The return of the prodigy son: Do return migrants make better leaders?

    The return of the prodigy son: Do return migrants make better leaders? Marion Mercier PII: DOI: Reference:

S0304-3878(16)30026-8 doi: 10.1016/j.jdeveco.2016.04.005 DEVEC 2070

To appear in:

Journal of Development Economics

Received date: Revised date: Accepted date:

25 May 2015 25 April 2016 30 April 2016

Please cite this article as: Mercier, Marion, The return of the prodigy son: Do return migrants make better leaders?, Journal of Development Economics (2016), doi: 10.1016/j.jdeveco.2016.04.005

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The Return of the Prodigy Son: Do Return Migrants Make Better Leaders ?

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Marion Mercier∗

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Abstract

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This paper describes the relationship between political leaders’ migration experience and the evolution of democracy during their leadership. We build up an original database on the personal background of 932 politicians who were at the head of the executive power in a developing country over the 1960 – 2004 period. These data reveal the existence of a positive correlation between the fact that leaders studied abroad and the change in the score of democracy in their country during their tenure, for leaders who reach power in initially autocratic settings. This correlation notably appears to be driven by leaders who studied in high-income OECD countries. The main finding, confirmed by various robustness tests, adds up to the recent literature on the effects of the characteristics of political leaders. It also suggests a new channel through which migration may shape development and politics in the sending countries – namely, the political elites.

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Key words: political leaders, migration, democracy, developing countries.

∗ IRES, Universit´e Catholique de Louvain; DIAL – IRD; IZA, Bonn. E-mail: [email protected] I wish to thank Lisa Chauvet, Paul Collier, Amelie Constant, David de la Croix, Jos´e de Sousa, Fr´ed´eric Docquier, Giovanni Facchini, Flore Gubert, Georg Kirchsteiger, Gianmarco Leon, Fabio Mariani, Florian Mayneris, Alice Mesnard, Hillel Rapoport, Gerard Padr´ o i Miquel, Arthur Silve, Ragnar Torvik, Thierry Verdier and Ekaterina Zhuravskaya as well as two anonymous referees for very helpful comments. I also thank the participants to the IZA 10th Annual Migration Meeting, 2nd DIAL Development Conference, 1st FERDI – IRES conference on International Mobility, 7th international conference on Migration and Development, to seminars at the University Paris 1 and UNU – MERIT and to the 4th International Conference on Economics of Global Interactions for useful discussions. Finally, I wish to warmly thank the scientific committee of the latter conference for having granted the Wim Meeusen Prize to a previous version of this paper.

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Introduction

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Recent as well as ancient history of the world has been marked by some individual personalities who played an important role in major events (economic, political, cultural, etc.), or in the construction of ideologies and intellectual trends, or both. This is in particular the case of political figures, such as Joseph Stalin, Felix Houphou¨et-Boigny or Indira Gandhi. When reaching the highest functions, political leaders become likely to shape the development path of their country. Although they may be constrained in their actions through mechanisms such as checks and balances or strong armies, leaders of the executive power potentially play a major role in the political and economic evolution of the country they are at the head of. Jones and Olken (2005) find that individual leaders have had a crucial impact on the growth pattern and policy outcomes of their countries since 1945, notably in autocratic settings where their actions are less constrained. Following this result, one related question emerges: which individual characteristics of the leaders affect the quality of their leadership and the development outcomes of their country, in particular in autocracies? In this paper, we focus on leaders’ migration experience1 and on the evolution of democracy in developing countries, an outcome that has, to date, never been considered by the literature as potentially affected by leaders’ characteristics. The first contribution of the paper is to build up a new database gathering information on the personal characteristics of 932 leaders who were at the head of a developing country between 1960 and 2004. The data document in particular their migration history. Its second contribution is to provide original evidence about one specific channel through which migration may impact politics in the home country: political elites. A lot of leaders in the developing world did migrate before reaching power. It is much less clear whether these migration experiences predict or affect the quality of their leadership, and in which direction. Some cases suggest that leaders who lived abroad in their past are prone to promote democracy. For instance, after having completed part of his studies in the UK, and having worked as a diplomat notably in the US, in Canada and in Germany, Anand Panyarachun became Prime Minister of Thailand in March 1991. Although he reached this position in the aftermath of an extra-constitutional process, he engaged important reforms to “lead Thailand back to the path of democracy” and “reverse the practice of militarization of politics in the country”, which culminated with the organization of free and fair general elections in May 1992 (UN, December 2015 (accessed)).2 Another example is Joaquim Chissano who also studied abroad (in Portugal and in France). When he became President of Mozambique in 1986, the political context was described as autocratic, and the level of democracy then gradually increased.3 He was granted the Prize for Achievement in African Leadership of the Mo Ibrahim Foundation in 2007 for his role in the democratization of Mozambique. Other examples go in the opposite direction – for instance, the score of democracy of Cambodia collapsed during the leadership of Pol Pot, who had previously studied in France. Anecdotal evidence is thus ambiguous, and beyond anecdotal evidence, the literature does not provide a systematic quantitative analysis of the link between leaders’ migration background and the quality of institutions. This paper aims at filling this gap. 1

We use the expressions “migration experience” or “migration background” in a broad sense, meaning that we refer to the fact that the leader migrated at least once before reaching power. We will be more precise on the type of migration experience (notably in terms of objective and destination) in what follows. 2 The Polity score of his country increased from -1 when he reached power, to 9 when he left it. See Section 4 for a presentation of this index of democracy. 3 The Polity score of Mozambique was equal to -7 in 1986, and had increased to 5 in 2005 when Chissano left power. See Section 4 for a presentation of this index of democracy.

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Related literature

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Do decision-makers matter?

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The following section summarizes the related literature on the impact of leaders and on the effects of migration on politics in the home country. Section 3 presents the data that were collected for this study and the sample exploited in the empirical investigation. The benchmark estimations are displayed in Section 4. The results suggest that tenures of leaders who studied abroad and of leaders who migrated for diplomatic reasons are characterized by more change in the level of democracy, when the tenure started in an initially autocratic setting. This benchmark correlation could attest to an impact of certain migration experiences on the propensity to democratize, as well as it could be driven by other mechanisms. In particular, it could reveal that specific political pre-conditions are simultaneously correlated with the selection of a returnee as leader and with subsequent democratization. It could also capture omitted factors both affecting the leader’s propensity to be a return migrant and the likelihood of democratization. Section 5 explores the risk of endogeneity and presents a range of robustness tests to question these potential confounding mechanisms. We investigate whether the destination and duration of migration episodes matters in Section 6. Section 7 finally concludes.

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The impact of individual decision-makers on aggregate outcomes and the personal determinants of individuals’ influence have been investigated by the economic literature, notably in the cases of firms4 and of central banks.5 As well as the characteristics of decision-makers may affect aggregate outcomes at the firm and central bank levels, the characteristics of political leaders may shape aggregate outcomes at the level of a country. This hypothesis, which is the basis of this paper, has already been tackled by the literature. In a groundbreaking paper, Jones and Olken (2005) study the change in national leaders as an explanation of growth shifts. Investigating the impact of leaders on growth is challenging since changes in leadership are not random, and growth may determine the probability of leader change.6 To assess the causal effect of leadership changes, Jones and Olken (2005) identify leaders who died unexpectedly during their tenure and thus exogenously left power. They find robust evidence that leaders matter for growth, especially in autocratic settings. This result paves the way for further investigation of the role of leaders, in particular of the individual characteristics that affect the quality of leadership. Besley, Montalvo, and ReynalQuerol (2011) go one step further in this direction and put forward a significant impact of leaders’ education on growth. Besley and Reynal-Querol (2011) additionally question the process of choice of the leader by investigating the differences in educational attainment between leaders selected in democracies and leaders selected in autocracies. They find that democracies are more likely to select a highly educated leader. Taken together, these two papers suggest that, at the same time, democracies select leaders differently regarding their educational background, and leaders’ 4

In particular, Bertrand and Schoar (2003) build an original data set that allows them to track managers during their career across different firms. They estimate the impact of manager fixed effects on firm-level outcomes, controlling for year fixed effects, firm fixed effects and firm-level time-varying characteristics. They emphasize an important impact of individual managers on corporate practises and firm performances, partly explained by age and education. 5 Adolph (2004) shows that central bankers’ career backgrounds affect inflation and interest rates as well as declared preferences. In a similar perspective, G¨ ohlmann and Vaubel (2007) find, in a panel setting, that central bankers have different levels of aversion to inflation depending on their education and occupational background. 6 For example, in democratic settings, incumbents tend to be more likely to be reelected during economic booms (Fair, 1978).

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The impact of migration on the origin country

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education drives their influence on growth. Education of the leaders is also put under study, together with professional background, by Dreher et al. (2009), who find that former entrepreneurs and scientists have a higher propensity to implement market-liberalizing reforms7 while former unionists have the opposite effect. To our knowledge, these papers are the only existing quantitative studies on the individual characteristics that affect leaders’ influence on country-level outcomes. Focusing on local leaders, Chattopadhyay and Duflo (2004) rely on a randomized policy experiment which consists in the reservation of one third of the Indian Village Council head positions for women, and find that political reservation for women induces a better access to public goods which are closely linked to women’s concerns, like drinking water. Local leaders’ gender thus appears to affect their political choices. Persson and Zhuravskaya (2015) collect data on the backgrounds of provincial party secretaries for 30 provinces of China over the 1986 – 2005 period, which allows them to show that party secretaries who have closer ties to the local elites make different decisions, in particular allocating public expenditure in education and health rather than in investment. Closely related to this literature, Jong-A-Pin and Yu (2013) introduce leader heterogeneity in terms of economic and military competence in the selectorate theory of Bueno De Mesquita et al. (2005). Assuming the presence of a revolutionary threat, their model predicts that economic competence is negatively related to political survival (this effect being moderated by the size of the winning coalition) and that, in such circumstances, a military leader may be preferred. They provide empirical estimates supporting these theoretical results. Finally, relying on individual data on a panel of 18 African countries, Franck and Rainer (2012) show that being the co-ethnic of the political leader is correlated positively with literacy and negatively with infant mortality, thus providing evidence of ethnic favoritism through the individual identity of the leader. We build on this recent and promising literature tackling the personal characteristics of politicians, and question whether migration experience is another dimension that matters for the quality of leadership in developing countries. A second strand of the literature, focusing on migration and politics in the origin country, motivates this research question.

