CITIZENS CONCEPTIONS OF DEMOCRACY AND POLITICAL PARTICIPATION IN GERMANY. Sergiu Gherghina Institute of Political Science Goethe University Frankfurt

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1 CITIZENS CONCEPTIONS OF DEMOCRACY AND POLITICAL PARTICIPATION IN GERMANY Sergiu Gherghina Institute of Political Science Goethe University Frankfurt Brigitte Geissel Institute of Political Science Goethe University Frankfurt Paper prepared for delivery at the Joint Sessions of Workshops European Consortium for Political Research 29 March 2 April 2015, Warsaw,

2 Introduction The recent spread of representative democratic regimes across the world coincides with an increase in citizens discontent towards representative institutions and actors. Over the last three decades electoral turnout has been in decline, party membership shrank, and the amount of loyal voters decreased in many contemporary democracies. A large body of literature discusses the disaffection of citizens with representative democracy (Dalton & Wattenberg 2000; Norris 2011). One of the solutions to address this democratic malaise has been the adoption of alternative forms of democracy that give citizen more say in political will formation and decision making (Scarrow 2001; Zittel & Fuchs 2007; Geissel & Newton 2012). At the same time, studies revealed that citizens preferences for different forms of democracy are not uniform. People have different conceptions regarding (the functioning of) democracy (Hibbing & Theiss Morse 2001; Font & Alarcón 2011; Bengtsson 2012). However, only isolated studies have paid attention to the connection between citizens preferences for democratic alternatives and their desire to get involved in (new) participatory procedures (Bengtsson & Christensen 2014). To fill this gap and to advance the understanding of such a linkage, our paper aims to investigate how preferences of German citizens for types of democracy influence their retrospective as well as prospective involvement in political willformation and decision making. Germany is the appropriate setting to investigate this linkage for two main reasons. At institutional level, there are provisions for direct and participatory democracy (at regional and local level) that allow citizens to engage in nonelectoral forms of participation. At behavioral level, German citizens make use of various ways to get involved in politics and the public participation reaches significant levels across events (e.g. Stuttgart 21). Our study is guided by the following research question: How do citizens conceptions of democracy correlate with their retrospective and prospective political participation? To provide an answer this paper presents the conceptions of democracy preferred by citizens living in Germany and discusses the effects produced by these preferences on types of political participation (voting, protests, referenda, deliberative procedures). In other words, we investigate the way in which attitudes towards forms of democracy are linked to political behavior. We seek to explain if people who, for example, prefer citizen oriented democracy over other conceptions of democracy (i.e. representative or expert) are consistently willing 1

3 to get involved in referenda and deliberation practices. To identify the relation between conceptions of democracy and political behavior we use a combination of political science theories and modified approaches from social psychology. In this sense, we apply several models that have been elaborated with respect to what citizens prefer when it comes to (alternative) processes for political decision making (representative, citizen oriented, expert) (Hibbing & Theiss Morse 2001; Esaiasson et al. 2012; Bengtsson & Christensen 2014). Our study draws on data from a survey conducted in autumn 2014 on a probability representative sample at national level in Germany. The paper starts with a review of the literature, i.e. theoretical approaches and state of the art, and a formulation of six testable hypotheses. Among these, three are related to conceptions of democracy and the other three refer to classic determinants of political participation. The second section briefly describes the research design and data. Next, we analyze and interpret our findings on the basis of descriptive and inferential statistics. The conclusion summarizes the key findings, discusses the major theoretical implications, and reflects on avenues for further research. Theoretical approaches In this paper we examine whether citizens conceptions of democracy are related to their (willingness towards) involvement in politics, i.e. political participation. Since conceptual work on this relationship is scarce we turn our attention to theoretical approaches form other sub fields that conceptualize the relation between normative disposition (perception of what is good democracy) and behavior (political participation). Earlier research on behavior has indicated that normative dispositions do not necessarily go hand in hand with the willingness to act according to these dispositions (Darley & Batson 1973; Seligman & Katz 1996; McCarty & Shrum 2000; Sniderman et al. 2001). In this sense, research on environmental sociology is the most advanced and revealed large differences between attitudes and actions. Many people are convinced that it is necessary to protect the environment but this does not necessary lead to an increased willingness to take specific actions in favor of environmental protection. The correlation between the general normative disposition and the readiness to act is low (de Haan & Kuckartz 1996, p.107) and the correlation between normative disposition and actual action is even lower (Diekmann & Preisendoerfer 1998). In the remainder of this chapter we discuss 2

