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Political Determinants of Public Health Investment in C hina and I ndia
Author(s) -
Joshi Devin K.,
Yu Bin
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
asian politics and policy
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.193
H-Index - 12
eISSN - 1943-0787
pISSN - 1943-0779
DOI - 10.1111/aspp.12087
Subject(s) - ideology , welfare state , politics , democracy , investment (military) , public health , economics , government (linguistics) , public investment , state (computer science) , government spending , welfare , development economics , political science , public economics , political economy , public welfare , market economy , medicine , law , linguistics , philosophy , nursing , algorithm , computer science
This article examines long‐term political determinants of divergent levels of public health investment in C hina and I ndia. Addressing the welfare‐state literature hypothesis that democracies tend to invest more than non‐democracies in social services including public health, we hypothesize that in low‐income countries the development ideologies held by political leaders and the degree to which lower classes pressure the state for public services may impact public health investment more strongly than regime type. We offer a test of this hypothesis through comparative historical analysis of democratic I ndia and non‐democratic C hina. Controlling for economic growth rates and including analysis of the outlying I ndian state of K erala, we find support for our hypothesis that development ideology and systematic pressure from the lower classes have a major impact on government investment in public health.