Does Resource Wealth Cause Authoritarian Rule?

Middle East scholars often suggest that the region's absence of democracy is in part due to its oil wealth. This paper examines three aspects of the "oil-impedes-democracy" claim. First, is it true? Does oil have a consistently anti-democratic effect on states, once other factors -- such as the effects of income and Islamic culture -- are accounted for? Second, can this claim be generalized: it is true only in the Middle East, or elsewhere as well? Do other types of minerals, and other types of commodities, have comparable effects on governments? Finally, if oil does have anti-democratic properties, what is the causal mechanism? Using pooled time-series cross-national data from 105 states between 1971 and 1997, this paper finds that oil exports are strongly associated with authoritarian rule; that this effect is not limited to the Middle East; and that other types of mineral exports have a similar anti-democratic effect, while agricultural exports do not. It then tests three explanatio..