Participation and Democracy: Dynamics, Causes ... - Jacobs University

Section B then outlines the methodological basis of the study and introduces the data
sets and measures (Chapter 4). The study applies a comparative perspective and uses
survey data from longitudinal representative large-scale survey projects to measure
participation in elite-challenging activities: the Political Action Study (1974), the World
Values Surveys/European Values Surveys (1981-2005), and the European Social Survey
(2002-2004). It includes more than 90 societies on six continents, thereby covering not
only the majority of the world population, but also a great variety of economic, social
and political environments. There is a limitation to this most different cases design: In
order to assure that political participation – in particular in elite-challenging activities –
is meaningful, case selection (beyond data availability) is guided by an external
assessment of a country’s compliance with political rights and civil liberties. Finally, the
measurement of the dependent variable (participation in elite-challenging activities) is
introduced.
Section C presents the empirical analyses – the testing of the hypotheses developed at
the end of the theory section and the discussion of the results. The empirical part is
organized as follows: Chapter 5 (“The ‘rise and fall’ of elite-challenging participation?”)
provides a first descriptive data overview for succeeding empirical analyses. Covering
more than 70 societies over a period of more than 25 years, it looks at trends and crosscountry
differences in levels and forms of elite-challenging activities. A first overview
suggests major differences in elite-challenging activities, with participation levels from
as low as 10 percent in Jordan to up to more than 80 percent in Sweden. On average, at
least twice as many people in high-income societies use petitions, demonstrations and
boycotts than in other societies. An inspection of the ESS data also shows a significant
discrepancy between Western and Eastern Europe, the latter facing a “post-honeymoon”
decline of civic action (Inglehart and Catterberg 2003).
Chapter 6 (“Common patterns of complement or displacement?”) looks at the
relationship between elite-challenging activities and other forms of political
participation such as voting, conventional participation, or participation in interest
organizations and citizen action groups. It addresses the question whether elitechallenging
activities are going at the expense of more traditional forms of participation,
7