hacia una mejor medición del apoyo a la democracia

7/17/2019 Hacia Una Mejor Medición Del Apoyo a La Democracia

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Hacia una mejor medición del apoyo a la democracia

(Support for the ‘ideal’ of democracy vs. ‘real’ support for democracy:

Venezuela and Chile in comparative perspective)

Paolo Moncagatta

Research and Expertise Centre for Survey Methodology

Universitat Pompeu Fabra

Barcelona, España

[email protected]

Área temática: Política comparada

Trabajo preparado para su presentación en el VII Congreso Latinoamericano de Ciencia Política,

organizado por la Asociación Latinoamericana de Ciencia Política (ALACIP).

Bogotá, 25 al 27 de septiembre de 2013.



Support for the ‘ideal’ of democracy vs. ‘real’ support for democracy:

Venezuela and Chile in comparative perspective

Paolo Moncagatta

ABSTRACT

Citizen support for democratic rule is an important feature for democratic regimes. But itsmeasurement has been problematic, as most research on the topic has focused on assessing support foran abstract concept: the ‘ideal’ of democracy. This article proposes a different conception ofdemocratic support, labeled ‘real’ support for democracy. ‘Real’ support is measured through a non-compensatory composite score that combines multiple items tapping citizens’ attitudes towards variousessential attributes of democratic rule. Using data from the 2006/2007 AmericasBarometer surveys, the‘real’ support measure is compared to a traditional measure of support for the ‘ideal’ of democracy in both Chile and Venezuela. Important differences are found in the aggregate levels of the two indicators,

as well as in their correlates, implying that they are indeed very different concepts. As well, substantialdifferences are found between countries, suggesting that analyses of democratic support that do nottake into account the political context might be intrinsically flawed.

RESUMEN

Hasta hace poco, una buena parte de los estudios sobre apoyo ciudadano a la democracia se ha limitadoa distinguir aquellas personas que expresan una preferencia por el concepto abstracto de “democracia”de aquellas que no lo hacen. Así, porcentajes de personas que “apoyan la democracia” han sido

calculados, comparaciones entre países han sido realizadas, y cientos de diagnósticos han sidoemitidos.

Sin embargo, a lo largo de la última década se ha visto un cambio importante en el enfoque de losanálisis del apoyo a la democracia. La literatura académica reciente ha expresado serias dudas sobrelos métodos tradicionales utilizados para medir el concepto. Hoy en día, los análisis más novedosos entorno al apoyo a la democracia coinciden en que la democracia es un concepto multidimensional, y quemedir el apoyo a ella como un único concepto abstracto puede resultar insuficiente.

Esta ponencia propone un indicador alternativo para medir el apoyo a la democracia, basado en lamedición de actitudes ciudadanas hacia varios de los principios e instituciones fundamentales de un

sistema democrático. Por motivos de ilustración, el análisis se realiza de forma comparada entre Chiley Venezuela, dos países con historias políticas recientes muy distintas.

El análisis brinda resultados muy interesantes, que permiten distinguir que no es lo mismo expresarapoyo al concepto de “democracia” en el abstracto que a los principios fundamentales que rigen a unsistema democrático. Además, se distingue que las fuentes de dicho apoyo pueden variar de manerasignificativa de acuerdo al contexto político en el que se realice el estudio.



INTRODUCTION

There is a broad consensus that citizen support for democratic rule is a valuable attribute for any

democratic system (Bratton & Mattes, 2001; Dalton, 2004; Easton, 1965, 1975; Inglehart, 2003; Linz

& Stepan, 1996a; Linz, 1978; Lipset, 1959; Mattes & Bratton, 2007; Miller, 1974; Norris, 1999). Not

only do democratic regimes depend on the public’s willing acquiescence and support for their survival

and effective functioning (Easton, 1965, 1975; Mishler & Rose, 2001), but a democracy is considered

to be consolidated only when democratic procedures and institutions become “the only game in town”

(Linz & Stepan, 1996a, p. 15). In this line, a strong current of literature has granted great importance to

understanding the conditions under which citizens develop and maintain positive attitudes towards

democratic rule.

But support for democracy has proved to be a difficult concept to study. Discussions regarding which

indicators are better suited for assessing it empirically date back to the 1970’s (Citrin, 1974; Miller,

1974). A decade and a half later, the literature on democratic support was still being described as

“ambiguous, confusing and noncumulative” (Kaase, 1988, p. 117). Today, the debate is far from being

closed: indicators which have been used to measure democratic support are still criticized severely and

recurrently. There is no scholarly agreement on how exactly the concept of support for democracy

should be interpreted or empirically assessed.

Building on an idea initially proposed by Mishler and Rose (2001), this article argues that most

research on support for democracy has been misconceived, as it has adopted an “idealist approach

(which) assesses popular support by measuring citizens’ commitment to democracy as an abstract

ideal” (Mishler & Rose, 2001, p. 305). The main problem with this approach is that support for

‘democracy’ in the abstract does not necessarily imply support for democracy’s essential attributes. For

example, in certain countries it is not hard to imagine a person answering that “democracy is preferable

to any other type of government” to a survey question, while at the same time being in favor of

restrictions on freedoms of press. There is strong evidence that citizens have different understandings

and expectations of what ‘democracy’ is and what it should deliver (Booth & Seligson, 2009; Bratton& Mattes, 2001; Schedler & Sarsfield, 2007; Vargas Cullell, 2006). In this sense, not all citizens who

express democratic support through the traditional ‘support for democracy’ survey items refer to the

same concept. It is thus necessary to differentiate those citizens who only say they support democracy

in the abstract from those who actually have consistent democratic attitudes.



This article makes three main contributions. First, it offers an alternative measure of support for

democracy, labeled ‘real’ support for democracy. The ‘real’ support measure proposed is novel because

it combines multiple indicators tapping citizen support for the essential attributes of a democratic

system into a non-compensatory composite score, thus allowing the distinction of those citizens who

have consistent positive attitudes towards democratic rule from all the rest. Second, by means oflogistic regression analysis, it is shown that there are important differences between the correlates of

support for the ‘ideal’ of democracy and those of ‘real’ support for democracy. Third, it is shown that

when studying democratic support, context matters: recent political history and ideological stances of

the incumbents play a role in determining the sources of democratic support in nations.

‘TRADITIONAL’ MEASUREMENT OF SUPPORT FOR DEMOCRACY

In the political attitudes literature, support for democracy has been traditionally related to David

Easton’s concept of “diffuse” political support: a durable, generalized attachment that is normally

“independent of outputs and performance in the short run” (Easton, 1975, pp. 444–445). Also

interpreted as measuring the legitimacy of a political system, “diffuse” support has been described as “a

deep-seated set of attitudes towards politics and the operation of the political system that is relatively

impervious to change” (Dalton, 2004, p. 23). This type of support has also been related to the

“affective” orientations citizens have towards political systems (Almond & Verba, 1963; Dalton, 2004;

Norris, 1999). It is that “reservoir of favorable attitudes or good will that helps members to accept or

tolerate outputs to which they are opposed or the effects of which they see as damaging to their wants”

(Easton, 1965, p. 273).

