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there has to be more to these graphs. what are the people that did not choose democracy choosing? I am certain it's not a dictatorship or kleptocracy.

grzm 10y ago
Good question. Looks like the source of the charts is this paper: Yascha Mounk and Roberto Stefan Foa, “The Signs of Democratic Deconsolidation,” Journal of Democracy http://www.journalofdemocracy.org/sites/default/files/Foa%26Mounk-27-3.pdf http://www.journalofdemocracy.org/sites/default/files/Foa%26... I haven't dug into it, but you might find it interesting.
- SonicSoul 10y ago
  thanks! What we find is deeply concerning. Citizens in a number of supposedly consolidated democracies in North America and Western Europe have not only grown more critical of their political leaders. Rather, they have also become more cynical about the value of democracy as a political system, less hopeful that anything they do might influence public policy, and more willing to express support for authoritarian alternatives. The crisis of democratic legitimacy extends across a much wider set of indicators than previously appreciated. How much importance do citizens of developed countries ascribe to living in a democracy? Among older generations, the devotion to democracy is about as fervent and widespread as one might expect: In the United States, for example, people born during the interwar period consider democratic governance an almost sacred value. When asked to rate on a scale of 1 to 10 how “essential” it is for them “to live in a democracy,” 72 percent of those born before World War II check “10,” the highest value. So do 55 percent of the same cohort in the Netherlands. But, as Figure 1 shows, the millennial generation (those born since 1980) has grown much more indifferent. Only one in three Dutch millennials accords maximal importance to living in a democracy; in the United States, that number is slightly lower, around 30 percent.1 The decline in support for democracy is not just a story of the young being more critical than the old; it is, in the language of survey research, owed to a “cohort” effect rather than an “age” effect. Back in 1995, for example, only 16 percent of Americans born in the 1970s (then in their late teens or early twenties) believed that democracy was a “bad” political system for their country. Twenty years later, the number of “antidemocrats” in this same generational cohort had increased by around 4 percentage points, to 20 percent. The next cohort—comprising those born in the 1980s—is even more antidemocratic: In 2011, 24 percent of U.S. millennials (then in their late teens or early twenties) considered democracy to be a “bad” or “very bad” way of running the country. Although this trend was somewhat more moderate in Europe, it was nonetheless significant: In 2011, 13 percent of European youth (aged 16 to 24) expressed such a view, up from 8 percent among the same age group in the mid-1990s (see Figure 2). this is kind of shocking.
  - grzm 10y ago
    Thanks for the quote. A couple things come to mind: how well do those polled understand (a) their own form of government and (b) what life under other forms could be like? I definitely can sympathize with with the feelings of cynicism and futility. I just can't imagine wanting to live under other systems, given what I've read of history.

grzm 10y ago

Good question. Looks like the source of the charts is this paper: Yascha Mounk and Roberto Stefan Foa, “The Signs of Democratic Deconsolidation,” Journal of Democracy http://www.journalofdemocracy.org/sites/default/files/Foa%26Mounk-27-3.pdf http://www.journalofdemocracy.org/sites/default/files/Foa%26... I haven't dug into it, but you might find it interesting.

SonicSoul 10y ago
thanks! What we find is deeply concerning. Citizens in a number of supposedly consolidated democracies in North America and Western Europe have not only grown more critical of their political leaders. Rather, they have also become more cynical about the value of democracy as a political system, less hopeful that anything they do might influence public policy, and more willing to express support for authoritarian alternatives. The crisis of democratic legitimacy extends across a much wider set of indicators than previously appreciated. How much importance do citizens of developed countries ascribe to living in a democracy? Among older generations, the devotion to democracy is about as fervent and widespread as one might expect: In the United States, for example, people born during the interwar period consider democratic governance an almost sacred value. When asked to rate on a scale of 1 to 10 how “essential” it is for them “to live in a democracy,” 72 percent of those born before World War II check “10,” the highest value. So do 55 percent of the same cohort in the Netherlands. But, as Figure 1 shows, the millennial generation (those born since 1980) has grown much more indifferent. Only one in three Dutch millennials accords maximal importance to living in a democracy; in the United States, that number is slightly lower, around 30 percent.1 The decline in support for democracy is not just a story of the young being more critical than the old; it is, in the language of survey research, owed to a “cohort” effect rather than an “age” effect. Back in 1995, for example, only 16 percent of Americans born in the 1970s (then in their late teens or early twenties) believed that democracy was a “bad” political system for their country. Twenty years later, the number of “antidemocrats” in this same generational cohort had increased by around 4 percentage points, to 20 percent. The next cohort—comprising those born in the 1980s—is even more antidemocratic: In 2011, 24 percent of U.S. millennials (then in their late teens or early twenties) considered democracy to be a “bad” or “very bad” way of running the country. Although this trend was somewhat more moderate in Europe, it was nonetheless significant: In 2011, 13 percent of European youth (aged 16 to 24) expressed such a view, up from 8 percent among the same age group in the mid-1990s (see Figure 2). this is kind of shocking.
- grzm 10y ago
  Thanks for the quote. A couple things come to mind: how well do those polled understand (a) their own form of government and (b) what life under other forms could be like? I definitely can sympathize with with the feelings of cynicism and futility. I just can't imagine wanting to live under other systems, given what I've read of history.