Does the current political system meet people’s expectations? 

As well as asking respondents how important they consider different things to be for democracy in general, the European Social Survey then goes on to ask respondents to rate how they think democracy is working in Britain today. Respondents are asked to indicate the extent to which they think each of the things listed in Table 1.2 actually applies in Britain.[12] They answered using an 11-pont scale with 0 signifying that they think it does not apply to Britain at all and 10 indicating that the respondent thinks it applies completely.[13] 

Table 1.6 summarises people’s evaluations of democracy in Britain. In the first column, we show the average (mean) evaluation given to each aspect of democracy (from a maximum score of 10). The second column shows the variance in these averages. The third column shows the percentage of people who consider that each aspect of democracy does not apply in Britain i.e. rate it less than five on a 0 to 10 scale. 

There is a clear consensus that some key features of democracy do apply in Britain – for example that elections in Britain are free and fair (average evaluation = 8.2) and that opposition parties and the media are free to criticize the government (7.8 and 7.7). However, evaluations of other aspects of democracy are decidedly more mixed. This is particularly true as regards people’s evaluations of how far democracy in Britain serves to involve its citizens in decision-making or ensure the material well-being of its citizens. Over one in three people (36 per cent) believe that the government in Britain does not explain its decisions to voters – rating this aspect below the mid-point of five on the evaluation scale and nearly two in five people (38 per cent) believe that the government does not protect its citizens from poverty. 

By comparing people’s evaluations of democracy in Britain with their expectations regarding democracy in general, we can see how far the performance of the current political system matches – or fails to match up to – what the public think democracy should deliver. To what extent do people perceive a democratic deficit in Britain i.e. do people feel that the current system is failing to live up to their high expectations? Is there any evidence of a perceived democratic surplus i.e. do people feel that some democratic rights and freedoms have been extended too far and should be scaled back? 

Table 1.7 presents a measure of the perceived democratic deficit or surplus on each item. It measures the difference in the extent to which the respondent thinks something applies in Britain and how important they consider that thing to be for democracy in general. Assuming that people will be more concerned by a failure to deliver something they consider to be particularly important, differences are weighted according to the importance attached to that item, with more important items generating a proportionally bigger deficit/surplus. The resulting measure ranges from -1 to +1 with negative scores indicating that there is a perceived democratic deficit and positive scores a surplus.[15] There is no evidence that people want less democracy than the British political system currently delivers; the average score on each items is less than 0. People in fact perceive a significant democratic deficit in a number of areas including equal treatment by the courts and the government’s ability to achieve social outcomes or involve citizens sufficiently in decision-making. 

Table 1.7 also shows the proportion of people who perceived there to be a democratic deficit i.e. who rate an item as being extremely important for democracy (scoring it nine or ten on the importance scale) but do not think it applies in Britain (evaluating it less than five on the 0 to 10 evaluation scale). Nearly one in five people (18 per cent) feel that the courts do not live up to their expectations in terms of treating everyone equally[17] and around one in seven (15 per cent) perceive a deficit in terms of the quality of the information the media provide. 

There is also a substantial group of people who perceive there to be a democratic deficit in terms of the delivery of material outcomes; nearly a quarter (24 per cent) of people think both that it is extremely important in a democracy for the government to protect its citizens against poverty and that this does not apply in Britain. Similarly, there is a perceived deficit in terms of how well the government communicates with voters; 24 per cent of people think that it is extremely important that the government explains its decisions to voters but that this does not apply, while 17 per cent think it is extremely important that citizens have the final say in key decisions via referendums but that this does not apply sufficiently in Britain.