Replication Data for: The Demand Side of Democratic Backsliding: How Divergent Understandings of Democracy Shape Political Choice

Why do citizens in democracies fail to punish political candidates who openly violate democratic standards at the ballot box? Building on recent debates about the heterogeneity of democratic attitudes among citizens, we probe how divergent understandings of democracy may shape citizens' ability to recognize democratic violations as such and, in turn, affect vote choice. We leverage a novel approach to estimate the behavioral consequences of such individual-level understandings of democracy by means of a candidate choice conjoint experiment in Poland, a democracy where elections remain competitive despite experiencing backsliding over several years. Consistent with our argument, we find respondents who adhere less strongly to liberal democratic norms tolerate democratic violations more readily. Conversely, voters who subscribe more strongly to a liberal understanding are more likely to punish non-liberal candidates, including co-partisan ones. Our study identifies political culture, particularly the lack of attitudinal consolidation around liberal democracy, as a missing variable in explaining continued voter support for authoritarian-leaning leaders.