Abstract:This paper seeks to identify the most important institutions for economic growth sustainability (EGS). While basing on the endogenous growth theory à la Romer (1986), I identify total factor productivity as a channel by which institutions affect EGS. I define sustained economic growth as an episode of positive growth of per capita GDP over five consecutive years. The results of econometric estimates with a sample of 123 countries including 85 developing and 38 developed countries, using panel data over the 1960-2003 period, indicate that an improvement in the respective quality of democratic, economic activities regulation, and property rights institutions, is favourable for EGS. However, regulation institutions seem to be the most important one for EGS. My main results successfully pass several robustness checks, and the positive link between “goodâ institutions and EGS is illustrated by a case study with three African countries: Botswana, Ivory Cost, and Ghana.