British Participation Survey, 2011

The <i>British Participation Survey, 2011</i> project was motivated by an interest in the highly topical issue of popular disaffection with representative democracy in countries such as Britain. It hypothesizes that there are two quite distinct groups of 'disconnected' or alienated citizen, whom might be termed 'dissatisfied' and 'stealth' democrats, and that the commonly proposed remedy of engagement in high-intensity forms of participation will only work for the former of these. Building on previous research conducted in the USA, the data provides new evidence as to the nature of popular discontent with politics and the potential for enhancing the practice and legitimacy of representative democracy through greater involvement of citizens in forms of deliberative political participation.<br> <br>