This paper appraises the state of the field on hybrid regimes by depicting the tensions and blurred boundaries of democracy and authoritarianism "with adjectives." An alternative conceptualization and ordering of regimes are subsequently introduced using a configurative approach. Rather than place regimes on a linear continuum from authoritarianism to democracy, it highlights the multi-dimensional arrangements possible for the construction of regime types. The configurative approach also provides an analytically useful way to measure and integrate hybrid regimes into our classificatory schemes. As a result, it helps alleviate the conceptual confusion in the literature and contributes to a discussion of hybrid regimes beyond the framework of authoritarianism. The paper concludes by presenting a list of all hybrid regimes in the world between 1990 and 2009 identified with this method.Keywords Authoritarianism . Hybrid regimes . Regime classification . Concept building and measurement "The boundary between democratic and nondemocratic is sometimes a blurred and imperfect one, and beyond it lies a much broader range of variation in political systems." Diamond, Linz and Lipset (1988) Democracy in Developing CountriesThe imperfect conceptual boundary between democratic and nondemocratic regimes has been the focus of much scholarly attention and debate at the turn of the St Comp Int Dev (2011) 46:270-297

This article draws on two recent and largely untapped sources of data to test empirically the Tocquevillian argument about the impact of involvement in civic organizations on individual attitudes and behaviors. Our analysis is based on two related studies – the European Social Survey (ESS) and the US ‘Citizenship, Involvement, Democracy’ (CID) survey – that incorporate innovative and detailed measures about respondents' involvement in voluntary associations in nineteen European countries and in the United States. These surveys provide us not only with rich individual‐level data within a cross‐national comparison, but they also allow us to develop and test a new measure of civic involvement that distinguishes between different levels of participation. After employing our ‘civic involvement index’ in pooled and individual country analyses, we find general support for the Tocquevillian argument. On average, those persons with greater levels of involvement in voluntary organizations also engage in more political acts, have higher life satisfaction and are by and large more trusting of others than those who do not. These findings highlight the general importance of actual involvement as opposed to nominal membership.

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