The economic literature on migration and politics in the sending country underlines important interactions between the different dimensions of migration and political outcomes, both at the macro and at the micro level. On the macro side, Spilimbergo (2009) questions the impact of foreign education on democracy in the home country. He shows that the number of foreign-educated individuals has a fostering effect on democracy, if this education is acquired in democratic countries. He describes five potential mechanisms through which a larger number of students in democratic foreign countries can positively affect democracy at home, and among them the fact that “foreigneducated leaders seem to be extremely motivated to keep up with the more developed countries where they studied.”. We specifically investigate this channel, by focusing on leaders who lived abroad and, in certain cases, studied abroad, before reaching power. Still in a macro perspective, Docquier et al. (2016) put forward a positive effect of emigration rate on the quality of political institutions in the home country,8 which is driven by emigration to rich democratic countries. In the same vein, Lodigiani and Salomone (2015) find that migration to countries with higher female political empowerment significantly increases the share of women in the origin country’s parliament. 7

Measured by the Economic Freedom index from Gwartney, Lawson, and Norton (2008). Measured by the Political Rights and Civil Liberties indicators from Freedom House data set, the Polity score from the Polity IV data set and the Economic Freedom of the World index from the Simon Fraser Institute. 8

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3.1

A new database on the characteristics of the leaders Data collection

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This set of macro results suggests a significant impact of emigration on political institutions. Consistently, recent micro evidence puts forward the existence of transfers of political norms from migrants to non-migrants in the home country. While conducting a household survey on perceived corruption in Cape Verde, Batista and Vicente (2011) rebuild the conditions of a referendum about political accountability, by offering respondents the possibility to anonymously send back a postcard asking for the disclosure of the survey’s results in the media. They find that the proportion of current and return migrants in the locality of the respondents is positively associated with their probability to send back this postcard. Migration intensity thus positively affects demand for political accountability in the origin community, and this impact is shown to be stronger when the destination country has better levels of governance. In a similar perspective, Pfutze (2012) finds a positive impact of migration intensity on the probability that a party in opposition to the former state party in Mexico wins a municipal election, and Barsbai et al. (2016) show that the share of votes for the Communist party in Moldova is lower in localities with more migration toward Western countries. Finally, Chauvet and Mercier (2014) show that Malian localities with a higher share of return migrants coming back from non-African countries exhibit higher participation rates to the local elections and stronger electoral competitiveness. Migration is thus found to affect politics in the home country, through institutions on the one hand, and through individual behaviors and preferences on the other hand. The impact of migration also appears to depend on the characteristics of the destination countries. While the specific “leader” channel has never been investigated yet, this second strand of the literature encourages to ask whether leaders’ migration experience affects the quality of political institutions.

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We collected original data on the characteristics of a sample of leaders. We relied on the Archigos database from Goemans, Gleditsch, and Chiozza (2009), which identifies the primary ruler in each country and year over the 1875 – 2004 period. We selected the sample of leaders who have been at the head of a developing country between 1960 and 2004.9 For each of them, we then collected information on his personal and familial characteristics, education, profession, military experience, and migration background. We adopted a broad definition of a “migration experience”, coding as a migration experience any episode during which the (future) leader settled down in a foreign country for an objective that was different from tourism. Four types of migration experiences are distinguished: studies abroad, exile, migration for diplomatic reasons, and for military reasons other than war (such as military training). To gather these data, we relied on a wide range of web sources: the online Encylopedia Universalis, the biographies of political leaders of the Barcelona Centre for International Affairs (CIDOB – Centro de Estudios y Documentaci´ on Internacionales de Barcelona), the websites of the national parliaments and political parties, Wikipedia, etc. Our final database provides information on 932 leaders who headed 136 developing countries during 1,042 leadership periods between 1960 and 2004. 9 The sample was chosen based on the countries’ status in 1960, thus a certain number of countries of the sample are not considered as developing countries anymore today based on the World Bank’s classification (for instance, Czech Republic and the Republic of Korea). The results presented below are however robust to the exclusion of these countries, as well as to the exclusion of countries that are current OECD members. Results available upon request.

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Who are the leaders?

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The empirical analysis that follows does not rely on these 1,042 tenures, but on a sub-sample of them. First, we have information on the migration experience of the leader for 883 of the 1,042 tenures (786 leaders over 932). Second, we focus on tenures which lasted at least one year (there are 750 so-called “long” tenures, and 675 for which the migration status of the leader is available), for two reasons. From a practical point of view, this allows us to match our leader-level data with country-level data recorded on a yearly basis. From a theoretical point of view, it is reasonable to believe that leaders who spend a very short time span in power do not have enough time to implement structural reforms that affect the quality of institutions. Excluding them from the sample thus diminishes the sources of noise in our estimations. Finally, the country-level control variables included in the benchmark specification are simultaneously available for 467 of these 675.10,11 The empirical analysis being based on a sub-sample of the database, one could wonder whether the leaders under study are specific as compared to the complete sample. Table 1 presents the main average characteristics of the whole sample, as well as the main average characteristics of our benchmark sample, and the tests of the significance in the differences between these two groups. This allows both to draw a portrait of the average political leader in the developing world between 1960 and 2004, and to have an idea of the representativeness of our sub-sample, given that we focus on “long” tenures for which the leader-level information as well as the other control variables are available. Very few significant differences appear between the complete sample and the benchmark sample. To simplify the comments, we will first describe the general trends of the complete sample (first column), and then comment the characteristics that are different between the complete sample and the benchmark sample. Most of the leaders are men (97%). On average, they reach power aged 52 and their tenure lasts a little more than five years. Half of the leaders is highly educated. Following Besley and Reynal-Querol (2011), we define high education as at least a master’s degree (or equivalent). In their data, less than 30% of the leaders are highly educated. The difference with the proportion observed in our sample is in line with the global spreading of education of the last century: while we focus on post-1960 leaders, their data start in 1848. Our database also contains information on leaders’ occupation. Military professions are the most represented category (28% of the leaders), followed by lawyers (19%). The academic sector gathers 13.5% of the leaders and science and administration around 9% each. 8% of the leaders are economists. The four last categories are less represented: health professionals and businessmen represent 4.5% of the leaders each, workers 3.5%, and priests 1.5%. Migration has clearly been a usual phenomenon among leaders of the developing world over the 1960 – 2004 period. More than 68.5% of them had a migration experience before reaching power. Migration is very common for African (82%), Latin American (74%) and Asian (64%) leaders, and a bit less for European leaders (40%).12 What have these leaders been doing abroad? In the statistics presented in Table 1, when 10

To be consistent with the empirical analysis, the descriptive statistics that follow are displayed at the level of the tenures. Note that the benchmark sample of 467 tenures gathers 433 different leaders, of which 30 are observed twice and 2 are observed three times. Observing more than one observation for the same leader is possible only if he left the power between two tenures. Thus, for instance, a re-elected incumbent does not count for two tenures but only for one, since he stays in power continuously across the two mandates. All the empirical results displayed below are robust to the exclusion of second and third tenures. 11 A list of the countries represented in the benchmark sample is displayed in Appendix 8.1. 12 Statistics not shown in the table for brevity.

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splitting migration experiences according to their objective, all the migration experiences of the leaders are considered. The different categories are thus not exclusive from each other. For instance, Burhanuddin Rabbani, leader of Afghanistan from 1992 to 1996, studied in Egypt and, later on, experienced an exile in Pakistan (the dummies Mig - Study and Mig - Exile are thus both equal to one in his case); while Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, President of Tunisia between 1987 and 2011, both attended military trainings in France and in the US and migrated in the frame of diplomatic missions (the dummies Mig - Dipl. and Mig - Milit. are both equal to one in his case). Note also that the means of Mig - Study, Mig - Exile, Mig - Dipl. and Mig - Milit. are computed over all the leaders whose migration status is available, and not only over the subsample of those who migrated.13 Among the 883 observations for which the leader’s migration status is available, 13.5% migrated for diplomatic reasons, and 42% for studying. 15% experienced an exile abroad. Finally, 17.5% went abroad for military reasons. Taken together, these migration experiences lasted on average seven years.14,15 Where did the leaders migrate? The most represented destination is Europe: 42.5% of the leaders of the complete sample did migrate in Europe at one point in their life before reaching power. 23.5% went to North America, and 13.5% to Africa. Asia and South America have been the destination (or one of the destinations, in case of multiple migration spells) of 11% and 10% of the leaders, respectively.16 Not surprisingly, the distribution of migration experiences across destinations varies according to the region of origin.17 We observe important flows of intra-continental migration: 45% of the African leaders of the complete sample migrated in Africa, which is the case of only 3% of the Asian leaders and less than 2% of the European and South American leaders. The same importance of intra-continental migration is observed in South America and Asia. Indeed, 32.5% of the South American leaders migrated within their continent, while no more than 1% of the African, European and Asian leaders went to South America. In the same vein, 26.5% of the Asian leaders migrated within their continent, while 7% of the European leaders, 5.5% of the African leaders and less than 1% of the South American leaders did settle down in Asia at one point in their life before reaching power. Migration toward North America is important, although more common among South American leaders (40.5% of them experienced it) than among leaders from the rest of the world (respectively 24.5%, 12.5% and 8% of the Asian, African and European leaders went to North America). Finally, migration toward Europe is less discriminant: it concerned 59.5% of the African leaders, 40% of the Asian leaders, 33.5% of the Latin American leaders and 32.5% of the European leaders of the complete sample. 13 We use the number of leaders rather than the number of migrants as denominator so as to: (i) make easy the comparison between migration-related and non migration-related statistics (e.g., between the share of leaders who migrated for military reasons and the share of military), and (ii) give directly an idea of the size of the different groups of return migrants, since the empirical analysis puts most of the emphasis on specific types of migration experiences rather than on migration in general. 14 The variable Mig. duration displayed in Table 1 measures, for each leader, the total time spent in migration (in years). In case of multiple migration spells, it sums up the duration of each of them. 15 The duration of migration is not available for a certain number of leaders. Specifically, among the 883 observations of the complete sample for which the migration status is available, 607 did migrate, but the time spent abroad is known for only 434 of them. As far as the 467 leaders of the benchmark sample are concerned, 334 did migrate but the time spent abroad is known for 246 of them. 16 Here again, the means are computed over all the leaders whose migration status is available and not only over the subsample of those who migrated, and they account for all the migration episodes (i.e., multiple destinations can be observed for the same leader. If we refer to the same two examples as above, Burhanuddin Rabbani both migrated in Africa and in Asia, and Zine El Abidine Ben Ali both migrated in Europe and in North America). 17 Not in the table for sake of brevity.

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All (#) Migration background: Migration 0.687 883 Mig – Study 0.421 883 Mig – Exile 0.149 883 Mig – Dipl. 0.135 883 Mig – Milit. 0.177 883 Mig. duration 6.956 434 Mig – Europe 0.424 883 Mig – Asia 0.110 883 Mig – Africa 0.135 883 Mig – N.-Am. 0.237 883 Mig – S.-Am. 0.099 883 Mig – Oceania 0.011 883

Benchmark Sample (#)

Diff. (Std. Err.)