When assessing support for democracy through surveys, most research has relied on indicators that

captured citizens’ attitudes towards an abstract concept: the ‘ideal’ of democracy (for examples see

Bratton, 2002; Fuchs, Guidorossi, & Svensson, 1995; Lagos, 2003, 2008; Linz & Stepan, 1996b; Linz,

1978; Mattes & Bratton, 2007; Rose & Mishler, 1996; Sarsfield & Echegaray, 2006). A frequently used

indicator to monitor the concept in the last decades builds on Juan Linz’s ideas on democratic

breakdown (Linz & Stepan, 1996b; Linz, 1978), and asks respondents: “With which of the following

statements do you mostly agree? (a) “Democracy is preferable to any other form of government”, (b)

“Under some circumstances, an authoritarian government could be preferable to a democratic one” or

(c) “To people like me, it is the same to have a democratic or non-democratic regime”.



Figure 1 reports the levels of support for the ideal of democracy found in nineteen countries of North,

Central and South America in 2012 through the use of the aforementioned ‘Linzian’ indicator.

Although the range between the countries that enjoy the highest levels of support and those that show

the lowest levels is large, it is still seen that in all countries a majority of the population expresses

support for democratic rule. There is no doubt that, at least when thinking of democracy in abstractterms, publics of the Americas tend to agree that it is preferable to any other form of government.

Figure 1 – Support for the ideal of democracy: the Americas 2012

62.9%

65.6%

66.0%

69.2%

69.6%

71.5%

72.0%

72.3%

74.0%

74.6%

76.2%

81.4%

81.5%

81.9%

83.5%

84.4%

87.1%

87.4%

91.2%

Paraguay

Guatemala

Brazil

Honduras

Ecuador

Peru

El Salvador

Colombia

Chile

Mexico

Canada

Bolivia

United States

Argentina

Panama

Nicaragua

Uruguay

Costa Rica

Venezuela

0 20 40 60 80 100

95% Confidence Interval (Design-Effects Based)

Percentages of respondents answering: “Democracy is preferable to any other form of government”Source: AmericasBarometer 2012 Surveys, Latin American Public Opinion Project



This indicator, widely used in studies of democratization, can provide a first impression of the levels of

citizen support for democracy in nations. But we must be aware that this may very well be a naïve

impression, as there is no certainty about what the meaning of this support really is. Figure 1 shows

how nations with very different democratic systems –such as the United States and Bolivia- report

having very similar levels of democratic support. Or how one of the world’s oldest continuousdemocracies, Canada, enjoys levels of support significantly lower than nations which have experienced

unstable democratic trajectories in the late twentieth century, such as Nicaragua, Panama or Argentina.

This figure suggests the uncertainty we face regarding what citizens in different contexts have in mind

when thinking about an abstract construct such as democracy: it seems plausible that a nation’s

democratic history determines the general conceptual framework under which its citizens understand

democracy. In this context, it would not make any sense to make cross-country comparisons of the

levels of democratic support found through such an indicator, as it is likely that we would be

comparing different things, and even run the risk of not knowing what we are comparing at all. Country

levels of support for the ideal of democracy should not be taken by themselves, but complemented with

the meaning they take in each specific context.

Besides the uncertainty regarding the meaning ‘democracy’ acquires in different political contexts,

there is an additional issue with the traditional measurement of support for democracy. As already

mentioned, the ‘Linzian’ indicator (and other unidimensional measures of democratic support i) has

been tapping support for an abstract concept: the ideal of democracy. But is expressing lip service to

the ideal of democracy enough for someone to be considered to support democracy? If the object to be

measured is that “deep-seated set of attitudes towards politics” (Dalton, 2004, p. 23), there are strong

grounds to be suspicious about this. It is not the same to say that “democracy is preferable to any other

form of government” in a survey than to actually have positive attitudes towards democracy’s

fundamental attributes. In other words, it is very likely that supporting the ‘ideal’ of democracy is not

the same as having democratic attitudes, or having ‘real’ support for democracy.

In fact, recent literature has cast doubts on the validity of some of the traditional indicators used to

measure support for democracy (Carlin & Singer, 2011; Inglehart, 2003; Schedler & Sarsfield, 2007).

There is an emerging consensus that democratic support is a multidimensional concept. In this line, an

improved approach to the measurement of the concept would imply using several indicators that tap

support towards specific core principles and institutions of a democratic system.



Efforts to analyze this ‘multidimensional nature’ of democratic support through empirical research are

fairly recent. One of the first steps in this direction was taken by Michael Bratton and colleagues,

developers of the Afrobarometer surveys in the late 1990’s. Bratton and Mattes differentiated the

rationalities undergirding support for democracy in African citizens as either “intrinsic” or

“instrumental” types of rationality (2001). For these authors, some citizens will support for democracy based on intrinsic reasons, or what they describe as “an appreciation of the political freedoms and equal

rights that democracy embodies when valued as an end in itself” (2001, p. 448), while others will

support for democracy based on instrumental calculations, where democracy is a “means to other ends,

most commonly the alleviation of poverty and the improvement of living standards” (2001, p. 448). In

more recent works, these authors developed an ‘index of commitment to democracy’ which included a

direct question tapping support for democracy plus other indicators that asked for opinions on rejection

of military, one-party and one-man rule (Bratton, 2002; Mattes & Bratton, 2007). They found that

almost a third of the respondents said they preferred democracy, but failed to reject consistently all

other forms of authoritarianism. Contrasted with “committed democrats” who rejected all variants of

authoritarianism, these “proto-democrats” seemed to have “nostalgic feelings for more forceful forms

of rule” (Bratton, 2002, p. 9).

Aiming to achieve a comprehensive understanding of citizens’ conceptions of democracy, Schedler and

Sarsfield (2007) developed a classification of what they call “democrats with adjectives”: people who

support the ideal of democracy in the abstract while rejecting one or more core principles of liberal

democracy. In their index of support for democracy they included both direct and indirect measures of

support for democratic principles and institutions. These authors arrived at a classification of six groups

of citizens, based on their different ideological profiles towards democracy: liberal democrats,

intolerant democrats, paternalistic democrats, homophobic democrats, exclusionary democrats and

ambivalent non-democrats. They did not, however, probe any further into the implications the existence

of such different groups has, and ended up suggesting that future research will have to explore both the

sources and consequences of these different attitudinal profiles (2007, p. 654).

