The Sixth Module of the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems (CSES)

Regents Of The University Of Michigan - Ann Arbor, Ann Arbor MI

Investigators

Abstract

The 1990s witnessed a dramatic increase in the number of democracies around the world. The independent watchdog organization Freedom House estimates that as of 2016, nearly two-thirds of the world's countries are electoral democracies, nearly doubling the number of democracies from just two decades earlier. More recent years have witnessed new challenges to the democracies. The largest movements of refugees since World War II, for example, has put great pressure on new and established democracies alike. Will this and other pressures decrease popular satisfaction with democracy? Will it initiate a turn to authoritarian leaders or to populist leaders? The CSES research project, a collaboration of scholars in more than 60 countries, is designed to be able to address these questions and many more that are equally important to science and society. CSES collaborators conduct high quality, nationally representative surveys after elections in their countries. CSES combines these surveys along with additional information about the country and electoral system into a single dataset for use - at no cost - by academics, students, policymakers, journalists, and the public. At nearly 25 years of service to science and society, CSES has already yielded many important results about electoral democracy and is poised to tackle these and other new questions. Freedom House estimates that as of 2016, 123 of the world's 195 countries are electoral democracies, approximately double the number of democracies just two decades earlier. The early twenty-first century, however, has witnessed challenges to the success of this great experiment. One of the largest massive movements of refugees in human history, for example, has put great pressure on new and established democracies alike. How much has this pressure been manifested in increasingly authoritarian leaders (even those elected via democratic procedures) and how much has been manifest in the spread of populism are questions that are ideally suited for study through the CSES. CSES advances the understanding of enduring and fundamental questions about electoral choice. The goals of this unique research program are threefold: to illuminate how societal, political, and economic institutional and structural contexts, most especially electoral institutions, shape the beliefs and behaviors of citizens, thereby conditioning the nature and quality of democratic choice as expressed through popular elections; to understand the nature of political and social cleavages and alignments; and to shed light on how citizens, living under diverse political arrangements, evaluate democratic institutions and processes. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.