From ballots to readiness: global evidence on democracy’s influence on climate change adaptation readiness

This study investigates how the level of democracy influences climate change adaptation readiness across 188 countries from 1995 to 2020, using selectorate theory to explain variations in leaders’ incentives to provide public goods. Employing a country‑year panel framework with fixed‑effects regression models, the analysis isolates the impact of democratic governance on adaptation readiness while controlling for economic and institutional factors. The results show that higher levels of democracy – characterized by broader winning coalitions – enhance leaders’ incentives to invest in long‑term public goods, particularly climate change adaptation readiness. Conversely, in less democratic regimes with narrower coalitions, political survival depends on distributing private goods to elites, leading to underinvestment in adaptation capacity. Nested analysis of case studies of Bhutan and Venezuela illustrate how democratic consolidation strengthens adaptive governance, whereas democratic erosion weakens it. These findings highlight that the level of democracy fundamentally shapes the political incentives underpinning national readiness for climate change adaptation.