The past 20 years have seen enormous progress around the world in socioeconomic indicators. The rapid diffusion of technology and greater access to capital and world markets have enabled economic growth rates that were previously unfathomable, and they have helped lift over 1 billion people out of poverty. And yet increased flows have also led to rising inequality, both within…
Governance
Democracy Derailed?
“Over the course of just one week, the Tunisian government has made three concerning moves that, taken together, signal a major backsliding in its democratic development. The first occurred on September 11 when Tunisia’s Parliament approved a government reshuffle that enabled the replacement of 13 of 28 cabinet ministers. It was an alarming move, as some of the new ministers…
Egypt
Egypt is one of the few great empires of antiquity that exists today as a nation state. Despite its extraordinary record of national endurance, the pressures to which Egypt currently is subjected and which are bound to intensify are already straining the ties that hold its political community together, while rendering ever more difficult the task of governing it. In…
Beyond the Arab Spring: Will economic and security challenges further test Tunisia’s democracy?
This paper examines Afrobarometer public opinion data to assess the extent to which citizens have embraced political challenges since 2011. Do Tunisians perceive an improvement of the country and the North Africa region since the events of the Arab Spring? Are they supportive of democracy and the way it is being implemented? What role do they think religion should play…
A Broken Social Contract, Not High Inequality, Led to the Arab Spring
During the 2000s, expenditure inequality in Arab countries was low or moderate and, in many cases, declining. Different measures of wealth inequality were also lower than elsewhere. Yet, there were revolutions in four countries and protests in several others. We explain this so‐called “inequality puzzle” by first noting that, despite favorable income inequality measures, subjective well‐being measures in Arab countries…
Fostering support for non-democratic rule? Controlled political liberalization and popular support for non-democratic regimes
When the Cold War ended, many non-democratic regimes across the globe embarked on a course of controlled political liberalization, hoping to stabilize their autocratic rule by mitigating popular demands for democratization and increasing regime legitimacy. But does this strategy actually work? This article uses multi-level analyses to examine how the degree of political liberalization affects regime support in non-democratic political…
Youth, Religion and Democracy After the Arab Uprisings: Evidence from the Arab Barometer
This article compares the changes over time in attitudes of youth in Egypt and Tunisia, two countries that experienced dramatic political changes in the aftermath of the Arab uprisings. The primary comparison is the change in attitudes over time within each country; views of youths just after the respective revolutions are compared with views of a similar cohort two years…
Measuring Public Support for Democracy: A Resource Guide
Individual attitudes to democracy are important for its functioning and survival. Positive attitudes to, and perceptions of, democracy can support collective resistance to state abuse and help prevent modern democratic backsliding. In contrast, negative attitudes to democracy can drive or signal democratic backsliding and even the deconsolidation of democracy. Scholars assume that high levels of public satisfaction with, trust in,…