0.715 467 0.454 467 0.156 467 0.105 467 0.218 467 6.776 246 0.426 467 0.084 467 0.143 467 0.276 467 0.126 467 0.011 467

-0.028 (0.026) -0.033 (0.028) -0.007 (0.021) 0.030 (0.019) -0.042* (0.022) 0.180 (0.612) -0.003 (0.028) 0.026 (0.017) -0.009 (0.020) -0.040 (0.025) -0.028 (0.018) 0.0006 (0.006)

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-6.17e-06 (0.009) 0.297 (0.614) -1.512*** (0.389) -0.030 (0.029) -0.024 (0.023) -0.005 (0.016) -0.002 (0.012) 0.032 (0.025) -0.012 (0.012) -0.002 (0.016) 0.001 (0.019) 0.005 (0.010) -0.006 (0.017) -0.0004 (0.007)

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All Benchmark (#) Sample (#) Characteristics of the leader: Woman 0.028 0.028 1,042 467 Age at arrival 52.00 51.70 1,036 467 Tenure duration 5.304 6.816 1,042 467 High education 0.514 0.544 871 467 Law 0.192 0.216 890 467 Eco 0.081 0.086 890 467 Health 0.045 0.047 890 467 Military 0.279 0.246 890 467 Business 0.044 0.056 890 467 Admin 0.088 0.090 890 467 Academics 0.134 0.133 890 467 Worker 0.035 0.030 890 467 Scientist 0.094 0.101 890 467 Religious 0.015 0.015 890 467

Political outcomes during the tenure: Polity score 1.107 2.181 974 467 Delta Polity 0.234 0.454 974 467

-1.074*** (0.358) -0.220 (0.209)

***p<0.01, **p<0.05, *p<0.1. Tenure duration and Mig. duration are measured in years. High education is a dummy equal to one if the leader had a master’s degree or equivalent before reaching power. All the variables related to migration are computed over the whole sample of leaders for who information on migration is available (not only over the subsample of migrants). For instance, 42% of all the leaders of the complete sample studied abroad. Polity score comes from the Polity IV dataset (Marshall, Jaggers, and Gurr, 2011), provided by the Integrated Network for Societal Conflict Research (INSCR) of the Center for Systemic Peace. It is an index of democracy that assigns to each country an annual score in the autocracy – democracy spectrum, ranging from -10 (closed autocracy) to 10 (full democracy). Delta Polity is the difference between the Polity score the last year of the tenure and the Polity score at the arrival in power.

Most of the individual characteristics are not significantly different, on average, between the complete sample and the benchmark sample. However, by construction, the benchmark sample is constituted of significantly longer tenures on average (“short-term” leaders are excluded from the benchmark sample). It also turns outs that the sub-sample under study is characterized by a slightly significantly larger share of leaders who migrated for military reasons. The last part of Table 1 displays the average level of democracy and change in democracy during

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Democracy and the migration of the leader Benchmark specification

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the tenure, in the complete sample and in the benchmark sample.18 The sample of leaders on which we perform the econometric analysis hereafter is characterized by an average score of democracy which is significantly higher, of one point on average, as compared to the complete sample. This difference remains very stable when we compare the benchmark sample with the “long” tenures. More precisely, the “long” tenures exhibit an average Polity score of 0.966, which yields a difference of means of 1.214 points (significant at the 1% level) with the benchmark sample. Given that the observations of the complete sample that remain in the benchmark sample are characterized by, (i) a tenure of at least one year, and (ii) the availability of the leader- and country-level data, this could reflect the fact that more democratic countries are characterized by a better availability of data. Table 1 also shows that the benchmark sample is not significantly different regarding the average change in the score of democracy during the tenure. This suggests that data availability might be correlated with the level of democracy without being correlated with democratization, but must be taken with caution given that these statistics are only uncontrolled differences of means. In the end, although the benchmark sample appears to be a selection of slightly more democratic tenures, the evolution of the Polity score during the tenure, which is the main outcome variable in the analysis, does not appear to follow a specific pattern in the benchmark sample. Combined with the very few differences observed in terms of individual characteristics, this is reassuring regarding the potential consequences of the sampling on our results.

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As argued in Sections 1 and 2, anecdotal evidence, as well as the literature about decision-makers and about the effects of migration on the origin country, motivate investigating the relationship between leader’s migration background and the quality of their leadership. We focus here on the evolution of democracy as political outcome of interest. We aim at questioning whether there is a correlation between, on the one hand, the fact that the leader migrated (and the type of migration experience(s) he had), and on the other hand, the evolution of democracy during his tenure. Said differently, we question whether the arrival in power of a new leader who happens to have a given migration experience is correlated with a subsequent specific trend in the evolution of democracy. While the variables related to the migration experiences of the leaders do not vary during the tenure,19 the mechanism we are interested in is about political change. To reflect these two points, we will consider a specification at the level of the tenures (which also allows to give the same weight to each leader, while controlling for the duration of the tenure on the right-hand side), and consider the evolution of the level of democracy during the tenure as dependent variable. We will estimate how this evolution is correlated with the leader’s characteristics (notably in terms of migration), which do not vary during the tenure, accounting for a certain number of covariates. We estimate Equation (1), each observation corresponding to a tenure: 18 Democracy is measured by the Polity score, an index of democracy that ranges from -10 (closed autocracy) to 10 (full democracy). See below for more details. 19 The migration background of an individual evolves in the course of his life. However in our perspective, the individual characteristics of the leaders are defined at the arrival in power and, as such, do not vary over time.

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DeltaP olityi,j,l = α + δ1 M igStudyl + δ2 M igExilel + δ3 M igDipll + δ4 M igM ilitl + γXj,l + τj + ηi + λCi,j + εi,j,l (1)

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The dependent variable is the change in the Polity score in country i during the tenure j of leader l. It equals the Polity score in country i observed the last year of the tenure j of leader l minus the Polity score in country i observed the first year of the tenure j of leader l. Polity score comes from the Polity IV dataset (Marshall, Jaggers, and Gurr, 2011), provided by the Integrated Network for Societal Conflict Research (INSCR) of the Center for Systemic Peace. It is an index of democracy that assigns to each country an annual score in the autocracy – democracy spectrum, ranging from -10 (closed autocracy) to 10 (full democracy). We are interested in the relationship between the evolution of the democracy score and the migration experience of leader l. We distinguish four types of migration experiences: studies abroad, exile, migration for diplomacy and for military reasons. We include a vector Xj,l of tenureand leader-level controls composed of: a dummy equaling one if leader l is a women, a dummy equaling one if leader l has at least a master’s degree (or equivalent), the duration (in years) of the tenure j of leader l, and ten dummies for the profession of leader l (Law, Economics, Health, Military, Business, Administration, Academics, Worker, Scientist and Religious). We introduce time dummies τj , that capture the global evolution of democracy observed across countries the year when the tenure j of leader l started, and country fixed effects ηi . We thus control for all the time-invariant country characteristics and country-invariant time trends. Moreover, we cluster standard errors at the country level to account for the potential within-country correlation of error terms. Although country fixed effects allow us to rule out the effect of time-invariant country characteristics, some time-varying characteristics probably matter. We control for a vector Ci,j of country-level variables averaged over tenure j to capture these trends. Ci,j encapsulates the yearly growth rate and the level of the GDP per capita, which may be correlated with democratization (data from the Penn World Tables), and the size of the population (data from the World Development Indicators, in hundreds of thousands). Moreover, since the probability of having a leader with a migration experience must be higher in more migration-intensive countries, and since migration intensity as well as students’ migration have been shown to affect democracy respectively by Docquier et al. (2016) and Spilimbergo (2009), Ci,j also contains: ¨ • the rate of emigration, based on data from Ozden et al. (2011),20 and • the number of students abroad normalized by population, from Spilimbergo (2009). 20 ¨ Ozden et al. (2011) provide decennial matrices of bilateral migrant stocks spanning the period 1960 – 2000, based primarily on the foreign-born concept. For each year when the data are available, we compute the total stock of emigrants from each origin country, and divide it by the size of its population (data from the World Development Indicators). This yields rates of emigration for the years 1960, 1970, 1980, 1990 and 2000. We finally allocate the emigration rate of 1960 to years prior to 1965, the emigration rate of 1970 to years between 1965 and 1975, the emigration rate of 1980 to years between 1975 and 1985, the emigration rate of 1990 to years between 1985 and 1995 and the emigration rate of 2000 after 1995. Note that the results are robust to alternatively allocating these emigration rates by decade (i.e., allocating the emigration rate of 1960 to years prior to 1970, the emigration rate of 1970 to 1970 – 1980, etc.).

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4.2

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To control for the initial level of democracy and for the past trend of democratization, we introduce (first separately, and then simultaneously) the Polity score measured at the arrival in power of leader l and the change in the Polity score observed during the tenure of his predecessor. In the end, we measure the correlation between the change in the level of democracy during the tenure and the migration status of the leader controlling for global time trends, for other characteristics of the leader, and for time-invariant and observable time-varying characteristics of the countries. The correlation between each migration type and Delta Polity that we estimate is thus based on the within-country variation of the migration status of the leaders, after controlling for a certain number of observable covariates. The main endogeneity concerns that threaten this identification are related to a potential reverse causality and/or to potential omitted variables. On the one hand, reverse causality suggests that, if a relationship exists between democratization and the leader’s migration experience, it could go from political outcomes to the propensity that the leader is a returnee rather than the opposite. Three main empirical strategies are implemented in Sections 5.1 and 5.2 to account for this issue: (i) we investigate the determinants (and notably, whether democratization is a determinant) of the likelihood that a return migrant reaches power; (ii) we investigate the correlation between the leader’s migration experience and democratization during his predecessor’s tenure; and (iii) we introduce in the benchmark specification additional control variables that capture the political trends which precede the arrival in power. On the other hand, a spurious correlation between democratization and leaders’ migration background could also appear if a third factor, both affecting political outcomes during the tenure and the likelihood that the leader is a return migrant, was not controlled for. Aside from the political context prior to the leader’s arrival in power, Section 5.2 tackles several other potential mechanisms that could be at play, namely (i) time-varying regional shocks (that could affect simultaneously leaders’ characteristics and democratization); (ii) the individual selection into migration (that could be at the origin of the correlation if leaders who migrate have specific characteristics that also make them more prone to democratize); (iii) nepotism/dynastic political systems (that could bias the results if individuals who have access to the political networks strategically make their migration decisions); and (iv) the possible intervention of foreign countries (which are also likely to be the former host countries of return migrants) in the choice of the leader.

Benchmark results

Columns (1) to (3) of Table 2 present the results of the estimations of Equation (1), first controlling for the initial Polity score, second for the Delta Polity of the predecessor, and third for both simultaneously. The duration of the tenure (respectively, the average rate of growth of the GDP per capita during the tenure) is positively (respectively, negatively) correlated with the change in the Polity score. Moreover, leaders who reach power in a more democratic country as well as leaders whose predecessor’s tenure was characterized by a larger evolution of the democracy score are associated with a smaller change in the quality of political institutions. On the other hand, the different types of migration do not appear to be significantly correlated to the change in democracy. In a second step, we follow the literature and distinguish leaders who take power in an already democratic country from leaders who take power in autocratic settings. We introduce the interactions between each type of migration and a dummy indicating whether the country was initially an autocracy (Initially autocratic). This dummy equals one if the country had a Polity score inferior or equal to zero at the arrival in power of leader l, and zero otherwise. The coefficient associated with each migration variable then corresponds to tenures which started in a relatively democratic 11

ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT Table 2: Benchmark results.

