Excluded but affected? The winner-loser gap in satisfaction with democracy among non-citizens

Abstract Previous research has extensively examined the winner-loser gap with regard to satisfaction with democracy (SWD). However, this phenomenon has not yet been studied for a group with considerable shares in Western democracies’ populations, foreign citizens, who are often not entitled to vote. We hypothesise that electoral outcomes influence not only voters but also non-citizens. We argue that the overall winner-loser gap may be less pronounced among non-citizens than among citizens. Since they are unable to influence the outcome, they may perceive both winning and losing scenarios as similarly distant from their own preferences. Additionally, we investigate whether the winner-loser gap remains stable over time for both citizens and non-citizens. We test these propositions using novel panel data from Germany (2021–2024, N = 2390 citizens, 273 non-citizens). Our findings reveal significant differences in satisfaction with democracy between winners and losers, with only citizens showing a stable significant gap. Overall, the results suggest that electoral participation enhances responsiveness to electoral outcomes: those who can vote show greater fluctuations in democratic satisfaction depending on whether they won or lost according to their actual vote choice. In contrast, politically excluded individuals do not exhibit a similarly pronounced winner-loser gap based on their hypothetical vote choice.