Generational and Ideological Gaps in Democratic Support: Seeds of Deconsolidation in Post-Crisis Southern Europe?

ABSTRACT

This article explores trends in overall levels of democratic support in Portugal, Spain, Italy, and Greece. Additionally, the article examines the extent to which the experience of the steep economic downturn in Southern Europe had specific effects on democratic support across different generations and ideological groups by examining survey data that span three decades. The evidence is mixed concerning the resilience of democratic values in the four South European countries, ranging from stability in Portugal to noticeable decline in Italy. Members of the ‘millennial’ generation appear to be more susceptible to the period effect of the crisis, whereas left-wing and centrist citizens are more likely to select democracy as the best form of government compared to right-wing citizens.

KEYWORDS:

• Economic crisis
• legitimacy
• political socialisation
• ideology
• diffuse support
• democratic satisfaction
• political generation
• authoritarian legacy

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Supplementary material

Supplementary data for this article can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.1080/13608746.2021.2016245

Notes

1. The several dimensions belonging to these two types of support have been much used in the literature; see, for instance, Van Ham and Thomassen (2017), Dalton (2004, ch. 2), Norris (1999b), and Klingemann (1999).

2. Sometimes, political disaffection, for us a distinct attitudinal phenomenon, has been confused with political discontent. Following the suggestion by Di Palma (1970, p. 31), the former consists of an estrangement of members of the polity from its core political institutions and more generally from politics. Its indicators include disinterest in politics, personal inefficacy, widespread cynicism, and high levels of institutional diffidence. While discontent ebbs and flows depending on current assessments of incumbents, disaffection has been remarkably stable in South European democracies (Torcal & Montero 2006).

3. It should be noted, however, that both surveys share several basic characteristics, such as sample sizes, face-to-face interviews, and the wording of most variables; see Tables A6 and A7 in the Online Appendix for a description of the two datasets.

4. Figures A8 and A9 in the Annexe include information about the creation of the dependent variables measuring both diffuse and specific support.

5. By ‘feeble democracy’ (Nikolakopoulos 2001) we mean a period in the political history of Greece (1946–1967) when the political system of the country could be best characterised as hybrid: an electoral democracy coupled with limited political liberties, under which the Communist party was banned and left-leaning individuals suffered systematic discrimination.

6. This control variable was not necessary for Portugal since the only CNEP survey with questions on diffuse democratic support was administered in 2015, so the distinction between EVS and CNEP answers is already captured by the predictor ‘crisis’.

7. The calculation of EMMs follows three stages: first, construction of a reference grid containing all combinations of predictor categories; next, for each line of the reference grid, calculation of predictions using the model’s estimated coefficients; finally, calculation of the equally weighted means of these predictions for the variable(s) of interest. EMMs are given on the response scale, ranging from 0 to 1. We relied on the R package ‘emmeans’ (version 1.4.7).

8. The estimated value for Greek millennials is fairly close to those of other cohorts (within a three-point range), yet the difference is statistically significant when compared to the silent and protest cohorts. In Portugal, only the distance between the protest generation and millennials is statistically significant.

9. The decline ranges from 3 points (92 to 89 per cent) in Greece to 21 points (75 to 54 per cent) in Italy.

10. For a somewhat different interpretation of the trend in millennial support for democracy, see Zilinsky (2019).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Emmanouil Tsatsanis

Emmanouil Tsatsanis is a Researcher at the Greek National Centre for Social Research (EKKE) and at the Hellenic Foundation for European and Foreign Policy (ELIAMEP). His research focuses on electoral behaviour, political identities, political representation, and party systems. His work has appeared in edited volumes and peer-reviewed international journals. He is co-editor of the volumes Political Representation in Southern Europe and Latin America (Routledge) and Political Representation and Citizenship in Portugal: From Crisis to Renewal (Lexington Books).

Enrico Borghetto

Enrico Borghetto is Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Florence ‘Cesare Alfieri’. His research has appeared in various refereed journals and edited books and has mainly focused on agenda-setting and legislative studies. He is currently one of the principal investigators for the Italian and Portuguese policy agendas projects, which are part of the Comparative Agendas Project network.

André Freire

André Freire is Professor of Political Science (PS) at ISCTE-University of Lisbon, where he is also Director of the PhD in PS (2015-present) and of the Bachelor in PS (2009-2015). He has taught and/or presented conferences as a guest at several Portuguese and foreign universities. He is the Director of the Observatory for Democracy and Political Representation, and of the Research Line IV, Politics and Citizenship, both at CIES-ISCTE. He has directed several research projects on ideology, electoral behaviour, institutions, political reforms, as well as political representation and has published about 30 books and 100 articles.

José Ramón Montero

José Ramón Montero is Professor Emeritus of Political Science at the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid (UAM). He has also taught at the Universities of Granada, Santiago, Zaragoza, Cádiz, and Complutense de Madrid, as well at the Centre for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences, Juan March Institute, and at the Instituto Empresa, both in Madrid. He has been Visiting Fellow at the Universities of Harvard, California in Berkeley, Ohio State University, Institut d’Études Politiques-Bordeaux, ICSTE-Instituto Universitário de Lisboa, and the European University Institute (EUI) and Istituto Italiano di Scienze Umane, both in Florence. He is currently a member of the Academia Europeae, and has published extensively on electoral behaviour, political parties, political culture, and political participation.