Key Indicators of UK Democracy
UK Democracy at a glance: how democratic is the UK?
In 2009, the Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust kindly provided us with a major grant to produce the fourth full Audit of Democracy in the United Kingdom. These periodic Audits are a major undertaking; the full Audit uses a comprehensive assessment framework and draws on a vast body of qualitative and quantitative evidence.
For the first time, we will be publishing the new Audit in a web format in mid-2011. We will also be making extensive use of the large number of statistical datasets which are now readily available to evaluate long-run trends in the state of British democracy and to assess how the UK compares with a range of other democracies across a number of key democratic indicators.
Key Indicators of political participation
Sample findings from our analysis of these datasets are presented below, the first of which focuses on evidence about key forms of political participation.
Please note that these statistical indicators represent only part of our analysis of democracy in the UK - a fuller picture will emerge as we complete the full Audit.
Democracy in the UK: thematic overviews
To what extent is there evidence of improvement or decline in different aspects of UK democracy? And how does the UK compare to other established democracies? Our thematic overviews present a range of key indicators 'at a glance'.
Thematic Overview 1: Trends in Political Participation in the UK (PDF)