Measuring Authoritarianism in Latin America: Challenges for Political Science
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Abstract
The growing literature on democratic backsliding has focused, to a large extent, on the actions taken by democratically elected leaders that affect said backsliding. However, it has paid little attention to the popular support of such leaderships and their actions. Public opinion research in Latin America has devoted several questions to measuring support for democracy and also offers some metrics of support for authoritarianism. In this article, we analyze data from the Latinobarómetro study, which has several time series related to the willingness to support an authoritarian regime under certain circumstances, or a military government, as well as possible support for authoritarian measures, political control, or restriction of citizen rights and freedoms. Our objective is to analyze popular support for authoritarianism and its implications for political life in the region. The most recent version of the study (Latinobarómetro 2023) included, along with the typical variables already well known on the subject, a set of new measurements that shed light on the attractiveness of authoritarian discourses and measures, which we hope will contribute to the understanding of the mobilization of latent political predispositions among the electorates of the region. The topics addressed range from the conceptual discussion about what authoritarianism is and how to measure it, how much authoritarian predispositions are over or underestimated through surveys, and what these topics add to the literature on the quality and functioning of democracy, as well as to the understanding of the impact of populist-authoritarian discourses in the region.
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