Seminar: April 26th, 13 (CET), Professor Claire Durand: 'The State of Democracy: Do People agree with Experts’ Judgement?'

21.03.2023

 

RECSM welcomes Professor Claire Durand from the Department of Sociology, Université de Montréal to present her latest research in a seminar titled: 'The State of Democracy: Do People agree with Experts’ Judgement?'

 

Event details:

26th April, 2023

13 - 14.00

Room 24.104 in the Mercè Rodoreda building

In person and online.

Please register at: https://forms.gle/GsTNdSU6qpQUq5rt8

 


Abstract:


Several international projects – Freedom House, Polity 4, V_DEM, The Economist EIU index, IDEA’s Global State of Democracy – propose various indicators of the level of democracy in each country over time. These indicators are used in academic research, and many authors have concluded that democracy has declined in recent years. However, researchers who examined the properties of these indicators have concluded that the indices present substantial biases and sometimes contradict each other. This raises questions as to what these indices really measure. To examine further the validity and reliability of these indices, this research has studied the extent to which they are consistent and whether they are related to the socio-political and economic situation in each country.


In a new phase, the research focuses on the relationship between these indices and people's evaluation of the level of democracy in their country. It uses a database of democracy indices and socio-economic indicators compiled for 170 countries since 1995. This database is combined with a database of over 2.8 million respondents who were asked about their perception of democracy and their evaluation of their country's situation in 18 different international survey research programs. The presentation will conclude with a reflection on the concept of democracy, what it implies in terms of measurement and how and why it would be relevant to integrate people’s perceptions in evaluations.

 

Bio:

Claire Durand is a full professor in the Department of Sociology at the Université de Montréal. After a career in the polling industry and a doctorate in work psychology, she focused her research on quantitative methods and polling methodology, including election polling. She has analyzed polls conducted during major electoral campaigns in Quebec, Canada, France, the United States and the United Kingdom. She has also studied the evolution of support for Quebec sovereignty and its determinants and has compared Quebec and Scotland in this regard. Her current research focuses on the combination and analysis of survey data. She has focused this research on the evolution of trust in institutions since 1995.

Her recent research has also focused on the errors of election polls and the role of polls in society. She has recently begun new research on socio-economic inequality, particularly as it relates to Aboriginal people.

Since 1998, she has also conducted four studies on the working conditions of university professors.

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