Carlin and Singer (2011), in a similar effort, examined citizens’ support for the core values of

‘polyarchy’ -Robert Dahl’s concept for real world approximations of true democracy (Dahl, 1971).

They identified five profiles of support: “polyarchs”, “hyper-presidentialists”, “pluralist autocrats”,

“hedging autocrats” and “autocrats”. They found that the majority of Latin American respondents were

not ‘pure’ polyarchs or autocrats, but showed mixed attitudes towards democracy. In an attempt to

draw a clearer picture of the different groups of citizens they identified, they examined the



socioeconomic, attitudinal and ideological correlates of the profiles, to find that support for polyarchy

is highest among educated, politically engaged, wealthy, and citizens who dislike the president (2011).

MEASURING ‘REAL’ SUPPORT FOR DEMOCRACY

In their influential revision of democratic indices, Munck and Verkuilen (2002) lay out three

“challenges” that every constructor of a democratic index should take into account:

“conceptualization”, “measurement” and “aggregation”. According to these authors, the initial task in

the construction of any index is that of “conceptualization”, or the “identification of attributes that are

constitutive of the concept under consideration” (2002, p. 7). Once the meaning of the concept has been

specified, the challenge of “measurement” has to be faced, which accounts to the selection of the

appropriate indicators to operationalize the concept. When the concept has been defined and measured,the final challenge of “aggregation” must be confronted. In this final step, analysts must “determine

whether and how to reverse the process of disaggregation that was carried out during the

conceptualization stage” (Munck & Verkuilen, 2002, p. 22).

This section presents the definition of democracy to be used as a basis for assessing ‘real’ support for

democracy. Following Munck and Verkuilen’s (2002) advice, the section is divided into three parts: the

first part will address the issue of conceptualization, laying out the necessary conditions for a political

system to be considered a democracy. The second part will tackle the measurement ‘challenge’,describing what data and indicators are used to operationalize ‘real’ support for democracy. The third

part will explain the aggregation rule chosen for constructing the ‘real’ support for democracy

indicator, and the arguments behind that choice.

Conceptualization

One of the principal arguments driving this research is that a measure of ‘real’ support for democracy

should take into account citizen support for all of democracy’s essential attributes. But what are the

essential features of a democratic system? What are the minimum necessary conditions for a political

system to qualify as a democracy?

Definitions of democracy have been offered by the dozen throughout the last decades (Collier &

Levitsky, 1997; Diamond & Morlino, 2004; Munck & Verkuilen, 2002; Schmitter & Karl, 1991). In

fact, it has been repeatedly described as an “essentially contested” concept (Gallie, 1956), in the sense



that its definition is the focus of endless disputes that, “although not resolvable by argument of any

kind, are nevertheless sustained by perfectly respectable arguments and evidence” (Gallie, 1956, p.

169). However, in recent years a procedural minimum definition based on Robert Dahl’s concept of

“polyarchy” (1971) has gained acceptance as a reference point for operationalizations of the concept

(Altman & Pérez-Liñán, 2002; Alvarez, Cheibub, Limongi, & Przeworski, 1996; Baker & Koesel,2001; Carlin & Singer, 2011; Schneider, 2008; Vanhanen, 2003).

Dahl coined “polyarchy” as a term for real world approximations of true democracy –which he thought

was an unattainable ideal-type regime. According to Dahl, the minimum requirements for polyarchy to

exist are: 1) the right to vote, 2) freedom of organization, 3) freedom of expression, 4) equal eligibility

for public office, 5) the right to compete for votes, 6) availability of diverse sources of information

about politics, 7) free and fair elections, and 8) the dependence of public policies on citizens’

preferences. These eight guarantees -Dahl argued- correspond to two separate underlying dimensions,contestation and inclusiveness, at both the conceptual and empirical levels. Contestation, in general

terms, refers to the extent to which citizens have equal opportunities to express their views and form

organizations. Inclusiveness, on the other hand, refers to variation in “the proportion of the population

entitled to participate on a more or less equal plane in controlling and contesting the conduct of the

government…” (1971, p. 4). Dahl’s claims were that these two dimensions vary somewhat

independently and that they are generally fundamental, in the sense that they are not artifacts of time or

geography.

Various empirical studies of quality of democracy and democratization have adapted Dahl’s ideas to

construct indices of democracy. In fact, most of what the best known indices of democracy have been

measuring (Alvarez et al., 1996; Coppedge & Reinicke, 1990; Marshall & Jaggers, 2002, Freedom

House, among others) consists of variations on Dahl’s two dimensions (Coppedge, Alvarez, &

Maldonado, 2008). Most of these indicators have primarily focused on the contestation dimension,

while only very few have reflected the inclusiveness dimension (Coppedge et al., 2008).

This article makes no exception and departs from Dahl’s concept of ‘polyarchy’ and its two dimensionsto specify the definition of democracy used for assessing ‘real’ support. But in addition to Dahl’s

‘contestation’ and ‘inclusiveness’, two more dimensions are included. The third dimension refers to a

crucial issue in political democracy: that of who in fact exercises power. As Munck and Verkuilen

point out, “some authors have suggested that merely considering whether offices are elected is not

sufficient to get at the essential question at stake – who exercises power?”, and thus argue in favor of



including a measure of what they label “agenda-setting power of elected officials” (2002, p. 12).

Similarly, Bollen includes a measure of “effectiveness of the legislative body” to be able to

differentiate between elected “puppet” legislatures and those that are both elected and effective (1980,

p. 376). In the same line, the authors of the Polity IV datasets argue that one of the essential elements

of democracy is “the existence of institutionalized constraints on the exercise of power by theexecutive” (Marshall & Jaggers, 2002, p. 13) and thus include in their definition of democracy a similar

dimension labeled “constraints on the chief executive”. I borrow this argument from the authors of the

Polity IV project and include in my definition the dimension of ‘constraints on the chief executive’.

The fourth dimension included in this article’s definition of democracy deals with another key aspect of

democratic institutionality: the existence of an appropriate system of checks and balances. In simple

terms, the dimension can be summarized as ‘respect for democratic institutions’. Carlin and Singer, in

their examination of citizen support for democratic ideals and institutions in the Americas, note that besides including support towards Dahl’s dimensions of contestation and inclusiveness, measures of

democratic support should also capture “citizens’ orientations to the basic institutions that undergird

these twin dimensions” (2011, p. 1505). They convincingly argue that support for democracy’s

principles “rings hollow unless accompanied by support for the vertical and horizontal checks and

balances that ensure their maintenance” (2011, p. 1505). Because of this, they introduce a dimension

labeled “institutions and processes”, which taps respect for the institutions charged with exercising

checks and balances.

