There is no alternative? How voters perceive democratic choices over economic policies

Globalization and Europeanization have restricted national autonomy over economic policies in advanced democracies and led to an increased convergence of party positions on economic issues. As a result, democracies face a responsiveness dilemma where economic choices are increasingly out of the reach of voters. Do citizens feel that they face more and more meaningless elections that do not lead to changes in economic policy? In this paper, we use novel data from a representative online survey fielded in Portugal and Germany that measures, for the first time, economic choice perceptions on the individual level. Economic choice is defined as (1) the variety of economic policy alternatives proposed by political actors (economic policy offer); and (2) the degree to which political actors are able and willing to fulfil their electoral promises once in government (economic mandate fulfilment). We aim to establish whether voters perceive their economic policy choice as limited; whether they are aware of the economic constraints that their governments face; and if a perceived lack of economic choice negatively affects support for democracy.