DEMOCRACY WATCHWhy Do People Continue to Support Politicians Who Attack Their Democracies? Expert Q&A
Most people in most countries say it is important to them that they live in a democracy. Yet, many people who claim to care about democracy also support political leaders and movements that have attacked democratic institutions and values. Even when people agree about the fundamental definition of democracy, they may disagree over how democracy is implemented in practice. Anti-democratic political leaders can take advantage of these disagreements to argue that their actions defend rather than disrupt democracy.
Ahead of a public event in London on May 8 on what the latest research can tell us about the state of democracy, The Conversation asked Scott Williamson, Associate Professor in Comparative Political Economy at the University of Oxford, to help us understand why people don’t always immediately push back when politicians attack their democracies.
Your findings show that people around the world have relatively similar ideas about what democracy means and are relatively committed to this idea of democratic governance. So why are so many people polarized about whether today’s crop of politicians are attacking our democracies and what to do about it?
Most people in most countries say it is important to them that they live in a democracy. Research by my colleagues and me also suggests that people tend to agree that competitive elections and protections for civil liberties are central elements of democratic governance.
Yet, many people who claim to care about democracy also support political leaders and movements that have attacked democratic institutions and values.
We have to recognize that even when people agree about the fundamental definition of democracy, there is still plenty of room to disagree over the specifics of how democracy is implemented in practice.
Anti-democratic political leaders can take advantage of these disagreements to argue that their actions defend rather than disrupt democracy. Their supporters will often be motivated to believe these claims, especially where politics and the media are highly polarized.
In the US, Donald Trump and the Republican party have long argued they are protecting American democracy from the deep state and the Democratic party. A prominent example is the claim that Democrats stole the 2020 election, and that subsequent charges against Trump were an attempt at political persecution.
This message is consistently amplified by rightwing media. Such claims are false, but they create a framework for justifying Trump’s actions in democratic terms.
A second potential problem is that people who understand democracy similarly and view democracy favorably may still decide that opposing anti-democratic leaders is less important than securing other political objectives. Several recent studies suggest that people in many countries, including the United States, are reluctant to make such trade-offs. Commitment to democracy is relatively strong.
