Is There a Crisis of Democracy in Europe?

Abstract

This paper discusses the current prospects of democracy in Europe from four perspectives: the bird's-eye view of long-term trends; the perspective of citizens' support of democratic principles and their dissatisfaction with the way democracy works in their own countries; the voters' perspective, which points to the rise of populist challengers in reaction to rising democratic dissatisfaction; and the elites' perspective of populists in power. Overall, there is reason for concern, but no reason to dramatize. The long-term trends point to the expansion of democracy; the citizens' support for democracy is still massive in Europe. At the same time, democratic dissatisfaction is widespread, giving rise to the surge of populist challengers from the left and the right. However, even if they gain power, populists meet with a large number of constraints that stabilize democracy.

Populism in Europe: An Illiberal Democratic Response to Undemocratic Liberalism (TheGovernment and Opposition/Leonard Schapiro Lecture 2019)

“…Paradoxically, the populist Zeitgeist is happening as people are overwhelmingly democratic and increasingly liberal (e.g. Kriesi 2020). In fact, Europeans are actually behaving now as democratic theory has always said democratic citizens should behave.…”

Is there a decline of democracy in the EU between 2004 and 2016? The relevance of data selection: a replication study of Smolka (2021) and comparison of democracy measures

“…Especially beyond the procedural quality of liberal democracy, when we include the stability of democratic institutions in the sense of their acceptance by elites and masses as well as their performance with regard to system functions like integration or distribution, the quality of deliberation or factual participation, changes may be observed (see e.g. Kriesi 2020). Most of the countries experiencing a decline of democracy are losing ground, and other democracies are facing serious attacks, but they are still democracies, as a vast majority of the measuring instruments note.…”

Protest against the politicians: Vote switching in the Italian 2016-2020 constitutional referenda

“…While there has been much discussion of democracy in crisis and rising displeasure and distrust among European and Italian electorates Kriesi, 2020), a victory for expressive voting over distrusted parties ought to be something to potentially laud. The referendum offered Italians a means to express a general will without the destabilizing effect of populist forces in government, in other words, it allowed for direct democracy to meet the populist challenge (Matsusaka, 2020).…”