4 the different factors to be taken into account when examining the relationship between normative disposition and action. Various studies have shown the importance of availability, i.e. whether devices needed to act according to one s normative disposition are provided. Someone with a normative disposition for sustainability might, for example, be willing to separate waste, but since waste separation is not provided in her country she cannot act according to her disposition. Also research on the availability of sport facilities and activities showed a strong correlation between availability and behavior: sport intention was more strongly associated with sports participation when sports facilities were more readily available (Prins et al. 2010). Local area availability of physical activity related facilities and physical activity correlate clearly with sport behavior (Powell et al. 2007). In the context of our paper these findings reflect that normative dispositions go more often hand in hand with prospective participation than with retrospective participation, because most likely not all forms of political activity (referenda, deliberative procedure) have been available within a polity or municipality. Citizens might be willing to participate in these forms of participation, but they do not have the opportunity, i.e. no available provisions. In the German case there is empirical evidence to strengthen this perspective: the absence of any direct democratic tool at national level reduces the availability of means for involvement. One reason for which citizens are willing to take action according to their normative disposition are considerations on low and high costs. Citizens might be more willing to act when costs are low, e.g., if not much time is needed and if money or other resources are not involved. If political participation is very time consuming the willingness to get involved is quite likely low even if citizens consider this form of participation in line with their ideal conception of democracy. From this perspective, voting which requires small costs will most likely be the most important activity no matter which conception of democracy a citizen might have. Looking comparatively at participation in referendums and deliberative procedures through the lenses of costs, the former is expected to be more likely. The Theory of Reasoned Action (e.g. Miller 2005) might be useful to understand the relationship between normative disposition, behavioral intentions, and activity. Normative dispositions do never stand alone but they are surrounded by a variety of other convictions and attitudes. A citizen might, for example, favor a more direct democratic form of democracy. At the same time she is convinced that political participation is meaningless 3

5 and without any effect, i.e. her external efficacy is very low. Weighting these two convictions she might come to the conclusion that even if her normative concept of democracy includes extensive participation she might come to the conclusion that based on the other conviction ( participation is useless, i.e. low external efficacy) her own willingness to participate is around zero. Finally, individual resources and skills will most likely have an effect on activity. A high level of individual resources and skills will make it more likely to transform normative dispositions into intentions and to translate intentions into activity. Resources and skills are mostly measured via educational level, but also experiences with civic engagement, political interest or media consumption can be regarded as a means to acquire political information (Figure 1). Figure 1: The model explaining relations between normative dispositions, intentions, and activities Resources and skills Availability of participation option Normative disposition Intention Activity/Participation Not included in the paper Internal and external efficacy High low cost considerations Main hypotheses In the paper we scrutinize the relationship between the preferences for conceptions of democracy (representative, citizen driven, and expert) and types of political participation (voting, use of referenda, deliberations etc.). Three conceptions of democracy are of interest to this paper. The representative model of democracy seems to be in a crisis and new models are rising at the horizon. In the wake of the proliferation of democratic innovations 4

