Drawing democracy: popular conceptions of democracy in Germany

Lina Silveira and Horst-Alfred Heinrich ()
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Lina Silveira: University of Passau
Horst-Alfred Heinrich: University of Passau

Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, 2017, vol. 51, issue 4, No 13, 1645-1661

Abstract: Abstract There are various ways to measure attitudes toward democracy. But what does democracy mean? Here, it is inquired into democracy as concept by getting insight into people’s understanding of it. In the paper, first, a four-dimensional concept is theoretically proposed. Furthermore, it is assumed that word-based questionnaires only provide limited access to the four dimensions of meaning. Consequently, a visualbased methodology is developed and applied. In the empirical part of the study, German citizens were invited to draw and verbally explain their images of democracy. This research yields evidence for following assumptions: (1) visual research reveals that democracy is indeed perceived as multifaceted concept in society together with reinforcement of results found by word-base methodologies; (2) the visual approach brings new insights to the realm of democratic theory; and (3) the four-dimensional approach is a possible framework to cluster the variety of definitions that might be offered by ordinary citizens to the concept of democracy.

Keywords: Visual analysis; Drawing; Democracy theory; Democracy concepts (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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DOI: 10.1007/s11135-016-0357-7

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