Understanding Democratic Stress

This article opens a Special Issue on Democratic Stress. Against the background of recent debates on ‘democratic crisis’, we argue that the concept of ‘democratic stress’ provides a useful way to understand the diversity of pressures that representative democracy faces in the contemporary context, as well as a valuable ‘organising perspective’ for developing more nuanced analyses. We then map out the main contributions of the articles included in this special issue, and survey the way in which they further this agenda, conceptually and empirically.