9. Is this really democracy?

Citizens’ dissatisfaction with contemporary democracy has become somewhat of a commonplace. Yet scholars routinely struggle to make sense of citizens’ critiques and expectations towards representative democracy: what exactly are citizens dissatisfied with? What is it, they expect from the central institutions of representative democracy? To answer these questions and account for the diverse and potentially contradictory beliefs citizens may hold towards representative democracy, this chapter advances a citizen-centred analysis of the concept of “democracy”. It draws on 4366 responses to an open question “what does democracy mean to you?” formulated in two Belgian national surveys (2009 and 2019). This dataset allows for identifying the institutions and practices citizens routinely associate with democracy (e.g., parties, parliament, representation). Our findings demonstrate that citizens’ accounts of democracy have changed over time. While representation was central to respondents’ reflections in 2009, in 2019 they more frequently defined democracy in relation to elections and rules of decision-making. Our findings also shows that citizens’ resentment correlates with these concerns and gives expression to unmet expectations. We identify three resentful tropes of democracy: democracy is unfair, democracy is a fake, and democracy is cold-hearted.