in: V-Dem Working Paper 130<\/p>\n
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Contestation and participation are commonly viewed as the two constituent dimensions of electoral democracy. How exactly have these two dimensions been conceptualized and measured in the literature? Are they empirically observable and do they matter for democratic development and stability? This paper answers the \ufb01rst of these questions and considers their implications for the second by reviewing the literature on democracy\u2019s dimensions. We highlight three issues that a\ufb00ect conclusions about dimensions of democracy and their relevance for understanding democratic development: First, conceptual ambiguities \u2014 substantive overlap between the two concepts \u2014 obscure the meanings of each of the two dimensions. Such ambiguities led to a second issue, which is concept-measurement mismatch. The conceptual contributions were never really met with an empirical equivalent that would allow us to properly measure the two dimensions. Scholars continue to invoke theoretical understandings from the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, however, but represent them using measures that were not explicitly concerned with measuring them, which presents the third issue of concept rei\ufb01cation. As a result of these three issues, inference about how democracy has developed and their relevance for democratic stability or for transitions to democratic rule has been di\ufb03cult. Based on these issues, we provide three suggestions for future research on dimensions of democracy.<\/p>\n