Civic Engagement

Background

Trust in government is essential for social cohesion and well-being. Today, more than ever, citizens demand greater transparency from their governments. Information on the who, why and how of decision making is essential to hold government to account, maintain confidence in public institutions and support a level playing field for business. Greater transparency is not only key to upholding integrity in the public sector; it also contributes to better governance. Indeed, openness and transparency can ultimately improve public services by minimising the risk of fraud, corruption and mismanagement of public funds.

Voter turnout

High voter turnout is a measure of citizens' participation in the political process. Voter turnout is defined as the percentage of the registered population that voted during an election. High voter turnout is desirable in a democracy because it increases the chance that the political system reflects the will of a large number of individuals, and that the government enjoys a high degree of legitimacy.

Even if the right to vote is universal in all the countries covered by the BLI, not everyone exercises this right. In the most recent elections for which data are available, voter turnout averaged 69% in OECD countries. Research has shown that more educated people are more likely to vote than less educated ones, and that older people are more likely to vote than younger ones. There is little difference in the voting rate between men and women in most OECD countries, although in Switzerland, men outvote women by nearly an estimated 5 percentage points. - Women outvote men by an estimated 8 percentage points in Lithuania and in the Russian Federation.  How well-off you are also affects how likely you are to vote. Voter turnout generally increases with individual income and on average there is nearly a 12 percentage point estimated difference between the top 20% of the population and the bottom 20%. This gap reaches 28 percentage points in Poland and 26 percentage points in the United States. In Korea, instead, the voter turnout among the bottom 20% of the population is estimated to be 1.5 percentage points higher than among the top 20%.

Voter participation is the best existing means of measuring civic and political engagement for several reasons (high quality data, broad cross-country comparability). However, this measure is far from ideal, in particular because of institutional differences in electoral systems. While voter turnout is indeed compulsory (and strongly enforced) in several countries, it is nevertheless a useful measure of citizen engagement.

In general, women are in the minority among elected representatives and although their number has slightly increased in the last decade, it is still well below parity. In the OECD, only about 29% of the seats in national parliament are held by women on average.

Stakeholder engagement for developing regulations

Public engagement in decision making promotes government accountability, a friendly business environment and public trust in government institutions. Indeed, a country's laws and regulations contain much information about how a society is organised, the rules of the game and the political decisions taken. If citizens can participate in the development of these laws and regulations, it is more likely they will comply with the rules.

Stakeholder engagement for developing regulations measures to what extent a country's executive branch engages with stakeholders when developing primary laws and subordinate regulations. This indicator measures elements such as consultation methods, openness, transparency and feedback mechanisms. The indicator is calculated as the simple average of two composite indicators (covering respectively primary laws and subordinate regulations).

Civic Engagement in Detail by Country