In a departure from traditional viewpoints on leadership, Bruce Bueno de Mesquita emphasizes the association between high turnover in political office and economic prosperity in Political Instability as a Source of Growth, a new Hoover Institution Essay in Public Policy.

According to Bueno de Mesquita, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, autocrats gain political loyalty by offering benefits to small groups of supporters. They tend to remain in office longer than democratic leaders who, by political necessity, build coalitions by offering goods that benefit larger groups.

Bueno de Mesquita theorizes that the U.S. government's emphasis on stable leadership as a condition for growth is mistaken and can hinder global economic expansion. He explains that policies promoting corruption, which are sometimes implemented by autocrats to stay in power, show that longevity in office does not always mean prosperity for a government's citizens.

Bueno de Mesquita identifies factors that create incentives for growth and compares the economies in democratic and autocratic countries. He encourages the United States, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, rather than simply bailing out regimes facing economic crises, to promote political reform in places where leaders protect their authority at the expense of growth.

Bruce Bueno de Mesquita is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution who specializes in international security issues and in the political economy of growth. His most recent books are Principles of International Politics: People's Power, Preferences, and Perceptions (Congressional Quarterly Books, 2000) and, co-edited with Hilton Root, Governing for Prosperity (Yale University Press, 2000).