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  • Measures of democracy are in high demand. Scientific and public audiences use them to describe political realities and to substantiate causal claims about those realities. This introduction to the thematic issue reviews the history of democracy measurement since the 1950s. It identifies four development phases of the field, which are characterized by three recurrent topics of debate: (1) what is democracy, (2) what is a good measure of democracy, and (3) do our measurements of democracy register real-world developments? As the answers to those questions have been changing over time, the field of democracy measurement has adapted and reached higher levels of theoretical and methodological sophistication. In effect, the challenges facing contemporary social scientists are not only limited to the challenge of constructing a sound index of democracy. Today, they also need a profound understanding of the differences between various measures of democracy and their implications for empirical applications. The introduction outlines how theMeasures of democracy are in high demand. Scientific and public audiences use them to describe political realities and to substantiate causal claims about those realities. This introduction to the thematic issue reviews the history of democracy measurement since the 1950s. It identifies four development phases of the field, which are characterized by three recurrent topics of debate: (1) what is democracy, (2) what is a good measure of democracy, and (3) do our measurements of democracy register real-world developments? As the answers to those questions have been changing over time, the field of democracy measurement has adapted and reached higher levels of theoretical and methodological sophistication. In effect, the challenges facing contemporary social scientists are not only limited to the challenge of constructing a sound index of democracy. Today, they also need a profound understanding of the differences between various measures of democracy and their implications for empirical applications. The introduction outlines how the contributions to this thematic issue help scholars cope with the recurrent issues of conceptualization, measurement, and application, and concludes by identifying avenues for future research.show moreshow less

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Metadaten
Author details:Heiko GieblerORCiDGND, Saskia P. RuthORCiDGND, Dag TannebergORCiDGND
URN:urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-427891
DOI:https://doi.org/10.25932/publishup-42789
ISSN:1867-5808
Title of parent work (German):Postprints der Universität Potsdam Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaftliche Reihe
Subtitle (English):revisiting and comparing measures of democracy
Publication series (Volume number):Zweitveröffentlichungen der Universität Potsdam : Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaftliche Reihe (104)
Publication type:Postprint
Language:English
Date of first publication:2019/05/28
Publication year:2018
Publishing institution:Universität Potsdam
Release date:2019/05/28
Tag:application; conceptualization; democracy; democratic quality; measurement
Issue:104
Number of pages:10
Source:Politics and Governance 6 (2018) 1 DOI: 10.17645/pag.v6i1.1428
Organizational units:Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaftliche Fakultät
DDC classification:3 Sozialwissenschaften / 32 Politikwissenschaft / 320 Politikwissenschaft
Peer review:Referiert
Publishing method:Open Access
License (German):License LogoCC-BY - Namensnennung 4.0 International
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