Completed dataset for the paper "Why did we witness different Covid-19 protest rates? Risk perception gap and deliberation quality as macro-level drivers of Covid-19 protests in the EU"

We investigated the macro-level factors that affected the development of different rates of protest across 25 European countries on a subnational level (207 NUT2 regions) between January 2020 and April 2021. Building on the theoretical consideration that people's main trigger for rule compliance is rule legitimation. We argued that the higher the risk perception gap between citizens and government the higher the likelihood of protests. Specifically, in case people perceive a higher Covid-19 threat, they are more likely to justify the implementation of strict Covid-19 regulations. This is because citizens consider such regulations useful for public safety and not a governmental abuse of power and this results in fewer protests. Conversely, in case citizens have a high-risk perception that is met by lenient regulations, people are dissatisfied with the government that does not keep them safe and this leads to more protests. Additionally, we argue that because deliberation processes foster a sense of inclusiveness and transparency among the citizens, making them feel heard by an accountable government, this increases citizens’ rule legitimation and their likelihood of protesting. Therefore, we argue that it attenuates the effect of the risk perception gap on protests. We used negative binomial regressions on secondary quantitative data. Our results confirm our first hypothesis and reject our second hypothesis. Our analysis adds to the study of crisis-management policies by investigating how a lower rate of protests can be achieved during crises.