How durably do people accept democracy? Politicization, political attitudes and losers’ consent in France

From 1981 to today, diffuse support for democratic principles has remained stable with high scores, whereas support for specific forms of democracy has been much lower and largely dependent on the year considered. On the basis of the four waves of the French European Values Study data (from 1981 to 2008), this article investigates the influence of different political factors on attachment or support for democracy by testing three different hypotheses: first, the level and the type of politicization affects opinions on democracy. Second, high expectations of democracy negatively affect specific support for democracy. Third, the ‘losers’ consent’ effect means that political opposition to the government turns into dissatisfaction with democracy but does not affect support for general democratic principles. Our results partly confirm the first two hypotheses and provide evidence that the losers’ consent effect is a relevant factor to explain variations in specific forms of support for democracy.