Democracy, Polarization, and the Four Different Types of Public Policies

The relationship between politicians and voters can be explained by the exchange of votes and policies. State services provided by political leaders can be classified into private goods, club goods, common-pool resources, and public goods depending on whether they are rival or not, and whether they are excludable or not. In authortitarian regimes where the size of the winnng coalition for the regime is small, rival goods such as cash are more efficient in maintaining the satisfaction of the winning coalition than are nonrival goods such as public goods. On the other hand, in democracies that require the majority to be satisfied in order to maintain the regime, nonrival state services that the majority can enjoy together are more efficient. This has already been shown by the literature of the selectorate theory. Beyond the theory, this paper argues that the goods properties of state services vary depending on the degree of political polarization. In a polarized regime, excludable state services are mainly offered to its own winning coalition in order to maintain the continuous support of the coalition. Nonrival and excludable club goods-based state services are well observed in polarized democracies. Depending on democratization and political polarization, the goods attributes of state service can be classified into club goods, public goods, private goods, and common-pool resources.