Assessing the impact of Covid-19 on support for democracy in Brazil: a panel study

Silva, Diego R. de Moraes; Turner, Jacob R.

doi:10.1590/1678-98732331e020

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Revista de Sociologia e Política

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Original Article • Rev. Sociol. Polit. 31 • 2023 • https://doi.org/10.1590/1678-98732331e020 copy

Assessing the impact of Covid-19 on support for democracy in Brazil: a panel study

Avaliando o impacto da Covid-19 sobre o apoio à democracia no Brasil: um estudo de painel

Authorship SCIMAGO INSTITUTIONS RANKINGS

ABSTRACT

Introduction:

While substantial shifts in political and social values typically evolve over generational timescales, exceptional disruptive events can occasionally prompt swift changes in societal attitudes. This article investigates the extent to which the Covid-19 pandemic has influenced the level of democratic support among Brazilian citizens.

Materials and methods:

Our research employed a three-wave online longitudinal panel study (N = 1,301) to assess the attitudes of Brazilian citizens towards democracy at three distinct intervals throughout the Covid-19 pandemic. Our research tool gauged various dimensions of democratic attitudes and inquired about the respondents' experiences with Covid-19 as well as of their close social circles. Utilizing a combination of propensity score matching and a difference-in-differences design, we estimated the causal effect of the Covid-19 experience on both “diffuse” and “specific” support for democracy.

Findings:

Our analysis revealed that exposure to the virus had limited overall impact on our measures of democratic support. However, we did identify some evidence indicating that severe exposure to Covid-19 had a negative effect on one dimension of democratic support, specifically, diffuse support.

Discussion:

Our findings underscore the resilience of deeply ingrained ideological beliefs and values. Despite being one of the most disruptive global events in recent history, the Covid-19 pandemic displayed only a modest influence on the foundations of democratic culture. While this suggests that concerns about the pandemic's impact on democratic attitudes may have been overstated, it remains crucial for social and political leaders to remain mindful of actively reinforcing and upholding democratic governance during the post-pandemic recovery phase.

Keywords
support for democracy; political culture; impact assessment; Covid-19; panel survey

Type	Variable	Description
Outcome	Specific support	Component extracted from a PCA with high factor loadings for two categorical variables on the individual's trust in the government and in the country's institutions as a whole.
	Diffuse support	Component extracted from a PCA with high factor loadings for two categorical variables on the individual's agreement that democracy is the best form of government and his/her disagreement with the idea that the government can override the laws, Congress, and institutions in difficult situations
Treatment	Testing positive	Whether the individual tested positively for Covid-19 (0 - No; 1 - Yes)
	Having severe symptoms	Whether the individual had severe symptoms of Covid-19 (0 - No; 1 - Yes)
	Knowing someone close who had severe symptoms	Whether the individual knows someone close to him/her who had severe symptoms of Covid-19 (0 - No; 1 - Yes)
Time	Wave	Whether the observation is from the pre-treatment period (Wave = 0 - May/June 2020) or post-treatment period (Wave = 1 - September/October 2021)
Covariates	Sex (male)	Whether the individual is female or male (0 - Female; 1 - Male)
	Age	Current age of the individual in years
	Education	Which is the highest education level attained by the individual (0 - No formal education; 1 - Incomplete primary school; 2 - Complete primary school; 3 - Incomplete secondary school; 4 - Complete secondary school; 5 - Incomplete higher education; 6 - Complete higher education; 7 - Graduate degree or more)
	Income	Which is the average nominal income bracket within the individual's household (0 - Up to 1 minimum wage; 1 - From 1 to 2 minimum wages; 2 - From 2 to 5 minimum wages; 3 - From 5 to 10 minimum wages; 4 - from 10 to 20 minimum wages; 5 - More than 20 minimum wages)
	Marital status (married)	Whether the individual is currently married (0 - No; 1 - Yes)
	Metropolitan city	Whether the individual lives in a large city/suburb of a large city (0 - No; 1 - Yes)
	Religiosity (religious)	Whether the individual considers himself/herself a religious person (0 - No; 1 - Yes)
	Openness to experience	Aggregation of two 5-point scales asking to which extent an individual would agree that he/she is someone who has an active imagination and disagree that he/she is someone who has few artistic interests
	Conscientiousness	Additive aggregation of two 5-point scales asking to which extent an individual would agree that he/she is someone who does a thorough job and disagree that he/she is someone who tends to be lazy
	Extraversion	Additive aggregation of two 5-point scales asking to which extent an individual would agree that he/she is someone who is outgoing and sociable and disagree that he/she is someone who is reserved
	Agreeableness	Additive aggregation of two 5-point scales asking to which extent an individual would agree that he/she is someone who is generally trusting and disagree that he/she is someone who tends to find fault with others
	Neuroticism	Additive aggregation of two 5-point scales asking to which extent an individual would agree that he/she is someone who gets nervous easily and disagree that he/she is someone who is relaxed and handles stress well
	Empathy Index	Additive aggregation of four 5-point scales asking to which extent an individual considers himself/herself as someone with the following feelings towards others: I often have tender, concerned feelings for people less fortunate than me. When I see people being taken advantage of, I feel kind of protective towards them. I am often quite touched by things that I see happen. I would describe myself as a pretty soft-hearted person.
	State dummies	State dummies for each one of the 26 Brazilian states plus the Federal District wherein the individual might live.

