Process or Outcome? Popular Conceptualisations of Democracy in the Arab World

How do people in the Arab world conceive of democracy? Many studies have used survey data to explore the factors which lead individuals in the Arab world to support or reject democracy, but there has been little research into what survey respondents think of when they are being asked about democracy. In this paper, I use data from several waves of the Arab Barometer survey project to investigate how Arabs interpret democracy, the factors which influence these conceptualisations and the effects that these conceptualisations have. I show that there is a significant divide between those who see democracy as a process, involving elections, political equality and freedom to criticize the government, and those who see democracy as an outcome, involving economic equality and provision of public welfare goods. Those with a greater level of education, who show more interest in and knowledge of politics and who are more religious hold more process-oriented conceptions of democracy. More outcome-oriented conceptions of democracy are associated with greater support for democracy in general and in respondents’ own countries. These findings contribute to important debates about the nature of public support for democracy in the Arab world, the compatibility between Islam and democracy and the difficulties of cross-national survey research on essentially contested concepts.