6 leading to multifaceted forms of democracy (e.g. Geissel et al. 2014), variations of citizens perceptions of democracy emerged. We refer in a parsimonious way to three models: representative, citizen driven and expert driven concepts of democracy (Bengtsson & Christensen 2014). Our expectation is that citizens conceptions of the democracy are linked to their willingness to get politically involved and to their actual political involvement. Bengtsson and Christensen (2014) showed that in Finland there is a distinct association between citizens ideals and the actions they take. Another body of research has also shown that in the world of politics normative political dispositions and political behavior are linked. Geissel (2008), for example, argued that citizens with a normative disposition of attentiveness ( monitoring politicians as civic duty ) show more intention to participate and they also participate more often. Based on these findings, we expect normative dispositions do have an impact on political behavior. Based on these consideration and as a replication of the work of Bengtsson and Christiansen (2014) we expect that a preference for the representative model of democracy is most likely at odds with direct political participation. Citizens with this preference are most likely willing to elect their representatives, but then they respect the division of labor between them and the political elite and do not try to interfere. Voting is probably their preferred and only form of political participation. In contrast, citizens favoring a citizenoriented form of democracy mostly also prefer comprehensive political engagement in a variety of different forms of participation. Finally, citizens with a preference for an expert democracy might be more oriented towards representative forms of participation than towards citizen oriented. Using the theories from the previous section and the debate about the linkages between conceptions of democracy and participation in this section, we formulate three general hypotheses: H1: Citizens preferring a representative conception of democracy engage mainly in electoral political participation (i.e. voting) and hardly in participatory forms. H2: Citizens preferring citizen oriented conceptions of democracy (direct or dialog oriented) engage in voting as well as in non electoral forms of political participation.. H3: Citizens preferring a conception of expert democracy engage in electoral participation and are unlikely to engage in non electoral forms of participation. 5

7 Secondary hypotheses and control variables In addition to the main effects highlighted in H1 H3, we test for the impact of three factors revealed in the literature as important determinants for participation: civic engagement, political interest, and media consumption. Among these, civic engagement has been often considered a valid explanation for political participation (Verba & Nie 1972; Rosenstone & Hansen 1993; Verba et al. 1995; Putnam 2000). There are at least three mechanisms at work: 1) the development of skills necessary for participation; 2) the provision of alternatives for deprived citizens and 3) a reflection of a general activism. First, the membership in organizations (political or non political) can enhance the political education and develop the communication abilities necessary for the involvement in politics. People can be socialized with the pro participatory values and to learn specific skills that may lead to further participation (Leighley 1996). Although the organizations to which citizens belong do not have (many) political activities, the discussions with other members may have a political dimension. At the same time, various organizations encourage their members to get politically involved in one way or another. Second, membership in organizations partly compensates for scarce socio economic resources (Verba et al. 1978). This favors the political participation though the use of organizational resources, thus making it independent from the individual resources. As a result, the membership in voluntary organizations increases the individual level of political participation (Verba & Nie 1972). Third, following the core argument of Putnam (1993), citizens who get involved in organizations are likely to be more interested in the societal problems. Consequently, their propensity towards political participation is higher than that of their fellow citizens. An extensive body of literature indicates that political interest is one of the most powerful predictors of political participation (Verba et al. 1995; Norris 2000). The argument is straightforward: individuals who are already interested in politics are more likely to participate than the rest of the public. This hypothesis follows the general idea outlined for H1 H3 that attitudes stimulate behavior and thus an increased attention paid to politics can be translated into actions. Media is the primary source for information in general and political information in particular. Referring to the latter, the role of media becomes prominent during electoral campaigns to inform citizens about political programs, ideologies, and issues promoted by candidates. So far, an extensive body of literature has shown a positive impact of media use 6

8 on political knowledge (Scheufele 2002; Drew & Weaver 2006). In turn, knowledge influences involvement: empirical evidence has shown that individuals who closely follow the development of the public affairs are more involved in comparison to the rest of the citizens (McLeod et al. 1999). On the basis of these mechanisms, there is no surprise that earlier findings pointed to a strong correlation between political participation and news interest and consumption (Putnam 2000). In light of these arguments, we hypothesize that: H4: Members of voluntary organizations are likely to participate more than the rest. H5: Citizens with an interest in politics are likely to participate more than the rest H6: Heavy media consumers are likely to participate more than their peers. Unlike the hypothesized relationships H1 H3, in H4 H6 we cannot formulate different effects for types of political participation. The arguments behind the relationships indicate that individuals who consume more media, are engaged in civic activities and bear an interest in politics will participate more than the others; there are no strong theoretical reasons to differentiate between effects for types. In addition to the variables from H1 H6, we control for three variables associated to the socio economic status (SES) income, education, and age that was considered important drivers for political participation (Millbrath & Goel 1978; Dalton 1988; Conway 1991; Verba et al. 1995). Research design and data To test these hypotheses we use individual level data from a national survey conducted in August September 2014 by the GESIS Leibniz Institute for the Social Sciences. The GESIS Panel is a mixed mode (online and mail) omnibus access panel representative for the German speaking population residing in Germany and aged between 18 and 70 years. The survey carried out in 2014 included a specific one wave battery of questions about conceptions of democracy and types of political participation, proposed by the authors of this paper. A total number of 3,983 respondents answered the questions used to operationalize the variables of this study. The do not know and no answer options were treated as missing values and excluded from analysis. We refer to three different models of democracy: representative, citizen or expertoriented. In our survey we asked citizens what kind of democracy they prefer using a 7

