Monica Ferrin Pereira (Collegio Carlo Alberto)

“Types of democrats in Europe. Hierarchy and differences”

Abstract

Democracy is one of the most problematic concepts in political science, as there is no agreement on how it should be defined and operationalised. Lack of consensus among the theorists has made it difficult to empirically undertake the study of democratic attitudes. In fact, although in the last years much has been written on public opinion on democracy, few studies have directly addressed people’s understandings of democracy. This paper proposes a tentative approach to citizens’ conceptions of democracy in Europe, both theoretically and empirically.