But in the 21st century, things look different. Dictatorships, as in China, appear to have learned from the failure of the Soviets. While they continue to oppress political opponents, they allow a high level of economic freedom within their borders. ~Kevin Hassett

For some people, this seems difficult to accept, but I’m not sure why it should be.  Providing goods and services and participating in government are two very different things.  If the government permits the former, but prohibits the latter, that might even help boost productivity (imagine how much more productive political bloggers would be at whatever they did for a living if they weren’t spending all their time blathering about politics!).  As a matter of resources, time, energy and attention, it could easily be argued that participation in politics and the exercise of political freedoms are a drag on economic activity.  We could acknowledge this and still say that we prefer to expend our energies on these other goods, but it makes sense that those who have no such political freedoms and no participation in government to worry about will probably devote more energy and attention to work.  Authoritarian governments may decide to do economically stupid things (such as the Thai junta clamping down on moving bahts out of the country), but democratically elected governments may make their countries commit prolonged economic suicide (e.g., Venezuela) to pursue ideological and political goals.  It certainly doesn’t follow that giving more people the right to vote will ensure better economic policies–to believe this is to assume that the mass of voters knows something about economic policy and can gauge and discern wisely which proposals are better than others.  Usually, voter preferences tend to be very blunt: they tend to overreact to perceived failure with extreme swings to the opposite side, or they find themselves confronted with a two party consensus on economic management that permits no real change no matter what the people may or may not want.     

It isn’t as if the thesis that societies with less of a participatory government could be economically more productive was entirely unsuited to the 20th century.  Singapore has stood as a brilliant, shining repudiation of all theories that insist political freedom and economic freedom are somehow inextricably tied together.  Arguably, Singapore is exceptional in many ways that could make it a weak example, but time and again you can find evidence that both less free and less democratic societies (not always the same thing) will enjoy greater productivity and wealth.  The post-Cold War era has seen this happen on a consistent basis, as the graph in Mr. Hassett’s own article demonstrates.  The disparity between unfree-but-productive and free societies has actually widened during the 2001-05 period.  Of course, this involves including Malaysia (which at least plays at having elections) and Russia (which has elections that produce outcomes that liberals don’t like) among the “repressive” societies, which will definitely boost the numbers against the free and the democratic.