High Education GDP pc growth GDP pc Emig Population Students abroad Initially autocratic

Initially autocratic x Mig - Study Mig - Exile

Initially autocratic x Mig - Diplomacy Mig - Military

0.721 (0.462)

-0.352 (0.639)

-0.0654 (0.614)

0.115 (0.869)

0.250 (0.867)

0.0990 (0.874)

-0.190 (1.035)

-0.194 (1.088)

-0.270 (1.127)

Yes Yes 467 0.427 110

Yes Yes 437 0.402 107

Yes Yes 437 0.451 107

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Initially autocratic x Mig - Exile Mig - Diplomacy

-0.109 (0.639)

0.633 (0.484)

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0.655 (0.484)

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Mig - Study

Initially autocratic x Mig - Military Profession dummies Country & year dummies Observations R-squared Number of countries

(5)

0.127** (0.0618) 1.315 (1.216) -0.292 (0.595) -0.295*** (0.0978) -3.62e-05 (0.000157) 1.783 (10.52) -0.00105** (0.000490) -0.399 (6.007) 0.0579 (1.497) -0.199 (0.540) 2.349** (1.042) 0.186 (0.753) -0.355 (1.307) -1.782 (1.140) 3.426** (1.601) -1.025 (1.016) 1.261 (1.189)

-0.143** (0.0651) 0.205*** (0.0681) 0.463 (1.160) 0.0593 (0.667) -0.485*** (0.131) -2.05e-05 (0.000144) -7.250 (10.62) -0.000905* (0.000486) 2.372 (5.738) 1.567 (1.311) -0.168 (0.509) 2.449** (1.179) 0.448 (0.688) -1.400 (1.166) -1.856 (1.214) 3.589** (1.598) -1.219 (1.198) 1.447 (1.274)

(6) -0.233** (0.0945) -0.115* (0.0667) 0.192*** (0.0670) 0.564 (1.121) 0.0804 (0.664) -0.460*** (0.130) -1.23e-06 (0.000145) -8.540 (10.79) -0.000936* (0.000497) 3.447 (5.928) -0.621 (1.441) -0.210 (0.516) 2.735** (1.182) 0.417 (0.699) -1.019 (1.134) -1.786 (1.219) 3.357** (1.600) -1.145 (1.186) 1.434 (1.241)

3.188** (1.235) -0.523 (0.492) 1.822* (1.013) 0.190 (0.767) -1.379 (1.275) -2.434* (1.295) 4.475*** (1.668) 0.616 (0.581) 1.034 (1.247)

Yes Yes 467 0.453 110

Yes Yes 437 0.471 107

Yes Yes 437 0.479 107

No Yes 467 0.390 110

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Woman

0.107* (0.0576) 1.461 (1.280) -0.108 (0.644) -0.285*** (0.109) 3.07e-05 (0.000140) 2.305 (11.26) -0.00102** (0.000471) -1.378 (6.262)

(4) -0.283*** (0.0981)

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Tenure duration

-0.225*** (0.0627) 0.188*** (0.0653) 0.308 (1.235) 0.301 (0.786) -0.468*** (0.134) 9.76e-05 (0.000148) -9.318 (10.31) -0.000580 (0.000427) 3.523 (5.831)

(3) -0.317*** (0.0879) -0.110* (0.0653) 0.169*** (0.0621) 0.677 (1.238) 0.267 (0.707) -0.479*** (0.124) 0.000110 (0.000133) -7.862 (11.36) -0.000851* (0.000464) 2.201 (6.029)

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Delta Polity - Predecessor

(2)

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(1) -0.410*** (0.0835)

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Dependent: Delta Polity Initial Polity score

(7)

LPM with country fixed effects. Robust standard errors clustered at the country level in parentheses. ***p<0.01, **p<0.05, *p<0.1. Tenure duration is measured in years. High education is a dummy equal to one if the leader had a master’s degree or equivalent before reaching power. GDP pc growth, GDP pc, Emig, Population and Students abroad are averaged over the tenure. Initially autocratic is a dummy equal to one if the Polity score the year of arrival in power of the leader was smaller or equal to zero. Profession dummies refer to: Law, Economics, Health, Military, Business, Administration, Academics, Worker, Scientist and Religious.

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5.1

Robustness

What drives the arrival in power of a foreign-educated leader?

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context, while the correlation between each migration variable and the evolution of democracy in initially autocratic countries is given by the coefficient associated with the migration variable plus the coefficient of its interaction with Initially autocratic. Columns (4) to (6) of Table 2 display the results. The coefficient for Mig - Study is still non significant but its interaction with Initially autocratic turns out to be significantly positive. This suggests that, while leaders’ migration experience is not significantly associated with the evolution of the quality of political institutions in relatively democratic contexts, tenures of leaders who studied abroad are characterized by an average increase of the Polity score around 2.5 points higher, when they reached power in an autocratic country. The correlation between leaders’ foreign studies and the change in democracy thus appears to be heterogeneous and, consistently with Jones and Olken (2005) who find that leaders affect growth especially in autocratic contexts, significant only in relatively autocratic settings where leaders presumably face a broader room for manoeuvre. The same is true for leaders who migrated for diplomatic reasons. Since it will appear below that this last result is less robust, the rest of the paper mainly focuses on studies abroad. Finally, the coefficients associated with Initially autocratic x Mig - Study and Initially autocratic x Mig - Diplomacy remain positive and statistically significant if we run the estimation without any leader- and country-level controls (this exercise is ran in Column (7) of Table 2). Said differently, foreign-educated leaders, as well as leaders who migrated for diplomatic reasons, appear to predict democratization in initially autocratic countries, even without controlling for any potential confounding factor.

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It is reasonable to believe that individuals who reach the head of the executive power are not picked up at random. In particular, symmetrically to Besley and Reynal-Querol (2011) who find that democracies select more educated leaders, one could wonder whether specific political characteristics are favorable to the selection of a foreign-educated leader in autocratic countries. Autocratic countries that are on a path of democratization could notably tend to select return migrants as leaders, and such reverse causality could drive the benchmark results displayed in Table 2. We investigate in Table 3 the determinants of the dummy indicating whether the leader studied abroad, both over the whole sample and in initially autocratic settings. We include as explanatory factors the growth rate and level of the GDP per capita, the emigration rate, the size of the population and the normalized number of students abroad, all these variables being averaged over the tenure of the previous leader. We also introduce successively the average level of the Polity score during the predecessor’s tenure, and the change observed in the Polity score during the predecessor’s tenure. These two variables aim at capturing whether the arrival in power of a foreign-educated leader is predicted, respectively, by the level of democracy and by the change in democracy observed prior to his arrival. Finally, we control for the gender, education and profession of the leader and for year dummies. The dependent variable being a dummy, Table 3 both displays the results of a Probit specification, which properly accounts for the dichotomous nature of the dependent variable (Columns (1) to (4)), and of a LPM with country fixed effects (Columns (5) to (8)). Since the benchmark results put forward an heterogeneity of the correlation between democratization and foreign-educated leaders that depends on the initial level of democracy, the estimations are ran successively over the whole 13

ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT sample and over the sample of leaders who reach power in an autocracy.21 Appendix 8.2 displays the same specifications with the dummy indicating whether the leader migrated in a diplomatic frame as dependent variable.

(1)

(2)

(3)

(4)

(5)

(6) (7) (8) LPM with country FE Whole sample Initially autocratic

Probit

0.0255* (0.0138) -5.48e-07 (2.16e-05) -0.000172** (8.15e-05) 0.261 (0.917) -0.237 (0.890) -6.05e-05 (0.00783)

Yes 359 0.318

Yes 359 0.318

98

98

0.0248* (0.0142) -1.49e-06 (2.17e-05) -0.000180** (8.41e-05) 0.257 (0.936) -0.248 (0.903)

0.131 (0.0814) 9.50e-05 (0.000120) 0.000880* (0.000446) 17.12** (7.981) -2.335 (1.927) -0.0249 (0.0327)

-0.00293 (0.00574)

0.160 (0.102) 7.30e-05 (0.000145) 0.00122*** (0.000452) 17.32** (7.997) -2.140 (2.016)

0.0100 (0.0215)

Yes Yes Yes

Yes Yes Yes

Yes Yes Yes

Yes Yes Yes

Yes Yes Yes

Yes Yes Yes

Yes 86 0.508

Yes 86 0.491

Yes 378 0.463

Yes 378 0.464

Yes 129 0.874

Yes 129 0.873

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Whole sample Initially autocratic Control variables measured during the predecessor’s tenure: GDP pc 0.121* 0.111* 0.341* 0.281 growth (0.0689) (0.0654) (0.200) (0.198) GDP pc -0.000156*** -0.000151*** 0.000311 0.000360 (4.16e-05) (3.93e-05) (0.000253) (0.000232) Population -0.000197*** -0.000198*** -0.00483** -0.00408** (5.62e-05) (5.64e-05) (0.00210) (0.00195) Emig -2.537 -2.531 10.47* 10.21* (1.602) (1.603) (6.080) (6.200) Students 2.008 1.959 -8.385** -7.617* abroad (1.431) (1.432) (4.103) (4.020) Polity score 0.00915 -0.0919 (0.0169) (0.0560) Delta Polity -0.00854 0.0262 (0.0218) (0.0484)

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Table 3: What drives the arrival in power of a foreign-educated leader?

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Robust standard errors (clustered at the country level in Columns (5) to (8)) in parentheses. ***p<0.01, **p<0.05, *p<0.1. GDP pc growth, GDP pc, Emig, Population and Students abroad are averaged over the tenure. Profession dummies refer to: Law, Economics, Health, Military, Business, Administration, Academics, Worker, Scientist and Religious.

The results suggest that foreign-educated leaders reach power in countries with a slightly significantly higher rate of per capita GDP growth, and relatively poorer (as far as the whole sample is concerned). Moreover, in the initially autocratic sample, leaders who studied abroad tend to reach power in countries with higher emigration rates but smaller numbers of students abroad. Conditional on leader-level controls (gender, education and occupation), the arrival in power of a foreign-educated leader is not significantly correlated with the prevailing level of democracy, nor with the evolution of democracy prior to his arrival. This suggests that the prevailing political context does not significantly determine the probability of arrival in power of a foreign-educated 21 The number of observations is smaller in Table 3 as compared to the benchmark estimations, because the righthand side variables are both related to the current leader and to the previous tenure. Among the 467 points of the benchmark sample, we lose those for which information (GDP per capita level or growth, population, emigration rate or students abroad) during the predecessor’s tenure is missing. As far as the whole sample is concerned, this concerns 89 observations in the case of the LPM, and 19 more in the case of the Probit specification (which is due to the presence of the year dummies: only leaders who had not studied abroad reached power in 1961, 1962, 1973, 1977 and 1987, so they are not used in the Probit specification).

