Abstract
This article evaluates the influence of corruption on how individuals assess the state of democracy in their country. Distinguishing between individual perceptions of small-scale corruption and macro-level corruption trends, we are interested in the question: which of the two indicators influences citizens’ judgments of their regime? Controlling for ten micro-level factors (i.e. individuals’ satisfaction with the government, economy, education system, their participation in social activities, their feeling of public safety, and their assessment on whether they are discriminated against, as well as the four demographics gender, age, education and income) and four contextual factors (i.e. development, economic growth, democratic stock, and income inequalities) our hierarchical linear model offers some nuanced results. First, we find that an individual’s assessment of whether the police and the judges are corrupted influences his or her satisfaction with democracy. Second, our results indicate that the same finding does not apply for the broad macro-level corruption indicator; macro-level corruption is rather unrelated to how a person judges the quality of democracy in his or her country.
Zusammenfassung
Der Artikel untersucht den Einfluss von Korruption auf die Einstellung von Individuen hinsichtlich ihrer Bewertung des Demokratiegrades ihrer Länder. Hierbei unterscheiden wir zwischen der individuellen Wahrnehmung von Korruption auf der Mikroebene sowie Korruptionsphänomenen auf der Makroebene und fragen danach, welcher dieser beiden Indikatoren die Regimebewertung durch die Bürger beeinflusst. Unsere Mehrebenenanalyse überprüft zehn Faktoren der Mikroebene (individuelle Zufriedenheit mit der Regierung, Wirtschaft, dem Bildungssystem, ihrer Beteiligung an sozialen Aktivitäten, das Empfinden öffentlicher Sicherheit, und ihre Einschätzung, ob sie bezüglich der vier demographischen Merkmale Geschlecht, Alter, Bildung und Einkommen diskriminiert werden) und vier Kontextfaktoren (Entwicklung, Wirtschaftswachstum, Demokratisierungsgrad und Einkommensungleichheit). Die Analyse bietet dabei ein differenziertes Ergebnis: Erstens stellen wir fest, dass die individuelle Einschätzung, ob Richter oder die Polizei korrupt sind, die Zufriedenheit mit der Demokratie beeinflusst. Zweitens legt unsere Analyse nahe, dass ein ähnliches Ergebnis bezüglich Korruption auf der Makroebene nicht gibt. Korruption auf der Makroebene steht in keinem Zusammenhang mit der individuellen Bewertung der demokratischen Qualität eines Landes durch dessen Bürger.
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Stockemer, D., Sundström, A. (2014). Corruption and citizens’ satisfaction with democracy in Europe: what is the empirical linkage?. In: Debiel, T., Gawrich, A. (eds) (Dys-)Functionalities of Corruption. Springer VS, Wiesbaden. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-04633-0_7
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