9 continuum scale. That means that interviewees could choose on a continuum whether they prefer a full representative democracy, a full direct democracy, where citizens make all decisions or a model in between more inclined to the one or the other side. The same survey structure was applied for model between representative and expert democracy. The conception of democracy (representative vs. citizen oriented vs. expert oriented) is measured as the answer to the following question: Who should make important policy decisions? Please indicate the number on the scale from 1 to 6 that is closest to your opinion. This was a matrix question that asked respondents to make three choices between a) 1. Citizens and 6. Elected politicians; b) 1. Elected politicians and 6. Politically independent experts; c) 1. Politically independent experts and 6. Citizens. We are interested in four types of political participation: voting as a feature of representative democracy, protest as a type associated to both representative and citizen democracy, and referendums and deliberative processes associated with citizen democracy. The use of different forms of political participation (retrospective) is measured through the answers given to the following question: So far, using a scale from 1 to 6 (where 1 = never, 6 = very often), which of the following activities did you undertake: a) Voting b) Participate in referendum, c) Participate in protest/demonstrate and d) Participate in participatory budgeting or other kinds of political consultations?. The order of these forms was not random and they were arranged to avoid a clear distinction between representative and citizen democracy (from perspective of the interviewees), on the one hand, and to begin with the most popular type of participation on the other hand. Similarly, the desire to use political participation (prospective) is measured through the answers provided to the question: Using a scale from 1 to 6 (where 1 = never, 6 = very often), which of the following activities would you be willing to undertake: a) Voting b) Participate in referendum, c) Participate in protest/demonstrate and d) Participate in participatory budgeting or other kinds of political consultations?. Media consumption is a four point cumulative index of three dummy variables: watching TV, listening to the radio, and reading newspapers. Each of the variables was coded 0 when the respondent allocated less than one hour per day to media, and 1 when the respondent spent more than one hour per day. Civic engagement is a five point cumulative index of four dummy variables that measure the involvement (coded as 1) of respondents into religious, social, union, and charity organizations. Interest in politics is an ordinal 8

10 variable measured as the answers provided to the question about how much interest respondents have in politics. The possible answers varied from not at all (coded 0) to very interested (coded 4). Among the control variables, income was coded on a four point ordinal scale with 1 corresponding to a gross revenue of maximum 900, 2 when the revenue was between 900 and 1,700, 3 to income between 1,700 and 3,200, and 4 above 3,200. Age has been recoded into four categories with the respondents up to 30 years old in the first group, those between 31 and 45 in the second, those aged in the third and Germans above 61 in the last one. Education is a four point ordinal variable that ranges from basic/primary (1) studies to university (4). Analysis and Main Results First we present in detail the distribution of respondents on the two macro variables (conception of democracy and political participation), while the second section presents the results of bivariate analysis (correlation and cross tabs). Descriptive Statistics The distribution of the respondents answers on their conceptions of democracy is summarized in percentages in Table 1. It indicates a fairly limited amount of respondents choosing the extreme points of the provided continuum with a minimum of 5% of those choosing politicians (when opposing experts) and experts (when opposing citizens) to 9% of those choosing citizens (when opposing politicians). Table 1: The Distribution of Respondents according to their perception of democracy (%) Citizens vs. Representatives Representatives vs. Experts Experts vs. Citizens Citizens 9 Politicians 5 Experts Politicians 6 Experts 7 Citizens 7 N 3,811 3,758 3,722 9

