Imagine you are watching a political talk show (perhaps one of the ones that are shown on Sunday morning, or perhaps The Daily Show) and the pundits are discussing problems with the democratization process in Iraq. One of the guests claims that a key factor making it unlikely that democracy could survive in Iraq (even if it were established there). is that there are too many different ethnic groups in the country. Does the empirical evidence in Table 1 support such a claim?

Question

A. Yes, because the coefficient on the Muslim majority variable is positive and significant.

B. No, because the coefficient on Effective number of ethnic groups implies that increasing the number of ethnic groups makes democratic survival more likely.

C. Sort of, because the coefficient on “Effective number of ethnic groups” is mildly significant (only one star) and it implies that increasing the number of ethnic groups makes democratic survival less likely.

Answer 1

C. Sort of, because the coefficient on “Effective number of ethnic groups” is mildly significant (only one star) and it implies that increasing the number of ethnic groups makes democratic survival less likely.