From rents to welfare: why are some oil-rich states generous to their people?

Eibl, Ferdinand and Hertog, Steffen ORCID: 0000-0002-6758-9564 (2023) From rents to welfare: why are some oil-rich states generous to their people? American Political Science Review. ISSN 0003-0554

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Abstract

Why do some, but not all oil-rich states provide generous welfare to their populations? Building on a case study of Oman in the 1960s and 1970s, we argue that anti-systemic subversive threats motivate ruling elites in oil states to use welfare as a tool of mass co-optation. We use the generalized synthetic control method and difference-in-difference regressions for a global quantitative test of our argument, assessing the effect of different types of subversion on a range of long-term welfare outcomes in oil-rich and oil-poor states. We demonstrate that the positive effect of subversion appears limited to center-seeking subversive threats in oil-rich countries. The paper addresses a key puzzle in the literature on resource-rich states, which makes contradictory predictions about the impact of resource rents on welfare provision.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	© 2023 The Author(s).
Divisions:	Government
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HM Sociology J Political Science J Political Science > JZ International relations
Date Deposited:	26 Oct 2023 11:48
Last Modified:	25 Apr 2024 20:48
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/120544

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