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leader. This is also true when focusing on initially autocratic settings. Symmetrically, Appendix 8.2 suggests that there is no specific political condition that predicts the arrival in power of a leader who migrated for diplomatic reasons. These results provide suggestive evidence that specific prearrival-in-power political circumstances are not driving the benchmark results. Additionally, we display a falsification test in Appendix 8.3. We re-iterate the benchmark specifications using as dependent variable the change in the Polity score observed during the previous leader’s tenure (Delta Polity - Predecessor ). If the effect that is at play goes from foreign-educated leaders (or from leaders coming back from diplomatic migration) to democracy, we should not observe any significant correlation between Mig - Study and the evolution of democracy during the predecessor’s tenure. While the correlation between Initially Autocratic and the change in democracy during the predecessor’s tenure is (expectedly) significantly negative, the coefficients associated with foreign studies, migration for diplomatic or military reasons, and exile, are never significant, neither in initially democratic nor in initially autocratic settings. Consistently with Table 3 and Appendix 8.2, this result does not support the reverse causality hypothesis.

Confounding mechanisms

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The benchmark results suggest that foreign-educated leaders, as well as leaders with an experience of migration for diplomatic reasons, who reach power in autocracies are associated with larger subsequent changes in the Polity score. These correlations could reveal a positive effect of foreign studies (and diplomatic migration) on the propensity to democratize, but they could also be driven by various potential confounding mechanisms. Following-up on the possible reverse causality, one could imagine that the benchmark correlations are driven by future leaders who come back from migration when their country starts democratizing. For instance, if emigration is triggered by dissatisfaction with respect to the home country’s leadership, return migration may immediately follow the first improvements of the political situation at home. We re-iterate the most demanding benchmark specification (Column (6) of Table 2) additionally controlling for the average Polity score during the previous leader’s tenure, Polity score - Predecessor, in Column (1) of Table 4. This introduces an asymmetry in the measure of the past level of democracy, since the predecessor’s average Polity score is calculated over varying time spans depending on the number of years he spent in power. Alternatively, to capture the expectations of democratization by an emigrant soon-to-be leader, we replace the average level of democracy during the predecessor’s tenure by the average Polity score during the five years preceding the arrival in power in Column (2), and by the change in the score of democracy recorded over the same period in Column (3). The results of these three specifications are consistent with the benchmark, the coefficient for Initially Autocratic x Mig - Study remaining very stable both in size and significance. On the other hand, the coefficient for Initially Autocratic x Mig - Diplomacy becomes smaller, and its statistical significance weakens. A second potentially important mechanism omitted in the benchmark specification is related to time-varying shocks at the regional level, which could affect simultaneously the pattern of democratization in entire regions of the world and the likelihood that the leader is a return migrant. To isolate our coefficients of interest from such shocks, we introduce a set of interactions between regional dummies and time trends. Thirteen regional dummies22 are interacted with dummies for 22 Namely, Central America and the Caribbeans, Southern America, Europe, Northern Africa, Western Africa, Central Africa, Eastern Africa, Southern Africa, Middle East, Central Asia, Southern Asia, Eastern Asia and SouthEastern Asia

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5-year periods. Column (4) of Table 4 displays the results when these regional time trends are introduced in the benchmark specification, while Column (5) additionally controls for Political score - Predecessor to account simultaneously for national political trends before the arrival in power of the leader.23 In both cases, the coefficient associated with Initially autocratic x Mig - Study (and, to a lesser extent, the coefficient associated with Initially autocratic x Mig - Diplomacy), remains stable and significant. A third source of potential endogeneity lies in the individual selection into migration. Migration is not random, and an important strand of the literature – both theoretical and empirical – emphasizes different mechanisms of self-selection in the processes of migration and of return. The positive correlation between foreign-educated leaders (and leaders with a diplomatic migration experience) and the change in democracy could be biased by selection. Individuals who decide to study abroad or who migrate in the frame of diplomatic missions may indeed have specific characteristics that simultaneously make them more prone to migrate and to be democrat, and that would also have made them more prone to be democrat had they not migrated. Such characteristics are potentially important omitted variables in our setting. It is not feasible to control for all, many of them being unobservable or difficult to measure (e.g. open-mindedness, ex-ante taste for democracy, etc.). To try to mitigate the selection bias, we display two simple empirical exercises attempting to isolate the migration decision – which may be correlated with individual characteristics also affecting the taste for democracy – and the impact of the migration experience. First, we control for twelve dummy variables reflecting the occupation of the leader’s father.24 They aim at capturing the leader’s unobserved characteristics that are inherited from his family, and that may determine simultaneously his likelihood to be a return migrant and his taste for democracy. Results are displayed in Column (6) of Table 4. The coefficient associated with Initially autocratic x Mig - Study remains stable when controlling for the father’s occupation. The coefficient associated with Initially autocratic x Mig - Diplomacy also remains statistically significant, although to a lesser extent as compared to the benchmark specification. In Column (7), we additionally control for the average level of democracy during the predecessor’s tenure (Polity score - Predecessor ), and in Column (8) for the regional time trends. This does not affect the results.25 Second, to go further in the investigation of the selection issue, Columns (9), (10) and (11) re-iterate the same three specifications as Columns (6), (7) and (8) but excluding from the sample leaders who migrated for studies after the age of 15. Arguably, leaders who migrated for studies before 15 did not decide it themselves, but rather followed their parents’ decision. Focusing on them, while still controlling for the father’s profession, should thus allow to limit the influence of the individual characteristics affecting migration decision on our estimation of the coefficient associated with studies abroad, and as such to mitigate the selection-into-migration issue. Of course, this test is not possible for migration for diplomatic reasons. The coefficient for Mig - Study x Initially autocratic remains significantly positive. However we should be cautious regarding its interpretation since it is estimated over few observations.26 23 Replacing Polity score - Predecessor by Polity score - 5 years or Delta Polity - 5 years does not affect the results. Results not shown for brevity, available upon request. 24 The occupational categories are the same as those used for the leaders, plus an eleventh category for fathers who were politicians and a twelfth category for fathers whose occupation is unknown. 25 Note that the results also remain stable if we replace Polity score - Predecessor by Polity score - 5 years or Delta Polity - 5 years. Results available upon request. 26 Again, results remain stable if we replace Polity score - Predecessor by Polity score - 5 years or Delta Polity - 5 years. Results available upon request.

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Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No 437 0.629 107

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No 437 0.630 107

Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes No 437 0.525 107

Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes No 437 0.525 107

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No 437 0.679 107

Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes 252 0.674 86

1.372 (2.464) -0.0249 (2.331) 12.23** (4.884) 1.104 (1.528) 2.444 (2.460) -0.634 (1.681) 0.507 (1.769) -0.353 (1.771) -0.276 (2.239) 0.104 (0.131)

(10)

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Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes 252 0.671 86

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(8) (9) Selection into migration -0.739 1.840 (1.835) (2.163) -0.789 -0.0683 (0.629) (2.326) 3.005** 12.41** (1.270) (4.788) -0.246 1.181 (0.726) (1.542) -1.395 1.850 (1.462) (2.292) -1.722 -0.685 (1.233) (1.753) 2.861* 0.895 (1.609) (1.799) -1.473 -0.818 (1.729) (1.777) -0.230 -0.0336 (1.414) (2.256) -0.0331 (0.0834)

SC

-0.488 (1.291) -0.0790 (0.531) 2.533** (1.187) 0.628 (0.662) -1.014 (1.110) -1.926 (1.166) 2.800* (1.515) -0.964 (1.185) 1.225 (1.237) 0.0107 (0.0723)

(7)

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-0.453 (1.232) -0.0890 (0.528) 2.538** (1.190) 0.622 (0.659) -1.035 (1.102) -1.921 (1.164) 2.816* (1.530) -0.987 (1.208) 1.242 (1.238)

(6)

MA

(4) (5) Regional trends -0.723 -0.500 (1.948) (2.132) -0.665 -0.714 (0.597) (0.585) 3.184** 3.168** (1.289) (1.287) -0.468 -0.521 (0.784) (0.794) -2.064 -2.245 (1.503) (1.647) -1.413 -1.400 (1.354) (1.374) 3.354* 3.413* (1.838) (1.848) -0.763 -0.858 (1.734) (1.622) 0.183 0.180 (1.391) (1.386) -0.0486 (0.0917)

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(1) (2) (3) Political trend before the arrival in power -0.624 0.421 0.303 (1.526) (1.527) (1.543) -0.209 -0.299 -0.327 (0.514) (0.546) (0.556) 2.734** 2.758** 2.807** (1.181) (1.267) (1.309) 0.417 0.650 0.696 (0.702) (0.642) (0.624) -1.017 -1.091 -1.038 (1.159) (1.158) (1.179) -1.786 -1.555 -1.531 (1.223) (1.227) (1.222) 3.356** 2.590* 2.537* (1.589) (1.529) (1.512) -1.143 -1.128 -1.026 (1.151) (1.209) (1.190) 1.433 1.532 1.408 (1.231) (1.179) (1.174) 0.000989 (0.0790) -0.0516 (0.0679) -0.0640 (0.0669) Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No No No No No No No 437 428 423 0.479 0.493 0.495 107 107 105

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes 252 0.914 86

0.848 (3.522) -0.628 (2.681) 20.57*** (6.420) 2.169* (1.286) -0.818 (3.258) -1.809 (1.742) 1.508 (2.632) 1.361 (2.465) -1.379 (3.029) 0.156 (0.161)

(11)

LPM with country fixed effects. Robust standard errors clustered at the country level in parentheses. ***p<0.01, **p<0.05, *p<0.1. Initially autocratic is a dummy equal to one if the Polity score the year of arrival in power of the leader was smaller or equal to zero. Leader-level controls refer to: Tenure duration (in years), Woman, High education (dummy equal to one if the leader had a master’s degree or equivalent before reaching power). Country-level controls refer to: Initial Polity score, Delta Polity - Predecessor, GDP pc growth, GDP pc, Emig, Population and Students abroad (normalized by population). GDP pc growth, GDP pc, Emig, Population and Students abroad are averaged over the tenure. Profession dummies refer to: Law, Economics, Health, Military, Business, Administration, Academics, Worker, Scientist and Religious. Regional trends refer to the set of interactions between 5-year period dummies and region dummies. Father’s profession dummies refer to: Law, Economics, Health, Military, Business, Administration, Academics, Worker, Scientist, Religious, Politician, and Unknown profession. Columns (9), (10) and (11) restrict the sample of foreign-educated leaders to those who migrated for their studies before the age of 15.

Leader-level controls Country-level controls Profession dummies Country & year dummies Regional trends Father’s profession dummies Studies abroad before 15 Observations R-squared Number of countries

Delta Polity - 5 years

Polity score - 5 years

Initially autocratic x Mig - Military Polity score - Predecessor

Initially autocratic x Mig - Diplomacy Mig - Military

Initially autocratic x Mig - Exile Mig - Diplomacy

Initially autocratic x Mig - Study Mig - Exile

Mig - Study

Initially autocratic

Dependent: Delta Polity

Table 4: Robustness tests.

