Individual Motives and Voter Turnout in the Arab World: What Role Does Perceived Regime Democracy Play?

المؤلفون

  • مؤلفون

  • Abdelkarim Amengay
  • Yasmine Lahnin

الكلمات المفتاحية:

Voter Turnout، Level of Democracy، Arab Countries

الملخص

This paper examines how citizens’ assessments of the level of democracy in their political system shape their likelihood of voting. To address this question, we draw on data from the eighth Arab Opinion Index, conducted in 2022 across nine Arab countries: Jordan, Tunisia, Algeria, Iraq, Kuwait, Lebanon, Egypt, Morocco, and Mauritania. The data is analysed using binary logistic regression. The findings indicate that individuals who hold a positive view of the level of democracy in their country are more likely to vote, regardless of objective indicators suggesting that the political system is non-democratic.

المراجع

  1. Most of which are based on the rational choice approach even if they do not say so explicitly.
  2. Jennifer Gandhi & Ellen Lust-Okar, “Elections under Authoritarianism,” Annual Review of Political Science , vol. 12, no. 1 (2009), pp. 403-422.
  3. Carolina De Miguel, Amaney A. Jamal & Mark Tessler, “Elections in the Arab World: Why do Citizens Turn Out?” Comparative Political Studies , vol. 48, no. 11 (2015), pp. 1355-1388.
  4. Jasim al-Atawi, “Nuwwāb al-Khadamāt: Nuwwāb Maḥbūbūn wa-Marghūbūn,” al-Ayyam , no. 10926, 9/3/2019, accessed on 9/8/2024, at: https://acr.ps/1L9zRbb
  5. Emilee Booth Chapman, “The Distinctive Value of Elections and the Case for Compulsory Voting,” American Journal of Political Science , vol. 63, no. 1 (2019), pp. 101‑112.
  6. Jeff Fisher, “Electoral Conflict and Violence,” IFES White Paper , no. 1, International Foundation for Electoral Systems, 2002, accessed on 8/8/2024, at: https://acr.ps/1L9zQyA
  7. For example, Ora John Reuter’s study on the 2016 Russian elections provides survey data showing that only 2.29% of respondents reported attempts to coerce them into voting. See: Ora John Reuter, “Civic Duty and Voting Under Autocracy,” The Journal of Politics , vol. 83, no. 4 (2021), pp. 1602-1618.
  8. De Miguel, Jamal & Tessler.
  9. Jonathan Hopkin notes that there are two kinds of clientelism. The first, “old” clientelism, involves an individual patron providing broad patronage to their clients (i.e. voters) in exchange for their votes. In the second, “new clientelism”, the role of patron “is taken up by the organised political party, which, rather than mediating between the client and the state, uses state resources to win the client's electoral support”. See: Jonathan Hopkin, “A ‘Southern Model’ of Electoral Mobilisation? Clientelism and Electoral Politics in Spain,” West European Politics , vol. 24, no. 1 (2001), p. 116.
  10. De Miguel, Jamal & Tessler.
  11. Bethany Shockley & Justin J. Gengler, “Social Identity and Coethnic Voting in the Middle East: Experimental Evidence from Qatar,” Electoral Studies , vol. 67 (2020).
  12. Eva Wegner & Francesco Cavatorta, “Revisiting the Islamist-Secular Divide: Parties and Voters in the Arab World,” International Political Science Review , vol. 40, no. 4 (2019), p. 559.
  13. Abdelhalim Mahour Bacha, “Ittijāhāt Fiʾat al-Shabāb al-Jāmiʿī Naḥw al-Mushāraka fī al-Intikhābāt al-Riʾāsiyya fī al-Jazāʾir,” Siyasat Arabiya , vol. 3, no. 13 (2015), pp. 102-116.
  14. Ferran Matinez i Coma & Lee Morgenbesser, “Election Turnout in Authoritarian Regimes,” Electoral Studies , vol. 68 (2020).
  15. Natalie Wenzell Letsa, “Expressive Voting in Autocracies: A Theory of Non-economic Participation with Evidence from Cameroon,” Perspectives on Politics , vol. 18, no. 2 (2020), pp. 447-448.
  16. See the results of the eighth AOI: ACRPS, AOI 2022 (Doha: December 2022), accessed on 9/8/2024, at: https://acr.ps/1L9zR6x
  17. Ibid. The list of countries covered by the eighth AOI includes Jordan, Tunisia, Algeria, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Iraq, Palestine, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Egypt, Morocco, Mauritania, and Qatar. A total of 33,648 respondents participated, with an average of 2,400 participants per country.
  18. Unlike the first question, the second question was asked everywhere, and therefore covers all the countries under study here. It also concerns only one type of election (legislative) in all countries.
