No abstract

In the light of the economic, political and social significance of the middle class for South Africa's emerging democracy, we critically examine contrasting conceptualisa-tions of social class. We compare four rival approaches to empirical estimation of class: an occupational skill measure, a vulnerability indictor, an income polarisation approach and subjective social status.There is considerable variation in who is classified as middle class based on the definition that is employed and, in particular, a marked difference between subjective and objective notions of social class. We caution against overoptimistic predictions based on the growth of the black middle class. While the surge in the black middle class is expected to help dismantle the association between race and class in South Africa, the analysis suggests that notions of identity may adjust more slowly to these new realities and consequently, racial integration and social cohesion may emerge with a substantial lag.

This article explores the association between subjective well‐being (life satisfaction and happiness) and the importance of living in a democracy in 10 countries: Brazil, China, India, Russia, Rwanda, Singapore, South Africa, Sweden, Turkey, and the United States. We examine well‐being as one possible indicator of the likelihood of a society's commitment to democracy. We find that there is indeed a relationship between life satisfaction and the importance of living in a democracy. Countries with high levels of life satisfaction tend to be secure democracies, whereas countries with lower levels of life satisfaction tend to experience more political and economic challenges. We briefly discuss the unique socioeconomic realities and historical trajectories that may be responsible for varied levels of well‐being and diverse sentiments on the importance of democracy. We have deliberately selected a wide range of diverse case studies in order to analyse our results within varied political and socioeconomic contexts.

The aim of this paper is to examine the claim that “most people in almost every country worldwide prefer democracy over other types of regimes” against new data, so as to add to the global map of popular perceptions about their support for various regime types. We describe measured changes in levels of public support in 49 countries over four waves of the World Values Survey on three levels: country specific, regional–continental, and global. We found that levels of support for democracy are high and stable across most parts of the world; however, support for various alternate (authoritarian) regime types is steadily increasing and could threaten the extent to which democratic values are entrenched, especially in younger democracies. We conclude with an overview of some of the factors that could plausibly shape such perceptions at the level of the general citizenry.

No abstract