In:
American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press (CUP)
Abstract:
Do democratic regimes depend on public support to avoid backsliding? Does public support, in turn, respond thermostatically to changes in democracy? Two prominent recent studies (Claassen 2020a; 2020b) reinvigorated the classic hypothesis on the positive relationship between public support for democracy and regime survival—and challenged its reciprocal counterpart—by using a latent variable approach to measure mass democratic support from cross-national survey data. However, both studies used only the point estimates of democratic support. We show that incorporating the concomitant measurement uncertainty into these analyses reveals that there is no support for either study’s conclusion. Efforts to minimize the uncertainty by incorporating additional survey data still fail to yield evidence in support of either hypothesis. These results underscore the need for both more nuanced analyses of the relationships between public support and democracy and taking measurement uncertainty into account when working with latent variables.
Type of Medium:
Online Resource
ISSN:
0003-0554
,
1537-5943
DOI:
10.1017/S0003055422000429
Language:
English
Publisher:
Cambridge University Press (CUP)
Publication Date:
2022
detail.hit.zdb_id:
2010035-8
detail.hit.zdb_id:
123621-0
SSG:
7,26
SSG:
3,6
