ABSTRACT The literature argues that intense political competition may resultin a nation’s potential for increased welfare. We theoretically andempirically examine this proposition by linking political competitionto health outcomes in the Indian context. Theoretical analysissuggests that political competitiveness increases the probabilityof having better health outcomes. This analysis also identifiesthat rural areas benefit from more from political competition thanurban areas. In India, the majority of the population (around 70%)resides in rural areas and, therefore, the diversity of ex-ante viewsabout political parties is higher in rural areas compared to urbanareas. In such situations, as competition intensifies, the governmentallocates greater amounts of resources to rural areas to win theelection. Thus, as political competition increases, the probability ofhaving better health outcomes rise in rural areas at a higher rate ascompared to urban areas. Our empirical analysis also exhibits the same.

中文翻译：

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拯救生命的竞争：印度的政治竞争和健康成果

摘要文献认为激烈的政治竞争可能导致一个国家增加福利的潜力。我们通过在印度背景下将政治竞争与健康结果联系起来，从理论和经验上检验了这一主张。理论分析表明，政治竞争力增加了获得更好健康结果的可能性。该分析还表明，农村地区比城市地区更多地受益于政治竞争。在印度，大多数人口（约70％）居住在农村地区，因此，与城市地区相比，农村地区对政党的事前看法的多样性更高。在这种情况下，随着竞争的加剧，governmentallocates更大量的资源向农村地区，赢得theelection的。因此，随着政治竞争的加剧，与城市地区相比，农村地区获得更好健康结果的可能性更高。我们的经验分析也显示出相同的结果。