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Democratic commitment in the Middle East: a conjoint analysis

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Hannah M. Ridge uses a conjoint analysis to show that citizens support democratic institutions, as well as favoring an effective welfare state and a state religion.

Image courtesy of interviewee. January 11, 2024

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This video video discusses public attitudes toward democracy in the Middle East, emphasizing a significant and robust public support for democratic governance. Despite concerns that this support may be superficial or contingent upon economic performance, findings indicate that citizens genuinely desire democracy, alongside thoughts on economic stability and effective governance.

The author conducted research using data from the Arab Barometer and their own surveys, revealing that while support for democratic institutions is present, populations are also tolerant of various regime types if those can deliver desired societal outcomes. The findings suggest that the drive for democracy exists in conjunction with the need for economic security and functioning public services.

The research argues for a broader understanding of democratization—one that goes beyond merely establishing electoral systems. It highlights the necessity of developing systems that function well and are responsive to public needs. Overall, the conclusion emphasizes that citizens in the Middle East desire democracy and representative government but also stress the importance of economic stability and addressing immediate societal needs.

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X-TIMESTAMP-MAP:LOCAL=00:00:00.000,MPEGTS=900000

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What we've actually seen is

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what looks like very robust support in certain ways

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for democracy or

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what we call democracy and political science.

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In the Middle East, we had this great concern

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for a long time that the support was somehow hypothetical

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or hypocritical because there wasn't seeing a lot

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of democratization after events like the Arab Spring.

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And what we actually find in practice is

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that there is public support for democracy,

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but it's not public support only

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for democratic institutions.

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We know there's other things that people want

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and we know there's other regime types people would tolerate

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if they thought that it could get them the kind

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of society that they deserve.

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And so we also know that all public support

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for democracy is about pushing back against the things

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that are making it harder to democratize in these countries.

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And these are phenomenon we specifically associate

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with the Middle East, but they're not just

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Middle Eastern concerns.

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We've seen a lot of interest in publics

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around the world in support, for instance,

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in illiberal regimes

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or more authoritarian regimes if we think

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that they can deliver economic security.

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And so it's not just a situation

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where the Middle East doesn't have democracy

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and it's unique in that phenomenon.

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It's a situation where we see people all over the world

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who wanna see themselves represented in government

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and they wanna know their governments, hear them,

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but that different regions have different circumstances

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that have made that more

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or less viable for them historically.

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I originally drew in developing this project,

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which is an offshoot of a book project

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that I've just had come out in September looking at a lot

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of data from the Arab Barometer Data Set,

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which asks citizens in the Middle East a lot

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of questions they have about, democracy.

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That's how they translate it into English,

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but they're really asking about the word deia.

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And so I started wondering what it means

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to ask people about a deia system of government.

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And I worked from that into developing my own surveys

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that I did using U Gov's Middle East panel

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to ask them about their attitudes towards multiple regime

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types and compared that with what we saw for support for

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tia, as well as support for a system

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where multiple political parties compete in elections,

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which is what we really think

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of when we talk about democracy and political science.

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And I found that while there is majority support in many

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cases for this selected government, it's not as high

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as support for Democrat.

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Because what Democrat really is, it's a system of government

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that works for the people.

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It's about representing what the people want

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and what the people need from their government.

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So if we think of democracy, less about the elections

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and more about a system that is by the people of the people

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and for the people, then Democrat is really a government

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that's for the people, even if it doesn't necessarily mean

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that every leader in every institution is

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by the people at any given moment.

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So when we look at the findings,

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particularly in the conjoin experiment, what we're seeing is

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that as much as we were afraid, right,

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that people were only telling us they liked democracy,

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that they only liked democracy in terms

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of elected government when it was convenient,

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what we actually see is no matter

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how I described things like the role

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of Islam in the society,

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or how I described it in terms of the economic deliverables,

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we were seeing this

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Interested in elected government in the public.

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And in fact that interest in elected government wasn't

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conditional on their delivering any sort of economic return,

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which is what we'd always sort of feared was happening, was

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that democracy was only good as long

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as it produced a strong economy.

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In fact, we see that that interest

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in government is still there.

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However, what it also means is that almost

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as powerful a drive, not quite as powerful as democracy,

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but almost is this idea of a society

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with a functioning economy, particularly a situation

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where people have jobs and food.

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And so I wouldn't say

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that these are contingent demands, but that they're demands.

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We have to think about when we think about what it means

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to create a viable and enduring democracy anywhere.

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So we focus so much in political science

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and really in public policy on ideas like democratization.

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But I'm starting to think of this more in terms of

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what I'm calling democratization, which is the

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how we're gonna create whole states that work,

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not just electoral institutions that work once or twice,

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but falter when there's a problem.

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How do we make enduring regimes?

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And that's not just an institutional question,

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and it's not just a public opinion question,

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it's an outcomes question as well.

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My broader research really is on

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public opinion on democracy.

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So I look at either in countries that have democracies

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on when they're satisfied with the democracy that they have,

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and in situations where people don't have a democracy, under

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what conditions do those people want

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democracy for their country?

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Or when do they look to other regime types?

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And so the book draws on a lot of data from the Arab world.

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It's called defining democracy,

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democratic commitment in the Arab world.

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And again, I find that there is strong interest in

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democratic institutions.

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It's just that that's facing off with a tolerance

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for many other potential regime types.

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So it's not that there's only one path forward,

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and that's true around the world.

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No country has only one path forward.

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It's just that what these alternative paths look like is

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something that's very context dependent.

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Uh, the key takeaway is

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that people in the Middle East are telling us

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that they want democracy for their countries.

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And that even in a situation like a Conduent experiment

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where they're given a full avenue to secretly tell me

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that they were lying, right, that they don't have any way

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that I can check on them being honest and a conduit.

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And they have every way to cover over that preference.

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And they could have revealed secret authoritarianism.

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They don't. They keep revealing a democratic interest.

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It's just that it's not only interest in democracy

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to the exclusion of all other concerns,

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economic concerns are still vital considerations

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for people in this region.

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