Politicians’ Business Interests and Effective Policymaking

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Kelly McMann
Kellogg Institute Visiting Fellow
Lucy Adams Leffingwell Professor, Case Western Reserve University

To what extent do politicians’ personal economic interests hinder the resolution of pressing public problems? Studies have shown that politicians’ economic interests can motivate them to steal from the state and exchange government influence for future private sector positions. But their economic interests also include their business dealings. We know less about the extent to which these business dealings affect their willingness to adopt policies that would solve public problems but would also undercut their personal economic gains.  I expect that the more democratic the regime, the more likely its politicians are to adopt policies that threaten their business profits.  The reason is that the more democratic the regime the stronger the accountability mechanisms that make personal enrichment less appealing to politicians. I explore the accuracy of these expectations by examining adoption of policies to address public economic, environmental, health, and security problems globally.  The paper for this work-in-progress is a first draft of this investigation.