The emergence of the Internet fueled euphoric—partially utopian—visions that can be summarized as democratic promises. In most cases, the normative and empirical discussion so far has considered e‑democracy tools and their potential, regardless of the scale of interaction—be it local,...

Women's political participation is essential for robust democratic governance. Despite significant historical progress, women around the world continue to be marginalized in politics and decision-making processes due to persistent structural, cultural, and institutional inequalities. In times of...

Political participation rates have declined steadily in Mexico since the 1990s. The decline has been most severe among the poor, producing a stratified pattern that more and more mirrors Mexico's severe socioeconomic inequalities. Poverty of Democracy examines the political marginalization of...

In this paper, we compare how two different types of political regimes—direct versus representative democracy—redistribute income toward the relatively poor segments of society after the introduction of universal and equal suffrage. Swedish local governments are used as a testing ground...

We examine how political participation and political competition are shaped by two class-based extensions of the franchise in 20th-century India. Creating a new dataset of district level political outcomes between 1921 and 1957, we find that the partial franchise extension of 1935 resulted in...

Young people in the UK are increasingly disinterested in ‘conventional politics'. This has been illustrated by the alarmingly low turnout of 18-24 year olds in the 2001 and 2005 general elections as well as in the shrinking and ageing memberships of political parties. Yet, young people remain...

The relationship between democracy and environmental protection is complex. Previous research has indicated that democracy's effects on environmental proection are quite mixed. These studies have tended to focus on the overall characterization of the political system and not on the overall level...