In sum, the definition of democracy used in this article to assess ‘real’ support for democracy consists

of four dimensions: ‘contestation’, ‘inclusiveness’, ‘constraints on the executive’, and ‘checks and

balances’. All four dimensions are considered necessary conditions for a political system to be deemed

a democracy: in this sense, support towards all four of them is necessary for a person to be considered

to have ‘real’ support for democracy ii.

Measurement

Data for this article was taken from the 2006/2007 round of the AmericasBarometer surveys, a series of

national representative surveys conducted by Vanderbilt University’s Latin American Public Opinion

Project (LAPOP). In the AmericasBarometer 2006/2007 round, 22 countries throughout the Americas

and Caribbean were included, and over 30,000 individuals were interviewed in total. In all countries,

the surveys were performed using national probability sample designs of voting-age adultsiii.



The 2006/2007 round of the AmericasBarometer surveys included a series of questions that asked

citizens about their attitudes towards different democratic principles and institutions. A total of nine

items were finally selected to operationalize the four dimensions outlined in the previous section: three

in the case of ‘contestation’ and two in all other cases iv. All indicators included in every dimension are

considered to be formative indicators: that is, support towards every one of them is considered asnecessary for their corresponding dimension to be fulfilled. In this line, while in the following

paragraphs the nine indicators will be presented as subcomponents of their corresponding dimensions

(for the sake of parsimony), in the end support towards all nine of them is seen as a necessary condition

for a person to be considered to have ‘real’ support for democracy.

Some scholars have interpreted polyarchy’s dimension of ‘contestation’ as focusing solely on the

electoral process: “democracy, for us, is thus a regime in which some governmental offices are filled as

a consequence of contested elections” (Alvarez et al., 1996, p. 4). There are others, however, thatdefend a broader definition of contestation, which includes subcomponents such as the existence of free

and fair elections, freedom of organization, freedom of expression and pluralism in the media

(Coppedge & Reinicke, 1990). In Dahl’s original terms, contestation refers to “the extent of

permissible opposition, public contestation, or political competition” (1971, p. 4). While there is no

doubt that having free and contested elections is of utmost relevance in a democratic system, I argue

that the existence of contestation should not be exclusive to the electoral process, but be extended to

daily political practices. For this reason, I agree with using a broad understanding of contestation, and

use three indicators tapping support towards the distinct subcomponents of ‘freedom of organization’,

‘freedom of press’ and ‘freedom of opposition’ to measure it. The items ask:

Freedom of organization: “To what extent do you agree or disagree of a law that prohibits meetings

of any group that criticizes the country’s political system?” (agree / disagree - 10 point scale).

Freedom of press: “To what extent do you agree or disagree of government censorship of critical

media?” (agree / disagree - 10 point scale).

Freedom of opposition: “Please tell me with which phrase do you agree more:

a) For the country’s progress, it is necessary that our presidents limit the voice and vote of opposition

parties, (or to the contrary), b) Even if it delays the country’s progress, our presidents must not limit the

voice and vote of opposition parties”.



Polyarchy’s dimension of ‘inclusiveness’ has been neglected from various indices of democracy, for

diverse reasons (Munck & Verkuilen, 2002). For example, Alvarez et. al.’s (1996) and Coppedge &

Reinicke’s (1990) argument that their research is concerned with the post-World War II era and that

universal suffrage can be taken for granted in this period makes it acceptable in their case to

concentrate on the contestation dimension. But while it could be argued that universal suffrage is anattribute of democracy that could be taken for granted today, the same is not necessarily true with

citizen attitudes towards it. As the aim of this research is assessing citizens’ attitudes towards the

fundamental attributes of democracy, it seems necessary to also include the dimension of inclusiveness

in the definition of democracy to be used. In this line, I use two indicators to assess support towards

inclusiveness, conceived here as the extent to which every citizen has the right to participate in the

political process. The first one concentrates on the most common conception of the inclusiveness

dimension, that is, citizen opinions towards the universal right to vote. But participation in the political

process should not be interpreted solely as having the right to vote: it also implies citizens having equal

eligibility for public office (Dahl, 1971). Thus, I include a second item in my measure of inclusiveness

that taps opinions towards the universal right of running for public office. The items ask:

Universal right to vote: “There are people who always speak badly about the form of government in

(country), not just about the incumbent government, but about the form of government. To what extent

do you agree or disagree with the right to vote of these people?” (agree / disagree - 10 point scale).

Universal right to run for public office: “There are people who always speak badly about the form ofgovernment in (country), not just about the incumbent government, but about the form of government.

“To what extent do you agree or disagree with these people’s right to run for public office?” (agree /

disagree - 10 point scale).

The operationalization of the dimension of ‘constraints on the chief executive’ is straight-forward: it

refers to “the existence of institutionalized constraints on the exercise of power by the executive”

(Marshall & Jaggers, 2002, p. 13). Because in most democracies the executive branch is typically

constrained by both the legislative and judicial branches of government, I use two indicators to measurecitizen attitudes towards this dimension:

Legislative constraints: “Please tell me with which phrase do you agree more: a) The National

Assembly (Congress) hinders the work of our presidents and should be ignored, (or to the contrary), b)

Even when it bothers the work of the president, our presidents should not pass over the National

Assembly.”



Judiciary constraints: “Please tell me with which phrase do you agree more: a) Judges frequently

hinder the work of our presidents and should be ignored, (or to the contrary), b) Even when sometimes

judges bother the work of our presidents, their decisions must always be obeyed.”

Lastly, the dimension of respect for democratic ‘checks and balances’ aims to tap citizen respect for the

institutions charged with exercising checks and balances in a democratic system. This article borrows

the conceptualization of this dimension from Carlin and Singer (2011) and measures it, as they did,

through two items:

Respect for legislative: “Do you think that there could sometime be any sufficient reason for the

president to shut down the National Assembly, or do you think that there cannot be a sufficient reason

for that to happen?” (yes/no)

Respect for judiciary: “Do you think that there could sometime be any sufficient reason for the president to dissolve the Supreme Court of Justice, or do you think that there cannot be a sufficient

reason for that to happen?” (yes/no)

Aggregation

‘Real’ support for democracy is defined as having consistent positive attitudes towards all of

democracy’s essential components. Because all nine indicators described above tap distinct essential

features of democratic rule, they are all considered necessary conditions for a complete understanding

of ‘real’ support for democracy. In this line, only those citizens who show positive attitudes towards

each and every one of the nine indicators are considered to have ‘real’ support for democracy.

As is observed by Goertz, “almost everyone, which is a large number of people, conceptualizes

democracy in terms of necessary and sufficient conditions, but at the same time almost no quantitative

measures use the mathematics of logic appropriate to the concept. Instead the inappropriate

mathematics of addition, average, and correlation are almost universally adopted” (2006, p. 11). In fact,

by relying on aggregation rules based on addition or correlation, such as factor analysis, the empirical

measurement of democracy usually falls prey to what he calls the most common form of measurement-

concept inconsistency: “a necessary and sufficient concept with an additive (or averaging) measure”

(Goertz, 2006, p. 98).

