I was reading this article on Vox, and saw this surprising quote:
After countries have passed a certain threshold of prosperity and development, peace, political liberalization and greater government accountability are the best safeguards against famine. There is no record of people dying of famine in a democracy.
Is this really true? What's the closest example we have to a democratic country experiencing a famine?
Depends on how you define famine. Is it just an extreme food shortage that kills people in a certain part of a country? That happens in third world democracies all the time. Or do you only consider it a famine if at least a few thousand people die? The last major famine in India was the Bengal famine of 1943. But, there was one at a smaller scale in Bihar in 1966.