Social capital and support for democracy and autocracy in Moldova.

Haerpfer, Christian (2016). Social capital and support for democracy and autocracy in Moldova. [Data Collection]. Colchester, Essex: UK Data Archive. 10.5255/UKDA-SN-852277

The late twentieth century has seen the greatest experiment in democracy in human history. Understanding how and under what conditions democracy flourishes is the central purpose of this project. It examines the social capital and support for the principles and practices of democracy among the mass publics of Moldova. The project will monitor support for democracy and its autocratic alternatives. This will generate an account of post-communist political transformations and their relationships with the formation of post-communist social capital. The development of social capital and the emergence and potential consolidation of democracy in one post-Soviet state has important implications for decision-makers. A successful consolidation of democracy in Moldova would prepare the way to integrate Moldova into the European Union, following her neighbor Romania. A fully democratic system in Moldova has important strategic implications for the future enlargement of the European Union, as a stable political environment is a pre-condition for inclusion. If the study reveals a low level of social capital in Moldova, then effective policy measures can be implemented to strengthen civil society in Moldova and ensure the requisite level of political and economic stability is attained.

Data description (abstract)

This data collection consists of survey data collected in 2007 in the Republic of Moldova. The project has been designed to monitor the impact of social capital on both normative and practical support for the principles and practices of democracy and its alternatives and to generate a comprehensive, balanced, and dynamic account of political transformations taking place in Moldova from the perspective of the mass citizenry experiencing those changes on a daily basis. The main research questions are analyzing the existence of a correlation between levels of social capital and successful democratization, between levels of social capital and support for democracy and finally, between levels of social capital and support for democracy as an ideal form of regime (Dowley and Silver 2002). The working hypothesis is that high levels of social capital at the individual level are associated with high levels of political support for democracy, even if the overall extent of social capital might be comparatively low. The impact of divisions between Russian speakers and Romanian speakers upon political support for democracy or autocracy was also measured. One of the outputs of the ESRC Research Grant is a monograph on ‘Social Capital and Support for Democracy and Autocracy in Moldova’.

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