Satisfaction with Democracy. Insights from Sub-National Politicians in Austria

Federalist systems divide political powers especially between the regional and the national level. Both political layers are directly elected by the public and hold autonomous legislative powers as well as control rights towards the national or sub-national government, respectively. Nevertheless political science literature has mostly focused on the national, and more recently the European level, when conducting elite surveys. National politicians or political candidates as well as members of the European parliament are regularly surveyed in single case or comparative studies. The sub-national level, however, has not drawn as much attention. The present paper wants to reduce this research gap by zooming in on the regional level and putting regional politicians at the center of our research. Our main research questions looks at the factors that explain satisfaction with the democratic system at the sub-national level. In addition, we are interested in the reform areas that regional politicians identify as well as their understanding of their own role in the multi-layered democratic system. In order to address this research interest, we present novel data coming from the case of Austria. The country represents an example of a Western European federalist country that devotes considerable powers to the sub-national level although the national level remains dominant. We surveyed the politicians at the Laender level in two steps: First, we conducted qualitative storytelling interviews with members of state parliaments with different political and regional background. Second, building on these interviews, we developed and implemented a quantitative online survey that was sent to all sub-national politicians in Austria. Overall, around half of the politicians participated in our survey and the data presents a representative picture of their opinions. All two paths concentrated on the assessment of democracy in general and at the Laender level more specifically. We test several hypotheses that link satisfaction with democracy to their understanding of federalism, their evaluation of their daily work (legislative powers, control rights), their satisfaction with the electoral process as well as party and context specific characteristics. So far, the data demonstrates a positive image of democracy in Austria. Despite that, there is a certain wish for reforms and changes. Politicians of oppositional parties logically long for more changes than the governing parties do. Altogether though Austrian’s democracy seems to manifest itself as a process rather than a fixed status or finished product.