To avoid this common mistake, I construct a binary non-compensatory composite score as the measure

of ‘real’ support for democracy. The construction process itself is made up of three parts. In the first



part, answers to all nine indicators measuring support for democracy’s essential attributes are recoded

in binary fashion: ‘positive’ answers are given a score of ‘1’ and all other answers a score of ‘0’ v. In

the second part, the scores of all nine binary items are added, to create an aggregated variable with

scores ranging from ‘0’ to ‘9’. Finally, the binary non-compensatory composite indicator of ‘real’

support for democracy is constructed, where only scores of ‘9’ in the aggregated variable are recodedas ‘real support’, while scores from ‘0’ to ‘8’ are treated as a residual category that will be denominated

as ‘not having real support’. In sum, only citizens who gave positive answers to all nine indicators and

received a score of ‘9’ in the aggregated variable are considered to have ‘real’ support for democracy.

For the scope of this article, the use of a non-compensatory composite indicator as the measure of ‘real’

support for democracy is the most appropriate, as its primary interest is differentiating those citizens

who have consistent positive attitudes towards all of democracy’s essential features from those who

show inconsistent or negative attitudes. This argument is similar to the one proposed by Alvarez et al.(1996) for developing their dichotomous classification of political regimes. These authors justify their

use of a nominal classification to differentiate between “democracies” and “dictatorships” with the

argument that “the analogy with the proverbial pregnancy is thus that while democracy can be more or

less advanced, one cannot be half-democratic: there is a natural zero point” (Alvarez et al., 1996, p.

21). In the scope of this article, that ‘natural zero point’ is having ‘real’ support for democracy: I am

not interested in finding the ‘degree of democratic support’ an individual has, but in differentiating

those who are ‘real’ democrats from all others. The advantage of using a non-compensatory composite

indicator is that, unlike factor scores, it does not allow for negative answers to one or more questions to

be compensated by positive answers to the other questions included in the index, that way avoiding

possible conceptualization-measurement inconsistenciesvi.

CASE SELECTION – CHILE AND VENEZUELA

It has been argued that expressing support for the concept of ‘democracy’ in the abstract does not

necessarily imply supporting democracy’s core principles; and that because of this, democratic support

should be studied by looking at support for the fundamental attributes of a democratic system. As well,

I argue that supporting democracy in one place does not necessarily mean the same as supporting it in a

different one. Both the meaning and the nature of support for democracy may vary depending on the

political context. In this sense, it is illustrative to examine it in comparative perspective, between

countries where the democratic support debate has been constructed on different terms. For the sake of



this, Chile and Venezuela are chosen as cases for study: they are two countries with transcendental

differences in their recent political pasts that make them appropriate for the analysis.

Prior to its dramatic democratic breakdown in 1973, Chile enjoyed a relatively long history of

democracy, with a party system and institutions similar to those found in Western Europe (Valenzuela,

1977). Then came the coup d’état of September 11, 1973 and the long and gruesome dictatorship of

Augusto Pinochet, which lasted until 1989. This regime, despite facing intense internal problems and

widespread international rejection, managed to obtain a great deal of support among important and

significant sectors of the Chilean population throughout its entire period. Even after the reestablishment

of democracy, support to Pinochet’s regime was substantial, to the extent that the authoritarian-

democratic conflict was a defining cleavage in the formation of the Chilean party system (Torcal &

Mainwaring, 2003). In this regard, both sides of the cleavage were represented in the post dictatorship

party system: in very general terms, the authoritarian side through “ Renovación Nacional” and “Unión Democrática Independiente”, and the democratic side through the “Concertación” coalition.

Pinochet’s regime is arguably the most influential issue shaping Chileans’ political attitudes in the last

decades. It is on these grounds that the debate about the regime in Chile has been constructed: Chilean

citizens have been permanently exposed to discussions held by elites who strongly promoted

democracy and its values vs. those who were, to call it somehow, more ‘sympathetic’ towards

authoritarian regimes, personified by Pinochet. This is especially the case for older citizens, who

experienced the dictatorship for themselves and are able to compare it to the democratic regimes thatcame after 1989. But even for the younger generations, the authoritarian-democratic conflict has been a

defining issue, as it has been the basis of the competition between the Chilean political parties.

Some preliminary hypotheses can be derived from the nature of the debate about democratic support in

Chile. First, that individuals’ self-placement in the left-right scale should have an influence on their

attitudes towards democracy: because Pinochet’s regime can be considered a ‘right-wing dictatorship’

it can be expected that people who locate themselves on the left side of the scale are more supportive of

democracy. This should happen for both measures of support: Chilean left-wingers should show agreater tendency to both support ‘democracy’ as an ideal and to have ‘real’ support for democracy.

One might also expect a positive effect of age on support for democracy: it can be argued that people

who experienced Pinochet’s dictatorship for themselves appreciate more the virtues of democratic

governance than their fellow citizens who were politically socialized after the dictatorship. But this



might not be necessarily so. Good percentages of Chile’s older generations supported Pinochet during

his regime and after it, making it also possible that the effect of age on support for democracy is null.

In Venezuela, the debate about democratic support in the last decades has been built on very different

terms. Unlike Chile, Venezuela has not had an authoritarian regime since democracy was established in

1958, being one of the longer lasting representative democracies in the region, despite its clear

deficiencies (Coppedge, 2005; Roberts, 2008). The political elites in Venezuela have not constructed

the regime debate in terms of authoritarianism versus democracy, but in terms of how democracy’s

functioning could be improved (Canache, 2002). This conflict has been fully exacerbated since the

arrival by democratic means of Hugo Chávez to the presidency of the republic.

Venezuelan democracy, since Chávez’s arrival, has undergone important transformations. The

increasing concentration of power on the executive branch has resulted in an almost inexistent

horizontal accountability (Frank, 2010). Freedoms of expression and organization have been weakened

substantially, and several concerns about the validity of the electoral processes held in the last decade

have been voiced in the media. This has led opposition parties and media to continuously refer to

Chávez’s regime as a dictatorship. Chávez, on the other hand, since the beginning of his mandate has

heavily promoted his regime as the ‘ Revolución Bolivariana’, a ‘true democracy’ that is ‘deeply

transforming Venezuela’. This has caused the Venezuelan electorate to be polarized around the figure

of Chávez, and ultimately, around two different conceptions of democracy (Moncagatta, 2013). On the

one hand, there are the citizens who sympathize with Chavez and believe that ‘democracy’ is the typeof regime his government has promoted. On the other hand, there are Chavez’s opponents, who believe

‘democracy’ is something else, a regime different from the one the incumbent government has been

promoting throughout the last decade.

