Work / Tableau / Data Storytelling

An atlas of electoral abstention in democratic countries

A visual companion to an academic publication, turning maps, charts, and electoral data into a readable story about democratic participation.

Research question

Where is abstention rising, and what does the geography of non-voting reveal?

This project explores abstention in legislative elections across democratic countries. It starts from a simple measure, the share of registered voters who did not vote, and uses it to follow a broader question: how has electoral participation changed over time, across countries, and inside national territories?

The page is designed as a public-facing version of a more technical appendix. The original work uses maps, distributions, historical series, and regional comparisons; here, those visual materials become a guided data story.

Why it matters

Abstention is more than an electoral statistic.

Low turnout can be shaped by technical rules, such as compulsory voting, but it can also point to political distance, institutional fatigue, weak party attachment, or unequal access to democratic participation.

For this reason, the project does not treat abstention as a single ranking. It reads the phenomenon through scale: first the world, then long-term national trajectories, then Europe, and finally the regional geography of the European Union.

01 / The latest elections

A global snapshot of abstention in today's democracies.

The story begins with the most recent legislative elections held in 72 democratic countries. The map is meant to work as an entry point: it shows that abstention is not distributed evenly, and that participation depends on a mix of electoral rules, political context, institutions, and civic habits.

02 / The long view

In most countries, abstention is higher than at the beginning of their democratic history.

The longitudinal analysis follows 57 countries from their first democratic elections after 1945 to their latest available election. In 46 of them, abstention was higher in the latest election than in the first one observed. The pattern is not uniform, but the direction of travel is clear enough to deserve attention.

03 / Europe in phases

European democracies did not move at the same speed.

The European comparison divides the story into historical phases: the 1950s, the 1970s, the 1990s, and the 2010-2023 period. In the last thirty years, average abstention increased in 24 of the 32 democracies observed, with particularly strong growth in many Eastern European and Mediterranean countries.

04 / Inside countries

National averages can hide sharp regional differences.

The regional view looks at 234 NUTS 2 regions in the European Union between 1990 and 2020. It shows that abstention is often geographically uneven inside the same country. Italy, Finland, Spain, Portugal, Greece, and Poland stand out as cases where regional gaps remain especially visible.

Data and method

A layered view of turnout data.

The analysis combines electoral archives and democracy classifications to compare countries only in democratic electoral periods. The main sources are the International IDEA Voter Turnout Database, Roberto Brocchini's electoral archive, the US Elections Project, and the European NUTS-level Election Database.

72 democratic countries for the latest-election global view.
57 countries for the historical analysis of democratic elections after 1945.
32 European democracies for the comparison by historical period.
234 EU NUTS 2 regions for the regional analysis between 1990 and 2020.

Reading guide

Three ideas to carry through the visual story.

Abstention has increased in most long-standing democratic trajectories, but not everywhere in the same way.
Institutional context matters: compulsory voting and the perceived importance of elections can strongly shape turnout.
Regional maps are essential because national averages often hide internal divides in democratic participation.

Source

From academic appendix to interactive portfolio project.

This page is based on the appendix "Atlante dell'astensionismo" by Gabriele Antonini, published in Etica Pubblica 2/2023, DOI: 10.1400/296150.