11 To have a better representation of citizens preferences we have plotted their answers into three area graphs. Figure 2 presents the answers to the question if citizens or elected politicians should take decisions, Figure 3 depicts the different answers on the elected politicians experts continuum, while Figure 4 refers to the opinions on the expert citizens continuum. The distributions indicate that most answers are clustered in the middle categories (between 50% and 60% of respondents) indicating a moderate tendency of seeing policies as a function of any of the three categories of decision makers. Figure 2: The Distribution of Respondents on the Citizens Politicians continuum Figure 3: The Distribution of Respondents on the Politicians Experts continuum 10

12 Figure 4: The Distribution of Respondents on the Experts Citizens continuum In spite of these nuances, the preferences for one decision maker against the other potential decision makers allow the identification of conceptions of democracy. For example, one respondent is considered to be a supporter of citizen democracy when preferring citizens over both politicians and politically independent experts. To measure the three conceptions of democracy, we recoded the respondents according to the answers they provided in three categories. First, respondents with a conception of citizen democracy were considered all those who chose 1, 2, or 3 at the question about citizens or elected politicians and those who chose 4, 5, or 6 at the question about experts or citizens. Respondents who made these two choices give consistent priority to citizenry both against elected politicians and experts. All other respondents who were either inconsistent (e.g. priority against politicians but not against experts) or who favored other types of democracy (e.g. politicians or experts). Second, respondents with a conception of representative democracy were considered all those who chose 4, 5, or 6 at the question about citizens or elected politicians and those who chose 1, 2, or 3 at the question about elected politicians or experts. Third, respondents with a conception of expert democracy were considered all those who chose 4, 5, or 6 at the question about elected politicians or experts and those who chose 1, 2, or 3 at the question about experts or citizens. The three conceptions are mutually exclusive, i.e. a respondent cannot belong to more than one. A graphical representation of their distribution is depicted in Figure 5 where we have also included the percentage of citizens who do not belong to any of the three categories and gave mixed answers. 11

13 Figure 5: Conceptions of democracy among respondents The distribution of respondents on the types of political participation is depicted in Figures 5 (retrospective) and 6 (prospective). The vertical axis indicates the percentage of respondents, while the horizontal axis presents the degree of participation on a six point ordinal scale that ranges from never (coded 1) to very often (coded 6). Referring to Figure 6, it is not surprising to observe that voting is the most popular type of political participation with almost 75% of the respondents doing this activity very often. At the other extreme, participation in deliberative processes has been never done by 63% of respondents and only 2% did it very often. The participation in referendum is the second most popular form of retrospective political participation with approximately one quarter of the German respondents being engaged on a regular basis; this confirms our initial theoretical expectation regarding high participation in the two types associated to relatively reduced costs. Since referendums are allowed only at local level (and not at national) it is quite likely that some respondents never had the opportunity to participate in a referendum if they were not organized in the area where they live. The same reasoning applies to deliberative tools that are exclusively implemented at local level and take place even less than referendums. With the exception of referendums where the distribution is relatively balanced, the other three forms of participation do not have great variation. A large share of the population clusters into one category: very often for voting or never for deliberation or protests. 12

14 Figure 6: The Types of Retrospective Political Participation Note: N differs across types of participation between 3,286 and 3,897. The distribution of prospective political participation (Figure 7) is quite similar to the one about retrospective participation. Voting and referendums are again the most popular forms of participation with more than 70% of the German respondents declaring that they will vote very often in the future and almost 50% declaring that they will participate in referendums very often. However, there are also some noticeable differences. The comparison between referendum percentages involvement so far with the willingness to participate in the future reveals an optimistic attitude towards this form of participation. For example, 30% of the respondents declare that they never participated in a referendum but only 7% answer that they will never do that in the future. The positive attitudes towards prospective political participation can be also observed in the case of deliberation where 63% of the respondents have never participated but only 23% reject the possibility to participate for the future. These observations strengthen the idea that the existence of referendums or deliberative processes in the areas of respondents may have an influence on the distribution of retrospective forms. Accordingly, there appear to be several instances in which respondents wanted to participate but some forms were not available to them. In light of this evidence we expect the hypothesized relationships to be stronger for prospective participation. 13