The importance of Chavez’s figure in Venezuelan politics makes it safe to argue that it is citizens’

alignments with him and with the different understandings of democracy what have shaped

Venezuelans’ political attitudes in the last decade. The debate about democracy in Venezuela has not

revolved around the question if people prefer democracy over authoritarian regimes, as in Chile, but ifthey prefer a certain ‘kind’ or of democracy over another: in other terms, if they are ‘Chavist’

democrats or not.

If at least two conceptions of democracy are present in the Venezuelan political scenario, it is important

to identify what specific attitudes are related to these different conceptions. Because the conception of

democracy Chávez has promoted is one that has allowed concentration of power in the executive, limits



on freedom of expression and organization, and other non-democratic practices, it can be expected that

citizens who align themselves with this conception of democracy will have, in general, weaker

democratic attitudes –at least in the measurement of ‘real’ support for democracy. In this sense, citizens

who evaluate Chávez’s mandate in positive terms should show less support for democracy than their

counterparts who evaluate his performance in poor terms. If ideology is to have any effect onVenezuelans’ support for democracy, it should be in the opposite direction than in Chile: because

Chávez’s regime is considered by his opponents as a left-wing populism (and even ‘dictatorship’), it

could be possible that right-wingers in Venezuela show stronger democratic attitudes.

On the other hand, it is also possible that there is no relationship between alignment with Chávez and

support for the concept of ‘democracy’ in the abstract: it is impossible to know what kind of regime

people are supporting in Venezuela when they agree with the statement that “democracy is always

preferable” in a survey question. The support expressed might be support towards Chavez’s‘democracia bolivariana’, but it might as well be support towards a completely different –and utterly

opposed- model of democracy. And whatever citizens’ conceptions of democracy might be should not

make a difference, at least in principle, in the levels and explanations of support for the ideal of

‘democracy’ in the abstract.

SUPPORT FOR THE ‘IDEAL’ OF DEMOCRACY VS. ‘REAL’ SUPPORT

‘Democracy’ is a concept which in general has positive connotations, and it can be expected that most

people express support for it, whether that expressed support is grounded on real attitudes or not.

However, there are enough reasons to be suspicious about the aggregate numbers regarding support for

a concept with such positive connotations, as they might be inflated by the presence of vacuous

conceptions of democracy, social desirability and a number of other biases.

As was illustrated previously in figure 1, both Venezuela and Chile appear to enjoy high aggregate

levels of support for the ideal of democracy when assessed through the ‘Linzian’ indicator. In 2012,Venezuela displays an outstanding 91,2% of people who answer that “democracy is preferable to any

other type of regime”. This level of support is the highest found in the Americas in that year, and as

high as the ones found in some of the most advanced Western European democracies (Lagos, 2003, p.

474). In the same year, Chile shows a somewhat lower level of democratic support. While a strong

majority of the population (74,0%) still supports ‘democracy’ in the abstract, there is a history of



sympathy for authoritarian regimes in the Chilean population as a legacy of Augusto Pinochet’s rule. It

is no surprise to find that a quarter of the Chilean population is either open to the possibility of having

an authoritarian regime in their country (7,9%) or indifferent to the type of regime (18,1%).

Figure 2.- Support for the ideal of democracy vs. ‘real’ support for democracy

85,8

74,2

19,417,2

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

Venezuela Chile

%

Support for the ideal of democracy

Real support for democracy

Source: AmericasBarometer 2006-2007 Surveys, Latin American Public Opinion Project

Figure 2 compares the aggregate levels of support for the ‘ideal’ of democracy and the constructed

measure of ‘real’ support for democracy found in both countries in the 2006/2007 wave of the

AmericasBarometers. While the level of support for the ‘ideal’ found in Venezuela is somewhat lower

than the one found in 2012, in Chile it is essentially the same. What is relevant is the huge difference

between the percentages of citizens that express support for the ideal of democracy and those who have

consistent democratic attitudes and can be considered to have ‘real’ support for democracy. It is clear

that these indicators are not measuring the same: they are only weakly correlated, with r = 0,186 in

Venezuela and r = 0,153 in Chilevii. It is also interesting to see that, while Venezuela presents a higher

percentage of citizens that have ‘real’ support for democracy than Chile, the difference in this measure

is substantially smaller than on the ‘Linzian’ indicator (2,2% vs. 11,6%). This could already be taken as

evidence in that performing comparative analyses of democratic support through the use of only one

direct indicator might provide incomplete or unclear conclusions.



EXPLANATIONS OF DEMOCRATIC SUPPORT

The assessment of the sources of citizens’ support for democratic rule has been an important and

recurrent issue in the political attitudes literature. Despite the considerable efforts deployed in

identifying the variables that influence support for democracy, no clear consensus has been achieved

among scholars. Common explanations have stressed the roles of early socialization processes (Easton

& Dennis, 1967; Inglehart, 2003), interpersonal trust and social capital (Putnam, 1993), institutional

arrangements (Mattes & Bratton, 2007; Norris, 1999), citizens’ previous electoral experiences (C.

Anderson, Blais, Bowler, Donovan, & Listhaug, 2005; C. J. Anderson & Tverdova, 2001; Singh, Lago,

& Blais, 2011) or the performance of democratic institutions and leaders (Evans & Whitefield, 1995;

Whitefield & Evans, 1999). While all of these factors have been shown to play a role, the variation of

their influence across contexts has been significant and few sound conclusions have been reached.

This part of the article examines the correlates of support for the ‘ideal’ of democracy and ‘real’

support for democracy in both Chile and Venezuela. The aim is twofold: first, to distinguish the

different effects variables show in different contexts, and second, to demonstrate that explanations of

supporting the ideal of democracy may be different from explanations of actually supporting

democracy’s essential features. With these objectives in mind, two logistic regression models are

specified for each country: the first, for support for the ‘ideal’ of democracy, and the second, for ‘real’

support for democracy.

The independent variables used in the regression models include some of the usual predictors found in

theoretical explanations of support for democracy. A first set includes six relevant modernization and

demographic variables: age, gender, wealth, urban-rural residence, religion, and education level. A

second set of variables deals with psychological engagement in politics, and includes measures of

political interest and political knowledge. A third set is composed of political variables and includes

ideology (through the use of left-right self-placement) and a variable that distinguishes citizens who

voted for a losing presidential candidate in the last election. Finally, three variables assessing short-

term outputs of the political system were included: the first one is an evaluation of the president’s performance, and the other two are current evaluations of the country’s economy and of personal

financesviii.

