has an opportunity cost; spending on investment and development of industries is foregone, often leaving the citizens of a non-democratic regime stuck in the early stages of Walter Rostow’s 5 Stages of Growth Theory, as shown in Figure 2, which can leave countries primary- or secondary-sector dependent and under-developed. As John Harriss describes, such “economic development [is] conducive to democratisation, partly because [it] strengthens the ‘moderate’ middle class”[5]: a social group of people who are better educated and financially-placed to resist being ‘bought-off’ by a dictator. Emerging middle classes therefore diminish the extent to which non-democratic leaders can bribe their winning coalition with private goods, as the prospect of doing so becomes increasingly expensive as the size and wealth of the middle classes grow as a result of development, while the loyalty norm weakens too.
We may also see a rise in post-materialist values as the population becomes wealthier, since “after a period of sharply rising economic and physical security, one would expect to find substantial differences [in] value priorities, […] for example, post-materialists […] are markedly more tolerant of homosexuality”[6]. This could erode the extent to which the population would be morally willing to accept such bribes, regardless of magnitude. Subsequently, economic development might lead to the demise of such a regime.

An additional economic explanation could be the ‘resource curse’, which suggests that countries “with abundant reserves of non-renewable mineral resources, such as Nigerian oil [and] DRC gold […] produce less diversified and less competitive economies, more income inequality [and] heightened danger of state capture and rent-seeking by ruling elites”[25]. This is because the revenue streams in these countries are so concentrated to the elites and ruling classes, providing only menial low-paid labour to politically-insignificant lower classes. Moreover, since they are primary-product-export dependent, manufacturing industries develop overseas where economies of scales are subsequently built; diminishing the ability of local entrepreneurs to set up competing businesses and increase their wealth. The likelihood of a democratic transition is therefore low, since “democracy is expected to increase redistrib