Public Opinion and Processes Commonly

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He points out that the "real culprit" for the changes in recent decades, in the countries where they have occurred, has been a changing economic climate and not a fundamental political spirit. Similarly, he finds little evidence of crisis in other common actions of political dissatisfaction, such as protests. He argues that, despite well-publicized outbreaks such as the gilets jaunes (yellow vests) in France, there has been no overall rise in protests this century; he also does not find, in any case, that this activity is clearly correlated with democratic dissatisfaction.

It detects, among the countries with low satisfaction, “a huge variation in the prevalence of protest activity”, ranging from the participation of 2% of the population each year in Poland, Estonia and Lithuania to ten times C Level Contact List in Spain and Greece. , countries where the protest seems "to form part of the way of life". Returning to places where there have been real democratic pushbacks, such as Hungary and Poland , here too Bartels challenges the common view that this is largely due to the spread of an anti-democratic ethos, increasingly pro-authoritarian attitudes, and growing xenophobia.



On the contrary, he argues that Fidesz in Hungary and Law and Justice in Poland presented themselves as more conservative than anti-democratic parties, and that those who voted for them did so because they had conservative preferences, not xenophobic or authoritarian ones. In short, it is a mistake to consider that a democratic setback occurred "because the voters wanted authoritarianism." Rather it was the result of "what began as mainstream conservative parties (...) seizing opportunities to entrench themselves in power.Crucial political leadership Bartels's other main argument in Democracy Erodes from the Top , rehearsed in his earlier works, is that political outcomes have little to do with what the citizenry wants. On the contrary, he believes, as the title indicates, that the behavior of the elites is decisive.