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18

Initially autocratic x Mig - Military Family link

Initially autocratic x Mig - Diplomacy Mig - Military

Initially autocratic x Mig - Exile Mig - Diplomacy

(13)

Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No 437 0.484 107

-0.693 (1.414) -0.203 (0.510) 2.769** (1.188) 0.493 (0.698) -1.066 (1.148) -1.858 (1.185) 3.280** (1.552) -1.072 (1.170) 1.306 (1.235) -0.864 (0.605)

0.0115 (0.0773) Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No 437 0.484 107

-0.735 (1.501) -0.196 (0.509) 2.768** (1.190) 0.497 (0.699) -1.046 (1.168) -1.861 (1.185) 3.263** (1.534) -1.049 (1.139) 1.289 (1.221) -0.877 (0.603)

-0.0400 (0.0906) Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No 437 0.631 107

-0.0368 (0.0821) Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No 437 0.679 107

D

(15) -0.672 (1.797) -0.778 (0.631) 3.005** (1.269) -0.276 (0.730) -1.381 (1.468) -1.700 (1.248) 2.848* (1.622) -1.517 (1.757) -0.213 (1.413) 0.311 (0.689)

TE

(14) Family link -0.609 (2.089) -0.714 (0.585) 3.184** (1.298) -0.435 (0.820) -2.281 (1.668) -1.446 (1.365) 3.400* (1.825) -0.802 (1.636) 0.143 (1.405) -0.527 (0.530)

0.237 (0.161) Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes 252 0.921 86

Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No 437 0.480 107

0.592 (1.351)

(21)

0.156 (0.161) Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes 252 0.914 86

0.848 (3.522) -0.628 (2.681) 20.57*** (6.420) 2.169* (1.286) -0.818 (3.258) -1.809 (1.742) 1.508 (2.632) 1.361 (2.465) -1.379 (3.029)

PT

-0.742 (2.243) -0.0317 (0.0830) Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No 437 0.679 107

RI

SC

0.591 (1.351) 0.000878 (0.0791) Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No 437 0.480 107

0.0344 (2.092) -0.0487 (0.0916) Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No 437 0.630 107

(19) (20) Foreign imposition -0.656 -0.502 -0.683 (1.550) (2.134) (1.839) -0.207 -0.714 -0.787 (0.514) (0.586) (0.631) 2.741** 3.167** 3.025** (1.189) (1.290) (1.263) 0.388 -0.522 -0.220 (0.717) (0.823) (0.754) -1.038 -2.247 -1.337 (1.142) (1.631) (1.453) -1.784 -1.400 -1.723 (1.223) (1.378) (1.234) 3.357** 3.415* 2.825* (1.592) (1.850) (1.602) -1.154 -0.858 -1.483 (1.152) (1.627) (1.724) 1.456 0.181 -0.239 (1.234) (1.388) (1.418)

(18)

NU

(17) -0.653 (1.462) -0.208 (0.517) 2.741** (1.190) 0.388 (0.714) -1.040 (1.117) -1.784 (1.219) 3.358** (1.603) -1.155 (1.188) 1.457 (1.245)

MA

0.182 (3.289) -2.416 (2.899) 23.41*** (6.436) 4.506** (1.888) -3.960 (3.449) -1.982 (1.775) 1.055 (2.566) 4.454 (3.160) -5.654 (4.240) -3.692* (2.158)

(16)

LPM with country fixed effects. Robust standard errors clustered at the country level in parentheses. ***p<0.01, **p<0.05, *p<0.1. Initially autocratic is a dummy equal to one if the Polity score the year of arrival in power of the leader was smaller or equal to zero. Leader-level controls refer to: Tenure duration (in years), Woman, High education (dummy equal to one if the leader had a master’s degree or equivalent before reaching power). Country-level controls refer to: Initial Polity score, Delta Polity - Predecessor, GDP pc growth, GDP pc, Emig, Population and Students abroad (normalized by population). GDP pc growth, GDP pc, Emig, Population and Students abroad are averaged over the tenure. Profession dummies refer to: Law, Economics, Health, Military, Business, Administration, Academics, Worker, Scientist and Religious. Regional trends refer to the set of interactions between 5-year period dummies and region dummies. Father’s profession dummies refer to: Law, Economics, Health, Military, Business, Administration, Academics, Worker, Scientist, Religious, Politician, and Unknown profession. Columns (16) and (21) restrict the sample of foreign-educated leaders to those who migrated for their studies before the age of 15.

Leader-level controls Country-level controls Profession dummies Country & year dummies Regional trends Father’s prof. dummies Studies abroad before 15 Observations R-squared Number of countries

Polity score - Predecessor

Foreign imposition

(12)

AC CE P

Initially autocratic x Mig - Study Mig - Exile

Mig - Study

Dependent: Delta Polity Initially autocratic

Table 4: Robustness tests (continued).

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The second part of Table 4 tackles two other mechanisms that could bias the benchmark results. The first one concerns dynastic political systems. In a country where nepotism is widespread, it is plausible that individuals who have access to the political networks make their migration decisions while they already know that they have a high probability to reach power. We introduce in Column (12) of Table 4 a dummy equaling one if the leader has a familial link with one of the previous leaders of the country (this is the case of nearly 17.5% of the benchmark sample). Family link appears to be negatively but non significantly associated with the change in democracy, while the results regarding studies abroad remain very stable. This stays true when we control for the average level of democracy during the predecessor’s tenure, regional time trends, and familial capital proxied by the profession of the father (Columns (13), (14) and (15)), and if we focus on studies abroad initiated at young ages (Column (16)).27 One could also think about the geopolitical relationships between countries as a potential omitted variable. Around 1.5% of the leaders of the benchmark sample reached power thanks to external countries. In those cases, it is probable that among the potential leaders to be chosen, the foreign country will prefer the candidate who studied on its soil or visited as a diplomat. We introduce in Column (17) of Table 4 a dummy variable which equals one if the leader has been imposed by a foreign country (variable taken from Archigos (Goemans, Gleditsch, and Chiozza, 2009)). The result on studies abroad remains stable, while the coefficient associated with Foreign imposition is not significant. This stays true if we additionally control for the average level of democracy during the predecessor’s tenure (Column (18)), regional time trends (Column (19)) and father’s profession (Column (20)), and if we focus on studies abroad before 15 (Column (21))28 . Regarding migration for diplomatic reasons, the introduction of Family link and Foreign imposition does not affect the results either, while, as already noticed, the statistical significance of the coefficient for Initially autocratic x Mig - Diplomacy weakens when the regional time trends and father’s profession are accounted for. As a last robustness check, Appendix 8.4 considers alternative measures of democracy. While Column (1) re-iterates the benchmark estimation of Column (6) of Table 2, Columns (2) and (3) display the same specification over two different dependent variables: the change in the indexes of Civil Liberties and of Political Rights (provided by Freedom House) over the tenure. As compared to the Polity score, which is based on institutional criterion and thus provides a de jure measure of institutional quality,29 Civil Liberties and Political Rights are more de facto indicators, built from public perception measures (Docquier et al., 2016). The index of Civil Liberties is based on questions related to freedom of expression and beliefs, association and organization rights, rule of law and personal autonomy, and individual rights. The Political Rights index gathers survey questions on electoral processes, political pluralism and participation, and on the functioning of the government. Both indexes range from 0 to 7, a higher score indicating less freedom. Finally, Columns (4) to (6) use as dependent variables the average during the tenure, rather than the change during the tenure, of the three indicators of democracy. The results of the different specifications are very consistent with the benchmark estimates regarding studies abroad. Foreign-educated leaders 27 Replacing Polity score - Predecessor by Polity score - 5 years or Delta Polity - 5 years does not affect the results (available upon request). 28 Replacing Polity score - Predecessor by Polity score - 5 years or Delta Polity - 5 years does not affect the results (available upon request). 29 Specifically, the Polity score accounts for the competitiveness and regulation of political participation, openness and competitiveness of executive recruitment, and constraints on the chief executive. Each of this component is graded based on legal documents.

19

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The characteristics of studies abroad Destination

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6.1

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6

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are associated with a more rapid democratization when it is measured by the Polity score or by the index of Political Rights. However, this is not the case when the index of Civil Liberties is used, which could suggest that the correlation between the evolution of democracy and foreign studies mainly stems through institutional reforms. On the other hand, when considered in level, all three indicators are positively correlated with foreign-educated leaders in initially autocratic settings.30 Finally, the correlation between Initially Autocratic x Mig - Diplomacy and the change in democracy turns out to be less robust to the use of these alternative measures of democracy.

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We follow Spilimbergo (2009) and question whether foreign education is differently correlated to the change in democracy depending on the country where it was acquired. We simply split the sample of foreign-educated leaders between those who studied in a high-income OECD country and the others. Results are displayed in Column (1) of Table 5. The coefficient associated with the interaction between studies abroad and Initially autocratic turns out to be positive and very significant as far as migration toward high-income OECD countries is concerned, while foreign studies in other destinations are not significantly correlated with the change in democracy. Although the distinction between high-income OECD countries and other countries is crude, it thus appears that the country where foreign education is acquired matters regarding the correlation between studies abroad and democratization. To check the robustness of this result to the previously investigated confounding mechanisms, we successively introduce in Columns (2) to (6) the average score of democracy during the predecessor’s tenure,31 the regional time trends, the dummies for the father’s profession, and the dummies Family link and Foreign imposition. Finally, Column (7) re-iterates the specification of Column (4) restricting the sample of foreign-educated leaders to those who migrated for their studies before the age of 15. Unfortunately, there is no tenure of leaders who migrated for their studies in non-high income OECD countries before the age of 15, and subsequently reached power in an initially autocratic country, which makes it impossible to check the robustness of the heterogeneity of the effect of Mig - Study across destinations to this test. In all other cases, the coefficient associated with Initially autocratic x Mig - Study, high-income OECD proves to be very stable. The correlation between foreign education and the change in democracy is driven by leaders who studied in high-income OECD countries, a result which is consistent with the idea that foreign education has a positive impact on leaders’ propensity to democratize.32 Two different mechanisms, potentially simultaneously at play, may be at the root of this phenomenon: the quality of education and a “preference shock”. First, leaders who studied abroad may have benefited from higher quality training and developed higher skills. As shown by Besley, Montalvo, and Reynal-Querol (2011), better educated leaders are associated with more rapid economic growth. Symmetrically, one could 30

Note that, in these estimations, we consider either the Polity score (Columns (1) and (4)), the index of Civil Liberties (Columns (2) and (5)) or the index of Political Rights (Columns (3) and (6)) to recompute the Initially autocratic dummy. 31 Replacing Polity score - Predecessor by Polity score - 5 years or Delta Polity - 5 years yields similar results. 32 Note that this result is robust to further splitting the control variable Emig between emigration rates in highincome OECD countries and in non-high-income OECD countries, and the control variable Students abroad between democratic and non-democratic destination countries (data from Spilimbergo (2009)). Results available upon request.

20

ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT Table 5: The destination of studies abroad.

