{"id":{"repo_id":"uiuc","oai_identifier":"oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/129721"},"canonical_url":"https://search.dev.ndltd.org/etd/uiuc/oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/129721","repository":{"repo_id":"uiuc","name":"University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign","base_url":"https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/oai-pmh"},"display":{"title":"In the name of democracy: Composition, variation, and measurement of conceptions of democracy","abstract":"Submission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'Closed Access', the embargo will last until 2027-05-01","abstract_html":"Submission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'Closed Access', the embargo will last until 2027-05-01","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Ahn, Seongjoon"],"institution":"University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign","degree_name":"Ph.D.","degree_level":"Dissertation","degree_discipline":"Political Science","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Althaus, Scott","Mondak, Jeffery J","Canache, Damarys Josefina","Miller, Benjamin"],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2025,"date_issued":"2025-04-24","date_published":"2025-04-24","updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:25:05Z","subjects":["democracy","public opinion","american","measurement","democratic theory"],"languages":["en","eng"],"rights":["Copyright 2025 Seongjoon Ahn"],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"https://hdl.handle.net/2142/129721","outbound_label":"Handle","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor","label":"Contributor","values":["Althaus, Scott","Mondak, Jeffery J","Canache, Damarys Josefina","Miller, Benjamin"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Ahn, Seongjoon"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date","label":"Dc Date","values":["2025-04-24","2025-05"]},{"key":"dc:type","label":"Dc Type","values":["text","Thesis"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["Political Science"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Dissertation"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["Ph.D."]},{"key":"thesis:institution_name","label":"Thesis Institution Name","values":["University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["democracy","public opinion","american","measurement","democratic theory"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:language","label":"Dc Language","values":["en","eng"]},{"key":"dc:rights","label":"Dc Rights","values":["Copyright 2025 Seongjoon Ahn"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["https://hdl.handle.net/2142/129721"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description","label":"Description","values":["Submission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'Closed Access', the embargo will last until 2027-05-01","The student, Seongjoon Ahn, accepted the attached license on 2025-04-24 at 12:58.","The student, Seongjoon Ahn, submitted this Dissertation for approval on 2025-04-24 at 12:58.","This Dissertation was approved for publication on 2025-04-24 at 16:58.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #21954 on 2025-10-19 at 19:54:00","In what ways do conceptions of democracy differ among Americans? Even though much of the empirical literature in political science seems to assume a singular conception of democracy, ordinary Americans differ in how they conceive of what democracy is. Both the participants of the January 6th Attack on the Capitol and the general public point to “saving democracy” as a driving motivation, but they exhibit drastically different behaviors. In this dissertation, I conduct a comprehensive investigation of Americans’ conceptions of democracy. I first develop a theoretical framework to examine how individuals conceptualize democracy and how these conceptions relate to political behavior. I then test and apply this framework using two empirical approaches. In Chapter 4, I employ mixed-methods analysis to explore variation in democratic conceptions among a small group of study participants. In Chapter 5, I use latent class analysis on an original, state-level representative survey of the American public (N = 25,902). In Chapter 6, I examine the factors driving these conceptual differences, identifying the demographic and attitudinal traits associated with particular understandings of democracy. In Chapter 7, I test the relationship between individuals’ conceptions of democracy and various political attitudes and find that, even after controlling for major demographic variables, variations in conceptions of democracy are strongly correlated with variations in political attitudes. The results show that 1) five different conceptions of democracy compete within the American public, 2) the division cuts across traditional sociopolitical cleavages, 3) certain conceptions deviate from the more conventionally accepted understandings of democracy, and 4) the variations in conceptions of democracy are highly correlated with variations in political attitudes. These findings suggest that democracy is understood as a multidimensional concept and that people hold distinct and sometimes contradicting composite conceptions of democracy. Furthermore, they imply that conflicting conceptions of democracy may help explain the conflicting attitudes of small-d democrats in the United States."]},{"key":"dc:format","label":"Dc Format","values":["application/pdf"]},{"key":"dc:title","label":"Title","values":["In the name of democracy: Composition, variation, and measurement of conceptions of democracy"]}]}],"canonical_facts":{"dc:contributor":["Althaus, Scott","Mondak, Jeffery J","Canache, Damarys Josefina","Miller, Benjamin"],"dc:creator":["Ahn, Seongjoon"],"dc:date":["2025-04-24","2025-05"],"dc:description":["Submission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'Closed Access', the embargo will last until 2027-05-01","The student, Seongjoon Ahn, accepted the attached license on 2025-04-24 at 12:58.","The student, Seongjoon Ahn, submitted this Dissertation for approval on 2025-04-24 at 12:58.","This Dissertation was approved for publication on 2025-04-24 at 16:58.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #21954 on 2025-10-19 at 19:54:00","In what ways do conceptions of democracy differ among Americans? Even though much of the empirical literature in political science seems to assume a singular conception of democracy, ordinary Americans differ in how they conceive of what democracy is. Both the participants of the January 6th Attack on the Capitol and the general public point to “saving democracy” as a driving motivation, but they exhibit drastically different behaviors. In this dissertation, I conduct a comprehensive investigation of Americans’ conceptions of democracy. I first develop a theoretical framework to examine how individuals conceptualize democracy and how these conceptions relate to political behavior. I then test and apply this framework using two empirical approaches. In Chapter 4, I employ mixed-methods analysis to explore variation in democratic conceptions among a small group of study participants. In Chapter 5, I use latent class analysis on an original, state-level representative survey of the American public (N = 25,902). In Chapter 6, I examine the factors driving these conceptual differences, identifying the demographic and attitudinal traits associated with particular understandings of democracy. In Chapter 7, I test the relationship between individuals’ conceptions of democracy and various political attitudes and find that, even after controlling for major demographic variables, variations in conceptions of democracy are strongly correlated with variations in political attitudes. The results show that 1) five different conceptions of democracy compete within the American public, 2) the division cuts across traditional sociopolitical cleavages, 3) certain conceptions deviate from the more conventionally accepted understandings of democracy, and 4) the variations in conceptions of democracy are highly correlated with variations in political attitudes. These findings suggest that democracy is understood as a multidimensional concept and that people hold distinct and sometimes contradicting composite conceptions of democracy. Furthermore, they imply that conflicting conceptions of democracy may help explain the conflicting attitudes of small-d democrats in the United States."],"dc:format":["application/pdf"],"dc:identifier":["https://hdl.handle.net/2142/129721"],"dc:language":["en","eng"],"dc:rights":["Copyright 2025 Seongjoon Ahn"],"dc:subject":["democracy","public opinion","american","measurement","democratic theory"],"dc:title":["In the name of democracy: Composition, variation, and measurement of conceptions of democracy"],"dc:type":["text","Thesis"],"thesis:degree_discipline":["Political Science"],"thesis:degree_level":["Dissertation"],"thesis:degree_name":["Ph.D."],"thesis:institution_name":["University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign"]},"updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:25:05Z"}