Preprint
An Incomplete Recipe: One-Dimensional Latent Variables Do Not Capture the Full Flavor of Democratic Support
SocArXiv
Center for Open Science
02/16/2023
DOI: 10.31235/osf.io/rym8g
Abstract
Prominent recent works have measured democratic support using a single latent variable that purports to span a single dimension from steadfast opposition to whole-hearted support. This ignores ample evidence that support for democracy is complexand multidimensional. Here we provide a series of validation tests of the sort of cross-national time-series latent variable measures employed in recent research by referenceto questions on support for liberal democracy and opposition to its erosion from multiwave surveys conducted around the world. These tests show that, across countries and years, this latent variable is nearly orthogonal to measures of support for contestation and participation; civil liberties; institutional constraints on executive power; and prioritizing democracy over the economy, economic equality, or order. We conclude that support for democracy in any robust sense is simply not well captured by one-dimensional latent variable. Such measures are powerful but researchers must be mindful of their limitations
Details
- Title: Subtitle
- An Incomplete Recipe: One-Dimensional Latent Variables Do Not Capture the Full Flavor of Democratic Support
- Creators
- Yue Hu - Tsinghua UniversityYuehong Tai - University of Iowa, Political ScienceHyein Ko - University of Iowa, Political ScienceByung-Deuk Woo - Incheon National UniversityFrederick Solt - University of Iowa, Political Science
- Resource Type
- Preprint
- Publication Details
- SocArXiv
- DOI
- 10.31235/osf.io/rym8g
- Publisher
- Center for Open Science
- Language
- English
- Date posted
- 02/16/2023
- Date updated
- 12/22/2024
- Academic Unit
- Political Science
- Record Identifier
- 9984822158102771
Metrics
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