Initially Autocratic x Mig - Exile Mig - Diplomacy Initially Autocratic x Mig - Diplomacy Mig - Military Initially Autocratic x Mig - Military

D

Polity score - Predecessor

Foreign imposition

AC CE P

Leader-level controls Country-level controls Profession dummies Country & year dummies Regional trends Father’s profession dummies Studies abroad before 15 Observations R-squared Number of countries

TE

Family link

Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No 437 0.485 107

Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No 437 0.485 107

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No 437 0.633 107

(5) -0.720 (1.788) -0.653 (0.659) 3.368** (1.381) -1.381 (1.239) 2.723 (1.724) -0.339 (0.747) -1.424 (1.489) -1.666 (1.247) 2.765* (1.608) -1.639 (1.773) -0.171 (1.395) -0.0360 (0.0818) 0.350 (0.693)

PT

(4) -0.794 (1.821) -0.672 (0.654) 3.368** (1.385) -1.337 (1.266) 2.677 (1.715) -0.297 (0.744) -1.448 (1.482) -1.690 (1.232) 2.786* (1.595) -1.587 (1.747) -0.187 (1.402) -0.0319 (0.0829)

RI

Initially autocratic x Mig - Study, other countries Mig - Exile

(3) -0.566 (2.116) -0.664 (0.599) 3.844*** (1.411) -0.455 (1.014) 1.558 (1.626) -0.452 (0.812) -2.532 (1.700) -1.359 (1.364) 3.429* (1.824) -1.041 (1.668) 0.348 (1.367) -0.0490 (0.0905)

SC

Initially autocratic x Mig - Study, high-income OECD Mig - Study, other countries

(2) -0.708 (1.513) -0.243 (0.509) 3.463*** (1.306) 1.011 (1.071) 0.349 (1.478) 0.522 (0.699) -1.298 (1.181) -1.731 (1.212) 3.270** (1.568) -1.474 (1.195) 1.689 (1.194) -0.00500 (0.0778)

NU

Mig - Study, high-income OECD

(1) -0.726 (1.433) -0.240 (0.512) 3.460*** (1.314) 1.011 (1.072) 0.355 (1.463) 0.523 (0.695) -1.288 (1.148) -1.732 (1.205) 3.264** (1.576) -1.463 (1.237) 1.681 (1.209)

MA

Dependent: Delta Polity Initially autocratic

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No 437 0.680 107

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No 437 0.680 107

(6) -0.730 (1.824) -0.671 (0.657) 3.424** (1.384) -1.294 (1.284) 2.598 (1.729) -0.260 (0.784) -1.399 (1.489) -1.689 (1.232) 2.743* (1.585) -1.605 (1.743) -0.187 (1.404) -0.0302 (0.0826)

-0.889 (2.324) Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No 437 0.680 107

(7) 0.848 (3.522) -0.628 (2.681) 20.57*** (6.420)

2.169* (1.286) -0.818 (3.258) -1.809 (1.742) 1.508 (2.632) 1.361 (2.465) -1.379 (3.029) 0.156 (0.161)

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes 252 0.914 86

LPM with country fixed effects. Robust standard errors clustered at the country level in parentheses. ***p<0.01, **p<0.05, *p<0.1. Initially autocratic is a dummy equal to one if the Polity score the year of arrival in power of the leader was smaller or equal to zero. Leader-level controls refer to: Tenure duration (in years), Woman, High education (dummy equal to one if the leader had a master’s degree or equivalent before reaching power). Country-level controls refer to: Initial Polity score, Delta Polity - Predecessor, GDP pc growth, GDP pc, Emig, Population and Students abroad (normalized by population). GDP pc growth, GDP pc, Emig, Population and Students abroad are averaged over the tenure. Profession dummies refer to: Law, Economics, Health, Military, Business, Administration, Academics, Worker, Scientist and Religious. Regional trends refer to the set of interactions between 5-year period dummies and region dummies. Father’s profession dummies refer to: Law, Economics, Health, Military, Business, Administration, Academics, Worker, Scientist, Religious, Politician, and Unknown profession. Column (7) restricts the sample of foreign-educated leaders to those who migrated for their studies before the age of 15.

21

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imagine that better educated leaders are more prone to democracy. If, on average, foreign studies are characterized by a higher quality than local education, their positive correlation with the change in democracy could reflect the fact that future leaders who study abroad reach a higher level of skills. Second, while studying in a foreign country, future leaders may experience a “preference shock” that makes them become more favorable to democracy. This interpretation is in line with the recent developments of the literature on migration and politics at home presented in Section 2.2, according to which the experience of migration triggers transfers of political norms. The “preference shock” channel suggests that future leaders, while studying abroad, develop a higher preference for democracy which makes them more likely to launch democratic reforms once they reach power. Unfortunately, the data at hand do not allow us to disentangle the effect of migration per se (“preference shock”) from the potential better quality of education in high-income OECD countries.

Duration

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Aside from the destination, the correlation between the leader’s studies abroad and democratization is likely to depend on the time spent abroad. In particular, if a transfer of norms from the host society to the migrant is at play, the time spent in the host society might influence it. Unfortunately, as specified in Section 3.2, the variable that measures the duration of migration suffers from a high rate of missing observations. Exploiting directly the duration of studies abroad would thus imply dropping a certain number of observations and plausibly introduce a selection bias, given that it is likely that the migration experiences which duration is not available have specific characteristics as compared to the migration experiences for which all the information exists. To circumvent this issue, we distinguish in Table 6 studies abroad of unknown duration, studies abroad that lasted less than two years, and studies abroad that lasted more than two years. This allows us to keep all the observations in the sample. This table has the same format as Table 5: Column (1) re-iterates the benchmark specification, Columns (2) to (6) successively add as controls the predecessor’s Polity score,33 regional time trends, father’s profession, Family link and Foreign imposition, and Column (7) runs the test on studies abroad initiated before the age of 15. It turns out that the coefficient associated with Initially autocratic x Mig - Study, more than two years is significant in all specifications, and larger than in the benchmark estimations, while Initially autocratic x Mig - Study, less than two years is never significant, and the level of statistical significance of Initially autocratic x Mig - Study, unknown duration is generally around 10%. Although weakened by the “black box” that the Unknown duration category represents, these results suggest that the longer the stay abroad, the stronger the correlation between the leader’s studies abroad and democratization (in initially autocratic countries).

7

Conclusion

This paper presents original data on the characteristics of the political leaders of the developing world over the 1960 – 2004 period, notably documenting their migration history. Thanks to these new data, we put forward a correlation between the fact that the leader studied abroad and the increase of the level of democracy in initially autocratic settings, where leaders presumably face a broader room for manoeuvre as well as a larger window of improvement. More precisely, the results suggest that tenures of leaders who studied abroad before reaching power in an autocratic 33

Replacing Polity score - Predecessor by Polity score - 5 years or Delta Polity - 5 years yields similar results.

22

ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT Table 6: The duration of studies abroad.

Initially autocratic x Mig - Study, more than two years Mig - Exile Initially Autocratic x Mig - Exile Mig - Diplomacy Initially Autocratic x Mig - Diplomacy Mig - Military Initially Autocratic x Mig - Military

D

Polity score - Pedecessor

Foreign imposition

AC CE P

Leader-level controls Country-level controls Profession dummies Country & year dummies Regional trends Father’s profession dummies Studies abroad before 15 Observations R-squared Number of countries

TE

Family link

Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No 437 0.482 107

Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No 437 0.482 107

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No 437 0.635 107

(5) -0.937 (1.878) -0.717 (0.648) 2.191♯ (1.332) -0.816 (1.078) 2.076 (2.821) -0.909 (0.837) 5.076** (1.970) -0.232 (0.778) -1.484 (1.635) -1.837 (1.397) 3.118* (1.673) -1.423 (1.790) -0.0871 (1.320) -0.0265 (0.0828) 0.360 (0.717)

PT

(4) -1.018 (1.914) -0.750 (0.634) 2.224♯ (1.351) -0.788 (1.104) 1.974 (2.750) -0.917 (0.839) 5.049** (1.983) -0.190 (0.768) -1.511 (1.619) -1.852 (1.387) 3.125* (1.664) -1.364 (1.754) -0.116 (1.325) -0.0227 (0.0840)

RI

Initially autocratic x Mig - Study, less than two years Mig - Study, more than two years

(3) -0.755 (2.202) -0.631 (0.594) 2.324♮ (1.426) -0.646 (0.873) 2.392 (3.031) -1.008 (0.920) 5.180*** (1.833) -0.479 (0.828) -2.276 (1.764) -1.560 (1.513) 3.696* (1.906) -0.813 (1.611) 0.302 (1.323) -0.0365 (0.0924)

SC

Initially autocratic x Mig - Study, unknown duration Mig - Study, less than two years

(2) -0.645 (1.533) -0.152 (0.601) 2.246‡ (1.394) -0.316 (0.612) 1.725 (1.680) -0.321 (0.775) 3.800*** (1.427) 0.417 (0.744) -1.191 (1.263) -1.848 (1.293) 3.387** (1.618) -1.177 (1.111) 1.517 (1.200) 0.000689 (0.0793)

NU

Mig - Study, unknown duration

(1) -0.642 (1.460) -0.153 (0.596) 2.247† (1.397) -0.316 (0.611) 1.723 (1.631) -0.321 (0.774) 3.800*** (1.422) 0.417 (0.742) -1.192 (1.232) -1.847 (1.285) 3.388** (1.630) -1.179 (1.142) 1.518 (1.210)

MA

Dependent: Delta Polity Initially autocratic

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No 437 0.683 107

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No 437 0.684 107

(6) -0.993 (1.904) -0.749 (0.634) 2.244* (1.330) -0.785 (1.107) 1.977 (2.754) -0.919 (0.843) 5.033** (1.961) -0.180 (0.799) -1.492 (1.578) -1.852 (1.389) 3.110* (1.653) -1.368 (1.754) -0.121 (1.328) -0.0223 (0.0837)

-0.261 (2.265) Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No 437 0.683 107

(7) 0.987 (3.817) -0.0564 (5.579) 19.60*** (6.206)

-1.186 (4.150) 22.07** (10.40) 2.168 (1.354) -1.184 (3.850) -1.879 (1.800) 1.609 (2.742) 1.461 (2.642) -1.465 (3.066) 0.146 (0.188)

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes 252 0.914 86

LPM with country fixed effects. Robust standard errors in parentheses, clustered at the country level. ***p<0.01, **p<0.05, *p<0.1. † p=0.111. ‡ p=0.110. ♮ p=0.106. ♯ p=0.103. Initially autocratic is a dummy equal to one if the Polity score the year of arrival in power of the leader was smaller or equal to zero. Leader-level controls refer to: Tenure duration (in years), Woman, High education (dummy equal to one if the leader had a master’s degree or equivalent before reaching power). Country-level controls refer to: Initial Polity score, Delta Polity - Predecessor, GDP pc growth, GDP pc, Emig, Population and Students abroad (normalized by population). GDP pc growth, GDP pc, Emig, Population and Students abroad are averaged over the tenure. Profession dummies refer to: Law, Economics, Health, Military, Business, Administration, Academics, Worker, Scientist and Religious. Regional trends refer to the set of interactions between 5-year period dummies and region dummies. Father’s profession dummies refer to: Law, Economics, Health, Military, Business, Administration, Academics, Worker, Scientist, Religious, Politician, and Unknown profession. Column (7) restricts the sample of foreign-educated leaders to those who migrated for their studies before the age of 15.

country are characterized by an increase of the Polity score around 2.5 points higher on average. The correlation between foreign-educated leaders and the improvement of the quality of political institutions is robust to a range of robustness checks, related to the risks of reverse causality (if specific political trends determine the arrival in power of return migrants) and of omitted variables 23

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(if third factors, such as regional shocks or individual selection into migration, simultaneously affect the propensity that the leader is a returnee and the pace of democratization). It also turns out to be driven by studies in high-income OECD countries, and of relatively long duration. In light of the previous literature establishing a causative effect of leaders on economic and institutional outcomes, the facts described in this paper suggest a new dimension that may shape leaders’ propensity to democratize and, subsequently, the evolution of democracy in their country. We suggest two mechanisms that could be at the origin of this correlation between foreign studies and the evolution of democracy: a “preference shock” experienced by future leaders while studying abroad, which would be in line with the literature on the destination-specific transfers of political norms that migration triggers, and an effect of the quality of foreign education. Whether one or both of them are indeed at play in the main result of this paper remains an open question.

