A report by Latinobarómetro Corporation, a non-profit NGO based in Chile, has revealed dissatisfaction with democracy to be linked to inequality, discrimination and disparity in their annual survey.
The organisation run Latinobarómetro annually, which is a public opinion survey of 600 million people across 18 Latin American countries.
Their 2016 report, titled “The Decline of Democracy” or “El declive de la democracia” analyses the evolution of support given to democracy since the organisation’s inception in 1995.
Latinobarómetro conducted 20,204 interviews across 18 countries between 15th May and 15th June 2016, in which they asked people about their attitudes towards democracy. The findings of the report was that democracy has not been able to fully consolidate in the Latin American region.
With regard to the survey, Latinobarómetro says:
“The data gathered over time tell of a region that has not yet climbed to higher levels of democracy. Democracy seems to consolidate in an imperfect manner, remaining stagnant in some issues.”
The data collected in 2016 has shown:
- Support for democracy is at 54% (in comparison with 52% in 2015)
- 23% said they were indifferent about the type of political regime
- 15% support authoritarianism
- 75% agreed that while democracy does have problems, it is the best system of government
The report concludes that social, political and economical inequality, discrimination and disparity are more important in determining the behaviour of citizens than ideology.