15 Figure 7: The Types of Prospective Political Participation Note: N differs across types of participation between 3,287 and 3,888. The analysis presented in the following section was organized in two phases. First, we use correlations to identify bivariate relationships between the three conceptions of democracy and types of political participation. The empirical evidence may indicate to what extent there is preliminary support for the three main hypotheses. In a second phase we run an ordinal regression analysis with the types of political participation as dependent variables to indicate the extent to which conceptions of democracy have explanatory power when included in a model with the variables from the secondary hypotheses and with control variables. Analysis (Correlations and regressions) Each of the three conceptions of democracy were correlated with types of political participation, both retrospective and prospective. Partly as a result of the small variation (see the previous section), the correlations are quite weak but empirical evidence goes in the hypothesized directions. The coefficients in Table 2 indicate that people with a conception of representative democracy voted more than the others (0.08, statistically significant at 0.01) and were less likely to be involved in types of political participation oriented towards citizens: 0.05, statistically significant at 0.05 with respect to the participation in referendums and 0.07, statistically significant at 0.0 regarding deliberations. Among the forms that involve citizens the least rejected was the protest where politicians were partly targeted and citizens have limited decision making power ( 0.02). The values of the 14

16 correlation coefficients between conceptions of democracy and prospective political participation are fairly similar. The only exception is the loss of statistical significance and lower coefficient ( 0.02) for referendums, but it is still negative and support the hypothesized relationship. Respondents with a conception of citizen democracy are more likely to participate in citizen oriented types of political participation (referendums, protests, deliberation) and less likely to participate in voting ( 0.04, statistically significant at 0.05). It is important to note that the correlations become stronger for prospective political participation for all the citizen oriented types of participation. For example, the coefficient for referendums increases from 0.03 (no significant) to 0.05 (significant at 0.01), while the most spectacular increase is observed in the case of deliberations where the coefficient is 0.06 for retrospective participation and 0.11 for prospective, both significant at Table 2: Correlations between conceptions of democracy and political participation Representative democracy Citizen democracy Expert democracy Retrospective Voting 0.08** 0.04* 0.01 Referendum 0.05* * Protests ** 0.04* Deliberations 0.07** 0.06** 0.07** Prospective Voting 0.07** 0.04* 0.07** Referendum ** 0.05** Protests ** 0.01 Deliberations 0.07** 0.11** 0.03 Note: The number of respondents for correlations is between 3,014 and 3,604. ** Significant at p > 0.01, * Significant at p > 0.05 The empirical evidence for people with a conception of expert democracy indicates a mixture between the representative and the citizen conceptions. More precisely, these respondents have a similar reaction to those favoring representative democracy in rejecting the citizen oriented forms of participation: 0.04 for referendums and protests and 0.07 for deliberations. At the same time, their participatory behavior does not appear to favor voting 15

17 since the correlation is almost inexistent (0.01, not significant). These mixed attitudes can be also observed when referring to prospective participation where they are more likely to participate in voting and some types that involve citizens (referendum, public decision), but not in others (deliberation, protest). This may be explained by the fact that they consider elections and referendums to have experts behind the citizens actions and citizens do not have the last word to say about policy. As expected, there is a nuanced negative attitude towards citizen oriented types of participation in the prospective question. In particular, it must be noted the turn taken by these respondents when asked about previous participation (negative) and willingness to participate in referendums (positive). These results provide weak empirical evidence in favor of the hypothesized relationships. Given the low variation on most types of participation, the coefficients indicate that there is a consistent relationship between the conceptions of democracy and types of participation, both retrospective and prospective. On the one hand, respondents who favor representative democracy engage in voting and reject forms in which citizens have a word to say (H1). On the other hand, respondents who embrace a citizen conception of democracy are oriented to participate in direct, deliberative, or protest forms and less in voting (H2). The respondents favoring expert democracy display mixed attitudes towards forms of participation (H3) being closer to the representative conception in retrospective and somewhat closer to citizens in prospective participation. Let us now include the conceptions of democracy in a regression model next to other variables. 1 The four models in Table 3 present the results of the ordered logistic regression for the retrospective forms of participation. The values of Pseudo R 2 indicate a relatively weak fit of the model to the presented data with best estimation for voting (also with the higher number of respondents). The odds ratios indicate support for H1: respondents with a conception of representative democracy are 1.36 times more likely to vote than the other respondents and 0.63 times, 0.84 times, and 0.57 times less likely to have participated in referendums, protests, respectively deliberations. The multivariate analysis strengthens the conclusions of the bivariate relationships and indicates that respondents with a conception of expert democracy have mixed feelings and there is no effect on voting and protests but 1 We ran a collinearity test among the predictor variables. The results indicate there is no strong correlation between any of the independent variables. In addition, when running the ordered logistic regression we have asked STATA to drop collinear variables during analysis and they were all included. 16