N° of observations	PCs	Eigenvalue	Difference	Proportion	Cumulative
2,602	PC1	1.441	0.349	36.02%	36.02%
N° of components	PC2	1.092	0.213	27.30%	63.33%
4	PC3	0.879	0.291	21.98%	85.31%
Rho	PC4	0.588	-	14.69%	100%
1
Variables	PC1		PC2	PC3	PC4
Preference for democracy	0.130		0.726	-0.672	0.059
Rejection of democracy relativization	-0.430		0.565	0.565	0.420
Trust in government	0.689		-0.096	0.092	0.712
Trust in institutions	0.568		0.379	0.470	-0.559

Treatment variable	Testing positive for Covid-19		Having experienced severe symptoms of Covid-19		Knowing someone close who had severe symptoms of Covid-19
Outcome variable	Specific Support	Diffuse Support	Specific Support	Diffuse Support	Specific Support	Diffuse Support
Diff-in-diff	0.022	-0.025	0.188	-0.236*	0.001	0.004
	(0.082)	(0.074)	(0.145)	(0.141)	(0.083)	(0.068)
Mean control t(0)	-0.079	-0.082	-0.086	-0.130	-0.020	-0.110
Mean treated t(0)	-0.001	-0.002	-0.144	0.016	-0.038	0.006
Diff t(0)	0.078	0.080	-0.058	0.146	-0.019	0.116^* *p < 0.01, p < 0.05, *p < 0.1
	(0.091)	(0.068)	(0.141)	(0.140)	(0.072)	(0.068)
Mean control t(1)	0.041	0.024	0.013	-0.003	0.074	0.003
Mean treated t(1)	0.141	0.079	0.144	-0.094	0.056	0.123
Diff t(1)	0.100	0.055	0.131	-0.091	-0.018	0.120^* *p < 0.01, p < 0.05, *p < 0.1
	(0.082)	(0.077)	(0.140)	(0.133)	(0.072)	(0.071)
Observations (total)	2,514	2,514	2,192	2,192	2,254	2,254
Control (pre and post)	1,034	1,034	1,031	1,031	695	695
Treated (pre and post)	223	223	65	65	432	432
R-squared	0.004	0.003	0.010	0.003	0.002	0.010
Robust standard errors in parentheses (clustered at city level).

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[1] Diego R. de Moraes Silva (moraessilva.diego@gmail.com) holds a PhD in Science and Technology Policy from UNICAMP and serves as director of the Department of Knowledge for Innovation, Science, and Technology at SICT/RS.