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NU

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MA

Barsbai, T., H. Rapoport, A. Steinmayr, and C. Trebesch. 2016. “The Effect of Labor Migration on the Diffusion of Democracy: Evidence from a Former Soviet Republic.” The Kiel Institute for the World Economy Mimeo .

D

Batista, C. and P.C. Vicente. 2011. “Do migrants improve governance at home? Evidence from a voting experiment.” The World Bank Economic Review 25 (1):77–104.

TE

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Tech. rep.,

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Countries in the sample

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Lebanon Lesotho Liberia Lithuania Macedonia Madagascar Malawi Malaysia Mali Mauritania Mauritius Mexico Moldova Mongolia Morocco Mozambique Namibia Nepal Nicaragua Niger Nigeria Oman Pakistan Panama Papua New Guinea Paraguay Peru

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NU

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Croatia Czech Republic Djibouti Dominican Republic Ecuador Egypt Equatorial Guinea Estonia Ethiopia Fiji Gabon Gambia Ghana Guatemala Guinea Guinea-Bissau Guyana Haiti Honduras Hungary India Indonesia Iran Jamaica Jordan Kenya Republic of Korea Latvia

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Afghanistan Albania Algeria Angola Argentina Armenia Azerbaijan Bahrain Bangladesh Belarus Benin Bhutan Bolivia Botswana Brazil Bulgaria Burkina Faso Burundi Cambodia Cameroon Cape Verde Central African Republic Chile China Colombia Comoros Democratic Republic of Congo Costa Rica

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Table 7: Countries in the 467-observations benchmark sample.

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8.1

Appendix

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8

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Philippines Poland Romania Russia Rwanda El Salvador Senegal Sierra Leone Slovak Republic Somalia South Africa Sri Lanka Sudan Syria Tajikistan Tanzania Thailand Togo Tunisia Turkey Uganda Ukraine Uruguay Uzbekistan Venezuela Zambia Zimbabwe

ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT 8.2

What drives the arrival in power of a diplomat?

Table 8: What drives the arrival in power of a diplomat returnee? (2)

(3)

(4)

(5)

Probit

-0.00862 (0.00957) -6.38e-06 (1.31e-05) -3.08e-05 (6.88e-05) -0.702 (0.475) 0.744 (0.543) 0.00389 (0.00562)

Yes 222 0.297 88

Yes 222 0.292 88

-0.0128 (0.00829) -8.07e-06 (1.33e-05) -4.27e-05 (7.35e-05) -0.663 (0.463) 0.663 (0.549)

-0.117 (0.0748) 3.67e-05 (0.000132) 0.000198 (0.000552) 18.64* (10.97) -3.019 (2.426) -0.0688 (0.0523)

-0.00597 (0.00402)

-0.146 (0.0984) 0.000112 (0.000144) 0.000557 (0.000582) 17.26* (10.17) -1.799 (2.621)

-0.0132 (0.0300)

Yes Yes Yes

Yes Yes Yes

Yes Yes Yes

Yes Yes Yes

Yes Yes Yes

Yes Yes Yes

Yes 46 0.140

Yes 46 0.154

Yes 378 0.279

Yes 378 0.282

Yes 129 0.754

Yes 129 0.725

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100

100

66

66

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Year dummies Observations R-squared Number of countries

Yes Yes Yes

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Characteristics of the leader: Gender Yes Education Yes Profession Yes

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Whole sample Initially autocratic Control variables measured during the predecessor’s tenure: GDP pc -0.643*** -0.673*** 0.387 0.743 growth (0.223) (0.226) (0.685) (0.692) GDP pc 2.86e-05 4.46e-05 9.85e-05 0.000139 (5.11e-05) (4.76e-05) (0.000292) (0.000302) Population -6.50e-05 -6.50e-05 0.000204 0.000107 (0.000134) (0.000138) (0.000798) (0.000758) Emig -12.17*** -11.97*** -9.750 -8.312 (4.223) (4.297) (6.735) (6.838) Students 0.615 0.447 -2.025 -2.879 abroad (1.680) (1.614) (3.942) (4.508) Polity score 0.0271 -0.0200 (0.0236) (0.0594) Delta Polity -0.00501 -0.0618 (0.0370) (0.0577)

(6) (7) (8) LPM with country FE Whole sample Initially autocratic

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(1)

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Dependent: Mig - Diplomacy

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Robust standard errors (clustered at the country level in Columns (5) to (8)) in parentheses. ***p<0.01, **p<0.05, *p<0.1. GDP pc growth, GDP pc, Emig, Population and Students abroad are averaged over the tenure. Profession dummies refer to: Law, Economics, Health, Military, Business, Administration, Academics, Worker, Scientist and Religious.

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ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT Falsification test

Table 9: Falsification test.

-0.352 (0.578)

Initially Autocratic x Mig - Study

-0.0868 (0.824)

Initially Autocratic x Mig - Exile

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Mig - Diplomacy

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Mig - Exile

-0.495 (0.731)

Initially Autocratic x Mig - Diplomacy

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Mig - Military

-0.267 (1.680)

Initially Autocratic x Mig - Military

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Leader-level controls Country-level controls Profession dummies Country & year dummies Observations R-squared Number of countries

(2) -4.921*** (1.135) -0.328 (0.581) -0.306 (1.041) -0.286 (0.954) -0.0381 (1.538) -1.041 (0.637) 1.518 (1.138) -0.783 (1.412) 1.683 (1.341) Yes Yes Yes Yes 437 0.375 107

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Mig - Study

(1)

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Dependent: Delta Polity - Predecessor Initially Autocratic

Yes Yes Yes Yes 437 0.276 107

LPM with country fixed effects. Robust standard errors clustered at the country level in parentheses. ***p<0.01, **p<0.05, *p<0.1. Initially autocratic is a dummy equal to one if the Polity score the year of arrival in power of the leader was smaller or equal to zero. Leader-level controls refer to: Tenure duration (in years), Woman, High education (dummy equal to one if the leader had a master’s degree or equivalent before reaching power). Country-level controls refer to: Initial Polity score, Delta Polity - Predecessor, GDP pc growth, GDP pc, Emig, Population and Students abroad (normalized by population). GDP pc growth, GDP pc, Emig, Population and Students abroad are averaged over the tenure. Profession dummies refer to: Law, Economics, Health, Military, Business, Administration, Academics, Worker, Scientist and Religious.

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8.3

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ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT 8.4

Alternative outcomes Table 10: Alternative outcomes.

Initially autocratic x Mig - Diplomacy Mig - Military Initially autocratic x Mig - Military Leader-level controls Country-level controls Profession dummies Country & year dummies Observations R-squared Number of countries

(5) Average CL 1.729*** (0.201) 0.276** (0.133) -0.448** (0.190) -0.281 (0.199) -0.0334 (0.235) 0.211 (0.186) -0.399 (0.276) -0.360 (0.224) 0.173 (0.263) Yes Yes Yes Yes 415 0.652 113

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(4) Average Polity -8.799*** (0.784) -0.00196 (0.412) 1.792*** (0.644) -0.0921 (0.572) 0.853 (0.984) -0.778 (0.616) 0.723 (0.994) -0.441 (0.742) 0.450 (0.652) Yes Yes Yes Yes 467 0.821 110

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Initially autocratic x Mig - Exile Mig - Diplomacy

(3) Delta PR 1.088*** (0.308) 0.512*** (0.189) -0.780** (0.325) -0.284 (0.242) 0.567 (0.426) 0.518 (0.492) -1.058* (0.546) -0.341 (0.284) -0.0278 (0.457) Yes Yes Yes Yes 302 0.611 97

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Initially autocratic x Mig - Study Mig - Exile

(2) Delta CL 0.239 (0.255) 0.203* (0.120) -0.137 (0.205) -0.295* (0.168) 0.506 (0.334) 0.421 (0.291) -0.490 (0.386) -0.504** (0.237) 0.0947 (0.235) Yes Yes Yes Yes 302 0.515 97

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Mig - Study

(1) Delta Polity -0.621 (1.441) -0.210 (0.516) 2.735** (1.182) 0.417 (0.699) -1.019 (1.134) -1.786 (1.219) 3.357** (1.600) -1.145 (1.186) 1.434 (1.241) Yes Yes Yes Yes 437 0.479 107

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Dependent: Initially autocratic

(6) Average PR 2.305*** (0.221) 0.0910 (0.148) -0.503* (0.271) 0.185 (0.224) -0.676** (0.296) -0.0325 (0.270) -0.348 (0.358) -0.779*** (0.251) 0.798*** (0.271) Yes Yes Yes Yes 415 0.701 113

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LPM with country fixed effects. Robust standard errors clustered at the country level in parentheses. ***p<0.01, **p<0.05, *p<0.1. Initially autocratic is a dummy equal to one if the Polity score the year of arrival in power of the leader was smaller or equal to zero in Columns (1) and (4), if the CL index the year of arrival in power of the leader was equal to or larger than 4 in Columns (2) and (5), and if the PR index the year of arrival in power of the leader was equal to or larger than 4 in Columns (3) and (6). Leader-level controls refer to: Tenure duration (in years), Woman, High education (dummy equal to one if the leader had a master’s degree or equivalent before reaching power). Country-level controls refer to: GDP pc growth, GDP pc, Emig, Population and Students abroad (normalized by population), averaged over the tenure. In Columns (1) to (3), we additionally control for the initial score of democracy (Initial Polity score) and change in the score of democracy observed during the predecessor’s tenure (Delta Polity - Predecessor ). Profession dummies refer to: Law, Economics, Health, Military, Business, Administration, Academics, Worker, Scientist and Religious. Higher values of the Polity score (used in Columns (1) and (4)) indicate higher levels of democracy, while higher values of the CL and PR indexes (used in Columns (2), (3), (5) and (6)) indicate less freedom.

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