Evaluations of the measurement of the concepts ‘Political Satisfaction’ and ‘Quality of state services’

In this paper we study the concepts ‘Political satisfaction’ and ‘Quality of state services’, included in the European Social Survey since the first round. We test whether these concepts can be compared across countries and over time by testing for measurement invariance. The results show that the concepts ‘Political Satisfaction’and ‘Quality of State Services’ can only be compared in a limited number of countries in each round as well as over time. Besides detailing which countries can and cannot be compared, in the following pages we also estimate composite scores and their quality for both concepts under study. Finally, we highlight the importance of correction for measurement error when using ESS data by comparing correlations between the composite scores of both concepts uncorrected and corrected for measurement error