The Perils of Political Competition

Abstract

This article explains the puzzling finding that postcommunist citizens living in countries with higher quality institutions have lower levels of political trust and participation. Why do political trust and participation not follow the quality of democratic institutions? I argue that in postcommunist Europe vibrant and robust political competition has stifled trust and, in turn, participation. Using multilevel data, I show that the polities that experienced vibrant political competition in their electoral arenas also witnessed the highest levels of disillusionment with political parties and, consequently, with the political system. Decades of monopolization of the electoral arena by communist parties left Eastern Europeans ill prepared to appreciate vigorous political competition, which, depending on its intensity, tended to depress trust in political parties as an institution and, consequently, stifled political participation.