Institutional Quality and Economic Growth: The Case of Emerging Economies

The roles of institutional quality on economic growth are still heavily debated in the literature. This paper investigates the impacts of institutional quality on economic growth for 29 emerging economies over the 2002-2015 period by employing System Generalized Method of Moments (SGMM) estimators. We find the significant positive impacts of institutional quality on economic growth. The institutional quality impedes the positive effects of foreign direct investments (FDIs) and trade openness on economic growth. However, institutional quality improvement can mitigate the competition brought by trade openness in the areas FDIs operate to optimize their spill-over effect.