Democracy, Infrastructure, and Interstate Trade, 1950 - 1993.

The purpose of this paper is to introduce, discuss, and empirically test transportation and communication infrastructure as important elements of international political economy and more specifically as important determinants of interstate trade. This paper is part of a larger research program which has developed a quantitative measure for these two forms of infrastructure for each state in the international system from 1840 until 1993. More specifically, this paper will examine two research questions: 1)What makes states more or less likely to build transportation and communication infrastructure? 2)How does transportation and communication infrastructure influence interstate trade? I will argue that the construction and development of infrastructure should play an important role in shaping the trade relations between states in the international system. These systems reduce transportation costs and coordination difficulties, thereby reducing the costs of goods and increasing profits, ceteris paribus. My findings support these claims; more transportation and communication infrastructure do increase the amount of bilateral trade between states. In addition, I argue that regime types, resources, and state population also play an important role in shaping how much transportation and communication infrastructure a state possesses. My findings indicate that there are significant regime and resource relationships at work in the construction of communication infrastructure. However, it initially appears that transportation infrastructure is largely determined by its previous values, and is largely unaffected by political or resource decisions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]