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Do pandemics reduce support for democracy? A survey experiment in Myanmar

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 August 2024

Swe Oo Mon Open the ORCID record for Swe Oo Mon [Opens in a new window]  and
Kyohei Yamada Open the ORCID record for Kyohei Yamada [Opens in a new window]
Swe Oo Mon
Affiliation:
Graduate School of International Relations, International University of Japan, Minamiuonuma, Japan
Kyohei Yamada*
Affiliation:
Graduate School of International Relations, International University of Japan, Minamiuonuma, Japan
*
Corresponding author: Kyohei Yamada; Email: kyamada@iuj.ac.jp
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Abstract

This paper focuses on people's attitudes towards democracy and authoritarian regimes in Myanmar and whether the extent to which they prefer democracy is moderated by the severity of the coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. If people view the authoritarian regime's capacity to take swift action favourably, their opposition to it may be lower. We explored this hypothesis by conducting a survey of 756 individuals in Myanmar in June 2022 that incorporated a vignette experiment. A hypothetical scenario of Myanmar society in 2023 was presented with a two-by-two design – the conditions of the government (election is restored or not) and the pandemic situation (good or bad) were randomly varied, and the respondents were asked to report their favourability of the hypothetical scenario. The results reveal: (1) regardless of the pandemic condition, respondents prefer democracy to authoritarian regimes by a wide margin; and (2) the extent to which democracy is preferred is lower when the COVID-19 condition is more severe. Similar results were obtained from supplementary analyses using a conjoint experiment.

Keywords

COVID-19democracysurvey experiment
Type
Research Article
Information
Japanese Journal of Political Science , First View , pp. 1 - 22
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2024. Published by Cambridge University Press

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