sciences & Cultural Studies, Montana State University – Billings, Billings, MT, USA
*
*E-mail: nisha.bellinger@msubillings.edu
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Abstract

How does democratic politics affect infant mortality? The bulk of existing research has debated whether democracies have lower levels of infant mortality than non-democracies. Yet, infant mortality varies as much within countries as it does between countries, suggesting that the political processes affecting infant mortality operate at the subnational level. To shed new light on the debate, this paper examines how three core democratic attributes affect infant mortality within a single democracy: India. I argue that higher levels of political representation, citizens’ participation, and electoral competition provide political incentives for elected representatives to reduce infant mortality. The theory is tested on a times-series data set from 15 major Indian states between 1980 and 2011. Overall, the results demonstrate the significance of democratic politics, particularly political representation, in influencing infant mortality.

Keywords

Indiademocracyhuman welfareinfant mortality
Type
Research Article
Information
European Political Science Review , Volume 10 , Issue 1 , February 2018 , pp. 3 - 28
Copyright
© European Consortium for Political Research 2016 

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