Political Regime Types and Economic Development in Nigeria: Significance of Conflict and Corruption

This article investigates the short- and long-run effects of political regimes (POLREGs) on economic development in Nigeria between 1984 and 2015. It looks at the effects of the conflict (CONFL) and corruption (COR) on economic development indicators and examines the interactive effect of POLREGs and COR as well as CONFL on economic development. COR and CONFL seem to be more prevalent in Nigeria during democracy relative to the periods under dictatorship. Using the Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) approach to cointegration, it derived a number of robust conclusions. Democracy in the long run yields higher economic development when it is devoid of CONFL and COR, while autocracy hinders economic development. In the short run however, more autocracy fosters economic development in Nigeria while democracy hinders it. COR portends grave threat to the development of Nigeria’s economy as it reduces development in the long run. Effect of CONFL on economic development in Nigeria is unclear. These findings highlight the need to establish effective anti-graft agencies to fight COR to the barest minimum in Nigeria. They also highlight the need to employ CONFL resolution mechanisms in resolving CONFL issues in the democratization process of the country. JEL: D74, K420, P160, O1, Q55