Table 1 presents the results of the four logistic regression models. The dependent variable used in the

models of support for the ‘ideal’ of democracy is again the ‘Linzian’ indicator, recoded in binary

fashion: people who answered “democracy is preferable to any other form of government” were given



a value of “1” (‘supporters’) and people who chose any of the two other answer possibilities were given

a value of “0” (‘non-supporters / indifferent’). The dependent variable used in the models of ‘real’

support for democracy is the binary non-compensatory composite indicator constructed previously: ‘1’

= ‘real support’ and ‘0’ = ‘not support’.

Table 1.- Logistic regression models for support for the ideal of democracyand ‘real’ support for democracy

B S.E. B S.E. B S.E. B S.E.

Age 0,010 0,008 0,000 0,007 0,015 ** 0,005 0,001 0,006

Gender (female) 0,132 0,193 -0,186 0,190 0,037 0,154 -0,293 + 0,177

Education 0,076 ** 0,026 0,007 0,025 0,023 0,027 0,034 0,030

Quintiles of wealth 0,010 0,066 0,103 0,064 0,035 0,066 0,029 0,077Urban 0,317 0,410 -0,056 0,516 -0,048 0,224 0,279 0,302

Catholic -0,233 0,248 0,122 0,261 0,190 0,159 -0,219 0,178

Political Interest -0,045 0,097 -0,221 * 0,099 0,023 0,085 0,129 0,090

Political Knowledge -0,036 0,070 0,185 ** 0,071 0,178 ** 0,062 0,100 0,074

Left-right self orientation 0,025 0,032 0,070 * 0,033 -0,163 *** 0,035 -0,061 0,040

Presidential evaluation -0,337 ** 0,117 -0,187 + 0,106 0,186 + 0,102 -0,158 0,114

Country's economy -0,252 * 0,128 -0,280 * 0,117 0,205 * 0,103 0,308 ** 0,119

Personal economy 0,154 0,125 -0,006 0,121 -0,129 0,112 -0,109 0,125

Voted for loser -0,296 0,332 0,245 0,256 -0,451 * 0,195 -0,013 0,248

Constant 1,830 * 0,787 -1,062 0,847 -0,309 0,596 -2,511 *** 0,677

-2 Log likelihood Nagelkerke R²

N

For all models: Significance level: +p<0,10; *p<0,05; **p<0,01; ***p<0,001.

Source: AmericasBarometer 2006-2007 (Latin American Public Opinion Project)

0,075 0,132 0,115 0,065

892 892 1099 1099

Support for the ideal

of democracy

Real support for

democracy

Support for the ideal

of democracy

Real support for

democracy

754,674 761,587 1125,895 930,411

VENEZUELA CHILE

The models presented above show that the variables that have significant relationships are different for

the two conceptions of democratic support. There is evidence that it is not the same to express support

for the ideal of democracy as an abstract concept as to doing it for an indicator which incorporates the

core attributes of democracy. In simpler terms: the reasons behind saying one supports democracy and

actually supporting its fundamental principles are not the same.

The table also shows that the reasons behind both support for the ‘ideal’ of democracy and ‘real’

support are not the same in Venezuela than in Chile. Only one variable is found to have statistical

significance across all four models: citizens’ evaluations of the country’s economy. But while in

Venezuela this variable has a negative relationship to both measures of support, in Chile it shows



positive relationships to both. This is a relevant finding that reinforces the argument that the political

context and recent democratic history should be taken into account when studying support for

democracy. While Carlin and Singer, in their region-wide analysis of the Americas, find that “citizens

who judge the national economy as strong or report an improved personal situation are significantly

less supportive of polyarchy” (2011, p. 518), in Chile we find the exact opposite: as evaluations of thenational economy improve, both support for the ‘ideal’ and ‘real’ support for democracy increase. This

suggests that performing aggregated analysis of political attitudes without taking into account the

specificities of the political context may obscure important relationships and lead to erroneous

inferences.

Very little explained variance of the ‘Linzian’ indicator is found in Venezuela (r² = 0,075). This could

be related to the fact that, as argued previously, the regime debate in Venezuela revolves around

different conceptions of democracy, and thus it is more difficult to discern which conception citizenshave in mind when expressing support for ‘democracy’ in the abstract. While a good proportion of the

citizens (85,8%) expressed support for democracy through this indicator, it is likely that many of them

expressed support for different conceptions of democracy. Because of this, it is not surprising that a

variable like self-placement on the left-right scale does not show any statistically significant coefficient

in this model. In Venezuela, it doesn’t make a difference whether you are a left or right winger: you

will still have the same tendency to support the ideal of democracy. In this context, it makes little sense

to try to find explanations for support for a unitary conception of democracy. When, in the abstract,

there are at least two conceptions of the ‘ideal’ of democracy present, any explanatory model will face

difficulties, as it will be in fact explaining two concepts instead of one. This seems to be the case for

support for the ‘ideal’ of democracy in Venezuela and this is probably one reason why the model yields

such low explanatory power.

The only variables that have statistical significance in this model suggest that education and short-term

policy outputs are related to citizens’ support for the ideal of democracy. The more educated and those

who evaluate the president and the national economy the worst tend to be more supportive. Or the other

way around: those citizens who evaluate Chávez and the Venezuelan economy the best seem to care

less about expressing support for the ideal of democracy. In sum, this model suggests that besides the

positive effect of education, support for the ideal of democracy in Venezuela is related solely to

attitudes towards short-term outputs of the political system.



When it comes to ‘real’ support for democracy in Venezuela, it is interesting to find that the same

independent variables are able to account for almost twice the explained variance of the previous model

(r² = 0,132). Again, the evaluations of the president and of the national economy show significant

negative relationships to this kind of support: as evaluations of the president and of the economy

worsen the tendency to express ‘real’ support for democracy increases. The three other variables thathave statistical significance in this model are all indicators dealing with politics: political interest,

ideology (expressed in left–right self orientation) and political knowledge. The coefficients suggest that

‘real’ support increases as citizens’ ideologies fluctuate to the right and as knowledge about politics

increases. This goes in line with the relationships found before: the right wingers in Venezuela are very

likely to be the same people who evaluate the national economy and the president the worst. In

conclusion: Venezuela’s right wingers, those in opposition to Chávez, seem to have in general more

democratic attitudes than the president’s supporters. As to political knowledge, it is not surprising to

find that those who are most knowledgeable about politics have a stronger tendency to support

democracy’s core principles and institutions (Carlin & Singer, 2011). What is truly counterintuitive in

this model is that the political interest variable shows a negative coefficient: as interest in politics

decreases, the tendency to have ‘real’ support for democracy goes up. Why are the least interested in

politics more supportive of democracy’s essential features? This issue will not be treated here, but

remains an interesting puzzle that further research on the topic should look into.

