@aarslew.bsky.social
Assistant Professor @AarhusUni. Researching how public opinion dynamics sustain regimes or facilitate regime change. Comparative politics | Political behavior | Authoritarianism | Democracy https://www.lauritsaarslew.com
Vilde takes! Sjældent forskere tør være så bramfri
Very happy to see this out in @bjpols.bsky.social
The last paper from my dissertation has found a home
The bottom line is that partisans aren't so blinded by in-party loyalty that they willingly do away with democracy. Costs accrue as alienation rather than ballot-box punishment (at least in one-shot experiments).
doi.org/10.1017/S000...
Source matters: learning about gerrymandering from a co-partisan outlet erodes attachments, but identical info from an out-party media is discounted. Media polarization and distrust may shield elites.
Even legally murky, non-explicitly illegitimate subversion (gerrymandering) reduces in-party attachments. Partisans disapprove of redrawing electoral maps to get an edge in elections, though less sharply than for blatant cheating.
The "good" news is that cheating strongly alienates the party base. In-party attachments plummet and out-party hostility decreases. Partisans become more ambivalent: less strongly attached to their side AND less hostile to opponents.
The "bad" news is that, consistent with prior work, vote-switching remains rare. Even clear electoral subversion only shifts 6pp. toward voting for the other party.
Three pre-registered survey experiments in the US (N = 8,800) provide information about electoral subversion to partisan voters. Violations (based on real-world incidents) range from blatant fraud and misinformation to gerrymandering. Study 3 adds partisan media source cues.
In this paper, I complement vote-choice measures with a more pliable support measure: partisan affective attachments. Using more sensitive indicators of voter alienation will help us understand voters' tolerance and support for electoral violations.
Prior work suggests that parties can undermine democracy with impunity due to low defection rates. But crossing party lines to punish anti-democratic behavior is an almost insurmountable obstacle for many voters. Non-punishment ≠ tolerance or support.
Much research concludes that partisans tolerate anti-democratic behavior, such as electoral subversion, because they rarely punish it at the ballot box. But refusing to vote against your party and actively supporting democratic subversion are not the same thing. My new paper in @bjpols.bsky.social:
Are regimes with higher nr's of core supporters more durable? Are regimes with more diverse coalitions of supporters more durable?
In this (published today) @cpsjournal.bsky.social article, @sirianned.bsky.social , @magnusrasmussen.bsky.social , and @torewig.bsky.social I answer "Yes" to both Qs.
🚨 New publication alert! 🚨
Why do some people keep voting throughout their lives while others drop out? And how do authoritarian elections - even uncompetitive ones- shape citizens’ habits?
Ksenia Northmore-Ball and I tackle these questions in my new paper, now out in @electoralstudies.bsky.social.
Re. Trump’s comments on Kimmel, do you know who else have “bad ratings”?
🤔 Do surveys exaggerate democratic support due to social desirability bias (SDB)?
➡️ Using survey-mode variation & list experiments in 24 countries, @pcmagalhaes.bsky.social & @aarslew.bsky.social find no evidence that SDB inflates democratic attitudes www.cambridge.org/core/journal... #FirstView
Det er altså ikke bare anklager for upassende bemærkninger om Kirks død, men også massivt pres fra den amerikanske regering. Altså repression og censur: www.nytimes.com/2025/09/17/b...
Exactly!
Check out this paper with @pcmagalhaes.bsky.social in @psrm.bsky.social.
We examine whether social desirability bias contaminates survey measures of democratic support.
tl/dr: we find no evidence to suggest that SDB inflates support for democracy in commonly used survey measures
Long ago, in a study of the democratic attitudes in Germany, Dalton raised the possibility of “Fragebogendemokraten” (questionnaire democrats): people who hesitate to express their sincere dislike for “democracy” in surveys, providing instead the “socially desirable” response (1)
Arrived and all set for #APSA2025 with two papers:
Public Opinion and the Restoration of Democracy with @robbwiller.bsky.social and @m-b-petersen.bsky.social (Thur at 12)
What Elites Believe About Opposing Trump with @aarslew.bsky.social and Martin Bisgaard (Sun at 8)
See you at the conference!
Who supports free speech, and how consistent is the support? Together with @suthank.bsky.social, I’ve conducted a survey of citizens in 33 countries for The Future of Free Speech. A lot of interesting findings (see 🧵 + link): futurefreespeech.org/wp-content/u...
Steve Levitsky gives the canonical answer about whether defending democracy is the right answer electorally for Democrats - that can't be the question. *Society* has to defend democracy and the Constitution, or they could cease to exist. nymag.com/intelligence...
Spot the difference! Hint: one of them is a dictator, who ruled Turkmenistan for more than 20 years...
#Trump #Gaza #Trumpgaza
Thrilled that my article has just been published at @apsrjournal.bsky.social! 🎉 The article argues that low statistical power is a major impediment to acquiring cumulative knowledge on questions concerning cross-national differences: www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
Delighted that @gregoryeady.bsky.social and my paper "Gendered Perceptions and the Costs of Political Toxicity: Experimental Evidence from Politicians and Citizens in Four Democracies" is now online @apsrjournal.bsky.social (Open access)
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Does childhood exposure to coethnics impede or promote the acquisition of citizenship?
In a new article in @pnas.org, I show that the modest presence of coethnic peers in school increases migrant children’s probability of getting 🇩🇰 citizenship later in life. 🧵👇 1/15
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
Polisky Dictatorsky
Our starter pack keeps on growing! Check it out!
Do you think Europeans are getting increasingly fed up with their democracies? Not really!
New 2024 Eurobarometer data reveals 50 years of democratic resilience.
Top-3 in 2024:
🥇 Denmark
🥈 Luxembourg
🥉 Sweden
Here are the numbers you usually don’t see.
The victory march of democracy has ended
What can we as researchers do?
In the Scandinavian countries, a particular tool is available: Democracy & Power Studies.
The Danish government appointed me as director of such a study. We started our work this year.
A 🧵 on what we do & how we do it
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Excellent pack - I would appreciate to be added to the list. Thanks in advance