Human Development and Its Institutional Drivers—A Panel Impact Assessment for EU-27 Member States

Institutions are one of the most important factors that support economic and human development. In this respect, this paper analyses the relationship between selected institutional dimensions and human development in the European Union over the period 2011–2022. More specifically, the analysis focuses on the Control of Corruption Index, Regulatory Quality Index and Rule of Law Index as proxies for institutional quality. Therefore, we applied the Panel EGLS method to assess the relationship between these institutional dimensions and the Human Development Index. According to the results, the Control of Corruption Index has the strongest positive association with human development among the analysed institutional dimensions. Moreover, we also found a positive relationship between the Rule of Law Index/Regulatory Quality Index and the Human Development Index, highlighting the important role of institutional quality in supporting human development. These findings provide additional empirical evidence regarding the relationship between institutional specificities and human development and increase the awareness on setting national priorities aimed at improving institutional quality as a way to support sustainable human development.