ИСТИНА

This paper is providing a comparative analysis of political participation in Europe, Eurasia, Asia and the Arab World in the time period 1981 - 2015. It is analysing the longitudinal direction of conventional political participation like voting or signing a petition on the one hand and of unconventional political participation like joining a boycott, participating in demonstrations or join strike on the other. The main survey data base of this paper is the World Value Survey in its 6 waves between 1981 and 2014. The other survey data base are several regional Barometers within the Global Barometer Survey Group, such as the Eurasia Barometer, the Asia Barometer and the Arab Barometer. The paper is looking at the increasing or decreasing trend of specific forms of political participation in different world regions. It will propose a multivariate model of conventional and unconventional political participation, which is considering the influence and impact of social structure, social capital, political interest, political involvement and support for democracy on conventional political participation on the one hand and on unconventional political participation on the other. The main research question is if we can speak of one specific trend of political participation which is the same in ALL world regions or if we have to speak of regional patterns of political participation.