<b>Government Performance and Support for Democracy in Spain</b> - Replication Files

Do problems with government performance impact public support for democracy? Observational studies offer mixed answers. Given the limits of observational data, we present results from a 2022 survey experiment of nearly 2,000 residents in Spain. Respondents were prompted to write about one of two common types of poor government performance—corruption or unemployment. In addition, we asked respondents to write about corruption as generated either by elites or by the system of government generally. Our outcome, support for democracy, is measured using both conceptual measures and questions about commonly eroded democratic practices. We find that treatments reduce support for conceptual democracy but did not reduce support for specific democratic practices like civil liberties or institutional checks on executives. These findings show that in addition to factors like partisanship and elite rhetoric, government performance plays an important role in shaping public support for democracy in nuanced ways.