  19. The precise phrasing of the question is as follows: “assume the existence of a scale from 1 to 10, where 1 means ‘the country is not democratic at all’ and 10 means ‘the country is entirely democratic’. If you were able to choose the number which best represents your view of the level of democracy in your country, then where would you put your country on this scale?”.
  20. For more on democratic backsliding in Tunisia after President Kais Saied dissolved the democratically elected parliament and assumed autocratic powers in July 2021, see: “Kharīṭat Qays Sʿayyid: Ataḥul Azamat Tūnis Am Tuʿammiquhā?” Situation Assessment , ACRPS, 21 December 2021, accessed on 9/8/2024, at: https://acr.ps/1L9zR1K
  21. In principle, this is not an ideal variable for measuring clientelistic motives and their effect on the likelihood that an individual will turn out to vote, but since there is no explicit question on this in the 2022 AOI, we will use this as an alternative.
  22. Without excluding the possibility that they may be voting out of a desire to support candidates who are not corrupt, or for other reasons.
  23. For more on this, see: Smets & Van Ham, p. 354. Jordan Iraq Morocco Algeria Lebanon Participated in last election Source: Prepared by the authors based on the 2022 AOI data.
  24. André Blais, Elisabeth Gidengil & Neil Nevitte, “Where does Turnout Decline Come from?” European Journal of Political Research , vol. 43,
  25. This comparison in presented for each country covered by the sample, except for Tunisia and Kuwait, where the question on participation in the Egypt Mauritania Tunisia Kuwait Will participate in next election no. 2 (2004), p. 221. most recent election was not asked.
  26. This correspondence lends confidence to the quality of the Arab Opinion Index data and suggests that the survey provides a reasonably reliable and representative account of electoral behaviour and political attitudes across the region. The data can be viewed at: “Voter Turnout Database,” International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (International IDEA), accessed on 9/8/2024, at: https://www.idea.int/
  27. “Ahamm al-Maḥaṭṭāt al-Intikhābiyya allatī Marrat bihā Miṣr Mundhu 2011,” Deutsche Welle , 10/12/2023, accessed on 9/8/2024, at: https://acr.ps/1L9zQsf
  28. Walid Badran, “al-Intikhābāt al-Tashrīʿiyya fī al-Jazāʾir 2021: Mā alladhī Yajib Maʿrifatuhu ʿan Awwal Intikhābāt Barlamāniyya baʿd Būtaflīqa?” BBC Arabic , 10/6/2021, accessed on 9/8/2024, at: https://acr.ps/1L9zRhx
  29. See “Freedom in the World 2022,” Freedom House, for details.
  30. Karlheinz Reif, Hermann Schmitt & Pippa Norris, “Second-order Elections,” European Journal of Political Research , vol. 31, no. 1-2 (1997), pp. 109-124.
  31. Ibid., p. 111. High Source: Ibid.
  32. This classification is, admittedly, somewhat subjective in how the boundaries between categories are drawn: for example, why set the upper boundary of the first category at 4, rather than 2 or 3? In our view, however, this is not problematic, since this categorization serves only to make the Iraq Lebanon Mauritania Egypt Tunisia Kuwait Jordan Morocco Algeria Low Middling data more readable from a descriptive perspective.
  33. Using the data from the nine countries in a fixed-effects binary logistic regression analysis with clustered standard errors. Models 3 and 4 exclude participants from Kuwait and Tunisia because the question on the integrity of the most recent elections was not asked in these countries. The question on place of residence was not asked in Kuwait. *(p < 0.05), **(p < 0.01), ***(p < 0.01). The reference groups for the categorical variables are as follows: age category (35-44), Gender (male), place of residence (urban), educational attainment (secondary), country (Morocco). Assessment of democracy Source: Prepared by the authors. Predicted Probabilities of Voting
Cover of العدد 21, Almuntaqa

التنزيلات

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منشور

2026-09-01

إحصاءات الاستخدام

43 مشاهدة 58 تنزيل

إصدار

مجلد 9 عدد 021 (2026): العدد 21

القسم

تحليل المؤشر العربي

الرخصة

الحقوق الفكرية (c) 2026 المنتقى

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