By ALEXANDRIA SAN JUAN
EIGHT out of 10 Filipinos or 84 percent are satisfied with the way democracy works in the country, the latest Social Weather Stations survey said.
The survey from Sept. 15 to 23 with 1,500 respondents found out that 59 percent are “committed democrats” or those who prefer “democracy to any other kind of government.”
The percentage of committed democrats is higher than the 20 percent or those “conditional authoritarians” who said that “under some circumstances, an authoritarian government can be preferable to a democratic one.”
Meanwhile, 19 percent are “indifferent,” or people who said “it doesn’t matter if we have a democratic or a non-democratic regime.”
The proportion of those who prefer “democracy to any other kind of government” hardly moved from 60 percent in March 2018 to 59 percent in September 2018.
The SWS noted that except for the 47 percent in July 2014, the preference for democracy has been above 50 percent since February 2009, reaching a record-high 65 percent in June 2013.
Before the 20 percent recorded in the latest survey, the proportion of those conditional authoritarians had been at 19 percent from September 2016 to March 2018.
The proportion of those indifferent also barely changed from 21 percent in March 2018 to 19 percent in September 2018.
The 2018 third quarter survey result is six points higher than the 78 percent who were satisfied with democracy in March 2018 but still lower than the record-high 86 percent in September 2016.
Since June 2010, the SWS noted that satisfaction with the way democracy works has ranged from 59 percent to 86 percent.
