Why Older Latin Americans Favor Democracy Despite Authoritarian Pasts

📌 The Puzzle: Older citizens in Latin America report higher preference for democracy, a finding that conflicts with parts of the literature predicting stronger pro-democracy views among younger cohorts socialized under democratic regimes. One plausible explanation is that older cohorts experienced political repression under authoritarian rule, producing an aversion to non-democratic regimes.

📊 What the study tested and how:

• Replicates prior tests of generational effects on democratic support.
• Uses individual-level data from the 2012 Americas Barometer.
• Introduces a new country-level measure—authoritarian legacy—capturing both the duration and intensity with which individual and political rights were curtailed in the past.

🔎 Key findings:

• Generational socialization matters: cohorts that lived under authoritarian rule are more likely to express support for democracy, confirming previous results.
• No amplification by harsh histories: there is no evidence that the generational gap in democratic support is larger in countries with stronger authoritarian legacies.
• National legacy effects: countries with stronger authoritarian legacies show lower overall support for democracy, whereas stronger democratic legacies are associated with higher overall support.

💡 Why it matters:

• The results present a nuanced picture: individual-level socialization under repression increases pro-democracy preferences, but harsher authoritarian histories do not necessarily widen generational divides.
• National political legacies shape baseline levels of democratic support, suggesting that aggregate attitudes reflect both cohort experiences and broader historical context.

📚 Data note: The analysis relies on the 2012 Americas Barometer and an original coding of countries' authoritarian legacies based on past curtailment of individual and political rights.

✳️ Bottom line: Socialization under authoritarianism boosts individual support for democracy, yet the strength of a country's authoritarian past primarily lowers overall democratic support rather than expanding generational differences.