The Database of Political Institutions 2020 (DPI2020)

The Database of Political Institutions 2020 provides institutional and electoral results data for about 180 countries from 1975 to 2020. It includes measures of checks and balances, government tenure and stability, party affiliation and ideology, and legislative fragmentation. Created by Carlos Scartascini, it had over 4,500 article citations on Google Scholar as of December 2020.

Use Cases

• Modeling the impact of government stability on economic growth based on tenure and stability measures.
• Analyzing legislative fragmentation's effect on policy outcomes based on opposition and government party fragmentation data.
• Classifying political regimes based on institutional checks and balances data.
• Studying the relationship between party ideology and fiscal policy based on party affiliation and ideology indicators.

Strengths

• Covers approximately 180 countries, providing broad geographic scope.
• Spans 45 years (1975-2020), offering longitudinal analysis potential.
• Highly cited in academic literature, with over 4,500 Google Scholar citations as of December 2020.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Last update date is unknown; freshness unverified.
• License is listed as closed, which may restrict usage.

Provenance

Source

Carlos Scartascini

Collection Method

Likely compiled from official electoral records and government publications.

Time Range

1975-2020

Freshness

Data covers up to 2020, but last update date is unknown.

Geography

Approximately 180 countries worldwide.