Pro-Democratic, but Not Anti-Authoritarian? Understanding Ambivalent Attitudes Toward Regimes

Abstract

Do those who support democracy also oppose autocracy, and vice versa? Intuitively, the answer is yes, given that these are contradictory regime types, and scholars often construct a bipolar index for analytic purposes. Yet our investigation of the latest wave of the World Values Survey (WVS) demonstrates that a plurality of citizens worldwide now support both democracy and autocracy, and this ambivalent camp has been growing. We further investigate who is ambivalent and why. Using WVS, we identify broad predictors of ambivalence globally, including knowledge gaps and value orientations. To improve causal inference and explore broader implications, we also conduct a preregistered survey experiment with a nationally representative sample of U.S. respondents. Findings suggest a powerful and underappreciated role for civic education to ameliorate ambivalence, particularly by clarifying the contrast space across regime types. More troublingly, they also reveal a strong association between ambivalence and openness to democratic backsliding.