Institutions and growth: Can human capital be a link?

This paper attempts to provide a sounder link between institutions and economic growth. It does so by i) identifying those institutions which might matter the most with respect to economic performance, ii) providing a rationale as to why they might matter, and iii) confronting that rationale with some systematic empirical evidence. We postulate that the central and common characteristic of relevant institutions is that they give agents a voice, a stake in the system.