In Chile we find a different scenario. For a start, the model for support for the ideal of democracy is

able to account for a greater variation than the one in Venezuela (r² = 0,115). This could be related to

something argued previously. In Chile, Pinochet’s dictatorship serves as a clear reference point that

grounds Chileans’ attitudes towards the concept of democracy. The regime debate, as stated before, is

primarily held in terms of democracy vs. authoritarianism. Because the dichotomy is held in these

terms, it could be argued that Chileans have a ‘more unitary’ conception of democracy than

Venezuelans do. In very general terms, it could be argued that democracy in Chile means one thing:

something opposed to authoritarianism. Because of this, possible explanations gain weight (the fact that

more independent variables show statistically significant coefficients in Chile than in Venezuela mayalso be proof of this) and the explanatory power of the model in Chile is somewhat higher.

Besides the positive relationship to the evaluation of the country’s economy, expressing support for the

ideal of democracy in Chile seems to be related mainly to political variables: evaluation of the

president, political knowledge, left-right self orientation and having voted for a losing presidential

candidate all show statistically significant coefficients. As expected, Chilean left wingers show a



greater tendency of supporting the ideal of democracy. In the same line, it is not surprising to find that

having voted for a losing presidential candidate (the right wing in this case) decreases the probabilities

of expressing democratic support. The positive effect of age may be taken as evidence to confirm that

Chileans from older generations who experienced Pinochet’s regime firsthand have a greater tendency

to appreciate democracy –at least as an abstract concept.

The model for ‘real’ support for democracy in Chile is able to explain less than the one for support for

the ideal (r² = 0,065). The only two variables which show a significant coefficient are ‘gender’ and

‘evaluation of the country’s economy’: males and those who evaluate the economy the best tend to

show more ‘real’ support for democracy. In Chile, the independent variables included in the models

can somewhat differentiate between citizens who express support for the ‘ideal’ of democracy, but play

a much smaller role in differentiating between citizens who show ‘real’ support for democracy from

those who do not. For having ‘real’ support for democracy in Chile, it doesn’t matter if you are a left-winger or a right-winger, if you know nothing or a great deal about politics, or if you voted for the

winning or a losing presidential candidate in the last election: it appears all Chilean citizens have

practically the same probability of having ‘real’ support for democracy.

In sum, both in Chile and Venezuela the variables that seem to have relationships to citizens’ support

for democracy deal with their attitudes to the political system and its outputs. While showing different

patterns in the two countries, political knowledge, ideology and evaluation of the president and of the

country’s economy are variables that show statistical significance, be it for support for the ‘ideal’ ofdemocracy or ‘real’ support. No other kinds of variables seem to play any role in influencing support

for democracy: modernization and demographic variables do not have any significant relationship to

‘real’ support for democracy (except for ‘gender’ in Chile), and only age in Chile and education level

in Venezuela have significant coefficients in the models of support for the ideal of democracy.

CONCLUSIONS

At the beginning of the 21st century, democracy is far from being consolidated in many nations

throughout the world. The recent events of the so-called “Arab spring” and the severe problems some

countries in Africa, the Middle East, Latin America and Asia are undergoing at the moment are just

examples of why it is still important today to understand the conditions that lead to stronger democratic



cultures. I believe this study offers useful insights that can contribute to a better comprehension of

citizen support for democratic rule.

Conclusions at various levels can be obtained. First, the most evident: assessing support for democracy

through the use of an only indicator is a limited approach. As Mishler and Rose (2001) have argued,

asking citizens about support for an abstract concept such as ‘democracy’ will certainly lead to unclear

conclusions, as people have different things in mind when thinking about this issue. In this line, it is

adventurous -to say the least- to perform comparative analyses of support for democracy by using only

one indicator. It is necessary to probe deeper into the specific meanings democratic support have for

different citizens to obtain any useful substantive insights on the concept. Multidimensional

perspectives for the analysis of citizens’ attitudes towards democratic rule will give much more

informative conclusions than unidimensional analyses.

Second, is that the specific meaning support for democracy obtains can vary depending on the political

context. In some places, ideology will play a stronger role, in others, economic evaluations, and so on.

In order to understand support for democracy in a particular context, it is necessary to take into account

the recent political history of the country, and the grounds on which the regime debate has been

constructed on. It was seen, for example, that evaluations of the economy had a positive relationship to

democratic support in Chile while having a negative relationship in Venezuela. Performing aggregated

region-wide analyses of democratic support can surely obscure important substantive findings such as

this. Supporting democracy in one place may mean something very different than in another, and only by taking into account the specificities of the particular context can one achieve a clear understanding

of the issue.

Very low levels of ‘real’ support for democracy were found in both countries. Is this something to be

alarmed about? This raises questions about what is in fact ‘important’ for a democratic regime. It has

been repeatedly argued in the literature that support for democracy is a healthy characteristic for a

democratic regime –if not essential to its survival. But what should we take as ‘important’ for

democratic functioning: the very high levels found of support for the ‘ideal’ of democracy or the muchlower levels found of ‘real’ support? It is not unrealistic to hypothesize that a measure of ‘real’ support

for democracy such as the one proposed here could be a much stronger indicator of democratic stability

than the traditional measures of support for ideal of democracy.



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NOTES

i Another example of a commonly used indicator tapping support for the ideal of democracy is the

“Churchillean” indicator, developed by Rose and Mishler (1996). The indicator asks respondents to

agree or disagree with the statement: “Democracy may have problems, but it is better than any otherform of government”.

ii While this article argues that the four dimensions specified are necessary conditions for a political

system to be considered a democracy, no claims are made regarding if having the four of them is

sufficient to be considered a democracy. There may be in fact other attributes political systems need to

have to be considered democratic.

iii I thank the Latin American Public Opinion Project (LAPOP) and its major supporters (the United

States Agency for International Development, the United Nations Development Program, the Inter-

American Development Bank, and Vanderbilt University) for making the data available.

iv By no means are the selected items considered to be perfect measures of the concepts they aim to

assess. It is evident that some are better measures than others; but they all are –to my judgment- the

best indicators the database offered for each concept’s particular case.

v For complete details on the recoding rules used for all indicators see the appendix.

vi Also, the use of a non-compensatory composite indicator implies all indicators used in the analysis

are given the same importance for the final measure. Thus, it makes no sense in applying different

weights to the indicators if they are all considered necessary for a complete understanding of ‘real’

support.

vii The numbers refer to Pearson’s r correlation coefficients, and both were significant at the 0,01 level.

The correlations were calculated between the binary measure of ‘real’ support for democracy and a

recoded version of the support for the ‘ideal’ measure, where ‘1’ = support and ‘0’ = all other answers.

viii For details on the wordings of the questions and the scales used, refer to the appendix. To facilitate

the interpretation of the regression coefficients, all independent variables were recoded from negative

(left) to positive (right) when necessary.

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