18 strongly oppose referendums and deliberations (H3). In three out of the four models presented there is almost no empirical support for H2. The citizen conception of democracy has no effect on referendums and deliberations the most obvious forms of citizen involvement. Instead, these respondents are 1.21 times more likely to engage in protests compared to the others (not statistically significant) and this contrasts sharply with the attitudes of respondents with representative democracy. 2 Table 3: Ordered Logistic Regression for retrospective political participation Voting Referendum Protests Deliberations Representative democracy 1.36* (0.19) 0.63** (0.07) 0.84 (0.09) 0.57** (0.07) Citizen democracy 1.06 (0.14) 0.98 (0.11) 1.21 (0.14) 1.01 (0.12) Expert democracy 1.01 (0.13) 0.78* (0.08) 0.95 (0.10) 0.70** (0.08) Civic engagement 1.41** (0.11) 1.25** (0.07) 1.71** (0.09) 1.60** (0.09) Interest in politics 2.26** (0.14) 1.32** (0.06) 1.55** (0.07) 1.43** (0.07) Media consumption 1.05 (0.04) 1.03 (0.03) 0.93* (0.03) 0.97 (0.04) Income 1.40** (0.07) 1.14** (0.04) 1.12** (0.04) 1.07 (0.05) Age 2.03** (0.11) 1.21** (0.05) 1.11* (0.05) 1.12* (0.05) Education 1.75** (0.12) 0.95 (0.05) 1.39** (0.07) 0.79** (0.05) N 2,920 2,436 2,753 2,486 LR Chi Pseudo R Note: Coefficients are odds ratios (standard errors in brackets) ** Significant at p > 0.01, * Significant at p > In interpreting the results of the ordered logistic regression we refer both to the strength and the statistical significance of coefficients. In spite of arguments in favor of interpretations limited strictly to statistical significance, we consider that the strength of effects provides important insights for our arguments. 17

19 All other variables with the exception of media consumption (H6) have a relatively strong and consistent effect across all four types of political participation; there is strong empirical support for the secondary hypotheses H4 and H5. For example, individuals with interest in politics are 2.26 times more likely to vote, 1.32 times more likely to participate in referendums, 1.55 times to be engaged in protests, and 1.43 times to participate in deliberative processes; all coefficients are statistically significant at the 0.01 level. In the context of this paper it is relevant to note that most of the supplementary and control variables have a similar effect on the types of participation. As illustrated in the example above, people who bear interest in politics are more likely to participate, irrespective of the type. This holds for civically engaged individuals, those with higher income, and older people. It is true that the strength of effect varies but all effects go in the same direction. 3 The consistency of effects across types of political participation increases the value of the observation related to the conceptions of democracy where effects although weak clearly differ. The results in Table 4 refer to prospective political participation and tell a similar story to the one above. There is empirical support for the hypotheses formulated about conceptions of representative and expert democracy and only partial support when it comes to citizen democracy. The individuals with such a conception have a consistent positive attitude towards all types of political participation. While there is strong and statistically significant at 0.01 on the willingness to participate in referendums and in deliberations, such a conception of democracy also has positive effects on the likelihood of voting and protesting (both significant at 0.05). Similarly to retrospective participation, there is no empirical support for H5 as media consumption appears to make a small difference only in the case of protests. Instead, there is strong and robust empirical evidence to support H5 and H6. Income and age do no longer have a consistent effect across all types of political participation and appear to make no difference in protests and deliberations. Education is also somewhat different compared with the retrospective models: it has no effect on deliberations and strong positive effects on the remaining three types. 3 Education is an outlier and indicates that less educated people are likely to particiate in deliberations, more educated people in voting and protests and has almost no effect in referendums. 18

