Democratic values and civic and political participation in the

V4 & Ukraine

Michael L. Smith, Ph.D.Institute for Social and Economic

Analyses, Prague

Values and behavior

• Why do we care about democratic consciousness? One of the reasons is that political values can can drive political behavior.

• Democratic attitudes are not only about what people believe, but an impact how they engage civically and politically.

• Other political values, such as postmaterialist values, have been linked to engagement with non-traditional forms of political participation (Inglehart 1990; Dalton 2002); postmaterialism does not simply motivate political participation, but it also embodies the values that postmaterialists strive for.

• My presentation will explore the relationship between democratic attitudes, as well as postmaterialism, on a variety of forms of civic and political participation in Ukraine and the Visegrad states, using the European Values Study (1990, 1999, 2008)

Q1. Would you say that having a democratic political system is a very good, fairly good, fairly bad, or very bad way of governing this country?

(Responses in % in EVS 2008)

Ukraine Czech Rep. Hungary Poland SlovakiaVery good 18.4 30.1 28.8 23.6 25.2Fairly good 53.6 51.4 53.4 62.9 61.9Fairly bad 20.8 13.3 13.6 11.1 10.7Very bad 7.2 5.2 4.2 2.4 2.2

Q2. Democracy may have problems but it’s better than any other form of government (Responses in % in EVS 2008)

Ukraine Czech Rep. Hungary Poland SlovakiaStrongly agree 24.8 31.6 23.8 23.4 28.1

Agree 52.0 52.4 57.2 66.9 61.8Disagree 20.0 13.6 17.0 8.7 8.3Strongly disagree 3.2 2.4 2.0 1.0 1.8

Democracy as very good way of governing this country

Denmark

Cypru

sSp

ain

Austria

France

Armenia

Finland

Kosovo

Montenegro

BelgiumSe

rbia

Portugal

Slove

nia

Moldova

Azerb

aijan

Slova

kia

Belarus

Estonia

Russia

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

Democracy as best form of government

Denmark

Greece

Austria

Switzerla

nd

France

Germany

Malta

Netherlands

Finland

Albania

Ireland

Czech

Republic

Romania

Portugal

Belarus

Ukraine

Poland

Lithuania

Latvia

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

Correlation coefficients between two democracy variables

Ireland

Finland

Ukraine

Bosnia

Lithuania

Czech

RepublicRussi

a

Montenegro

Netherlands

Luxe

mbourg

N. Ireland

Poland

Slovenia

Hungary

Belgium

Switzerla

nd

Denmark

Cyprus

Kosovo

-0.1

0

0.1

0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5

0.6

0.7

Measuring postmaterialism• I construct postmaterialist and materialist dummy variables (both

dichotomous) based on the 4-item questions. – Ref. cat.: mixed values

• Inglehart (1977) himself preferred the 12-item index, but it has been criticized heavily. So, I use the more conventional “4-item index”.

Value orientations by country, 2009 (%)

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Postmaterialists Materialists Mixed values

Postmaterialism in the CEE, 1990-2008

1990 1999 20080

2

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Latvia

Lithuania

Poland

Czech Repub-lic

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Hungary

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Ukraine

Pe

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Materialism in the CEE, 1990-2008

1990 1999 20080

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

50 Estonia

Latvia

Lithuania

Poland

Czech Repub-lic

Slovakia

Hungary

Romania

Bulgaria

Slovenia

Ukraine

Pe

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nt

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st

Proportion of postmaterialists by GDP per capita, 2008

Proportion of postmaterialists by level of democracy (Economist Democracy Index), 2008

% Postmaterialists and materialists who have volunteered for a civic organization, EVS 2008

While there are very few Ukrainian “postmaterialists,” those that are are over twice as likely as materialists to engage in civic voluntarism

% Volunteered for civic organization

0102030405060708090

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Postmaterialists Materialists

% Postmaterialists and materialists who are members of a civic organization, EVS 2008

The gap between membership in civic organizations between postmaterialists and materialists is largest in Ukraine

% With at least one membership in a civic organization

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Postmaterialists Materialists

% Postmaterialists and materialists who have participated in a lawful demonstration

0102030405060708090

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Postmaterialists Materialists

% Postmaterialists and materialists who have engaged in at least one form of political participation

Since some forms of political participation (e.g. boycotting) are quite rare in the CEE, the data was recoded into a dummy variable indicating whether the respondent participated in at least one form of political participation)

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Postmaterialists Materialists

Explaining civic volunteerism in the CEE(odds ratios and significance levels for logistic regression model using

explanatory variables shown)

Ukraine Czech Rep. Hungary Poland Slovakia

Democracy best for country

1.246 1.006 1.115 1.146 1.110

Postmaterialism 4.698*** 1.328 1.159 1.393 1.469

Materialism 1.021 1.108 .797 .617* .578*

Trust 1.260 .929 1.233 2.154*** 2.172**

College 2.034** 1.499* 2.275*** 1.557 1.682*

Female 1.298 .782* .903 .857 .692*

Age .990 .999 .995 1.010 1.000

Constant .048 .402** .103*** .033*** .122***

Nagel. R2 .058 .014 .043 .048 .059

Explaining civic memberships in the CEE(odds ratios and significance levels for logistic regression model using

explanatory variables shown)

Ukraine Czech Rep. Hungary Poland Slovakia

Democracy best for country

1.212* .978 1.222* 1.099 1.227

Postmaterialism 6.070*** 1.246 .975 1.043 1.254

Materialism 1.092 1.015 .763 .649* .803

Trust 1.070 .853 1.104 1.420* 1.683**

College 2.242*** 1.383* 1.936*** 1.428* 1.597*

Female 1.161 .820 .907 .614** .719*

Age .985 .998 .994 1.013** .996

Constant .206*** .958 .170*** .099*** .258***

Nagel. R2 .092 .012 .041 .039 .044

Explaining political engagement in the CEE(odds ratios and significance levels for logistic regression model using

explanatory variables shown)

Ukraine Czech Rep. Hungary Poland Slovakia

Democracy best for country

1.086 1.676*** 1.130 1.195 1.503***

Postmaterialism 1.883 1.879*** 1.299 1.528 2.234***

Materialism .809 .877 .490*** .821 .857

Trust 1.105 1.036 .952 1.087 1.193

College 1.787*** 1.894*** 1.495* 1.449* 1.747**

Female .719* .773* .957 .634** 1.057

Age 1.007 .995 .995 1.005 .990*

Constant .164*** .139*** .194*** .191*** .262***

Nagel. R2 .036 .100 .042 .035 .082

Conclusions• Democratic attitudes do contribute to civic and political

engagement, but depends on how to define those attitudes– Postmaterialism explains civic and political engagement better than more

explicit questions on democratic attitudes– Respondents have to make priorities of their values

• Democratic attitudes can also impact voter behavior (specific candidates/parties) but that cannot be examined here

• What else matters?– Education is a major predictor of civic an political engagement in the

Visegrad states and Ukraine– Trust matters, though not by much, and only in Poland and Slovakia

• Ultimately, there is a disconnect between democratic values and what we might see as healthy democratic behavior. The latter has a myriad of possible causes, which means promoting democratic behavior means focusing much more on grassroots democracy.