20 Table 4: Ordered Logistic Regression for prospective political participation Voting Referendum Protests Deliberations Retrospective Representative democracy 1.74** (0.23) 0.87 (0.09) 0.87 (0.09) 0.70** (0.08) Citizen democracy 1.33* (0.17) 1.57** (0.17) 1.29* (0.14) 1.33** (1.15) Expert democracy 1.60** (0.20) 1.32** (0.14) 1.02 (0.10) 0.86 (0.09) Civic engagement 1.30** (0.10) 1.11* (0.06) 1.56** (0.08) 1.45** (0.08) Interest in politics 2.00** (0.12) 1.78** (0.08) 1.50** (0.06) 1.62** (0.07) Media consumption 0.98 (0.04) 0.99 (0.03) 0.94* (0.03) 0.94 (0.03) Income 1.24** (0.06) 1.09* (0.04) 1.04 (0.04) 1.01 (0.04) Age 1.39** (0.07) 1.15** (0.05) 0.97 (0.04) 1.02 (0.04) Education 1.71** (0.11) 1.50** (0.08) 1.40** (0.07) 1.04 (0.05) N 2,918 2,779 2,774 2,474 LR Chi Pseudo R Note: Coefficients are odds ratios (standard errors in brackets) ** Significant at p > 0.01, * Significant at p > 0.05 Conclusions This paper aimed to identify the way in which preferences of German citizens for types of democracy influence their retrospective and prospective involvement in politics. Similar to previous results for the Finish population (Bengtsson & Christensen 2014) we found that citizens have different ideas about how a democracy should look like. Most citizens prefer a mixture of representative, citizen oriented, and expert democracy with different prioritizations. More important, there is a correlation between citizens perception of 19

21 democracy and their intentions for political behavior. We found empirical evidence for most of our (primary) hypotheses. Citizens favoring representative democracy are less inclined to take part in participatory devices, whereas citizens favoring a citizen oriented concept of democracy are more willing to get involved in them. Those citizens who favor a more expert oriented democracy, show mixed participation intentions. Looking at our regression analyses these findings hold. However, not all of our secondary hypotheses and control variables turned out to be explanatory. The SES was kind of a mixed bag and did not show clear patterns; furthermore, there is no empirical support for the hypothesis about media consumption. The other two factors (civic engagement and interest in politics) turned out to have an effect on participation. There is a difference between retrospective and prospective participation that can be interpreted in the light of availability of tools. Our findings bear theoretical and empirical implications that move beyond the investigated single case study. First, in the German case, the correlation between conceptions of democracy and political participation was stronger for prospective intentions then for retrospective behavior. Respondents favoring citizen oriented democracy are more inclined to participate in the future than they did up to now. Accounting for theoretical approaches aimed at understanding the relation between normative disposition, intention and activity, our findings suggest, that availability is an important dimension. If participatory devices are available citizens use them; if they are not available citizen can just formulate their intention to apply them. However, this implication is preliminary. Since we have no information about whether forms of participation were available within the respondents areas/municipalities the implication can be more regarded as a hunch. Further research is necessary to show whether this assumption can be grounded empirically. The second implication refers to the concept of democracy and the self conception of citizens. In particular, the concept of expert democracy is relevant. Citizens favoring an expert democracy do not necessarily want to rely on professional experts. Quite on the contrary and they show an intention to be more involved in political matters at least in the future. We might conclude that their preference for expert democracy does not necessarily mean they favor professional experts. At least partly they consider themselves as experts and want to be taken into account in political will formation and decision making. Our study has shown that research on the linkage between citizens conception of democracy and participation is fruitful and will probably be even more fruitful in the 20

22 following period because new models of democracy proliferate around the world with citizens asking for more say in political will formation and decision making. This development has to be accompanied by empirical research in at least two directions. On the one hand, it will be instructive to empirically assess our idea about the importance of availability. To test our assumption whether the availability of participatory options plays a role for political involvement and how big this role is, options for political participation and participation at local level should be correlated. While this is not easy due to scarce data about participation provisions, research in this field would contribute significantly to our knowledge about participation and democracy. On the other hand, we need in depth research to identify the determinants of the relationship between conceptions and participation, i.e. a broader framework with several explanatory factors. While we have shown the existence of a linkage between normative beliefs and activity, the causal mechanisms require careful investigation. 21

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