Democratic theorists tend to assume public ignorance is widespread within and across democracies. Though a few comparative surveys have signaled considerable cross-national variation, many scholars continue to generalize from American studies, which repeatedly show low levels of political knowledge. I present evidence from thirty-two emerging and established democracies challenging this conventional wisdom, and argue existing theories are ill-equipped in explaining variation across populations. In particular, I find individuals' political and economic contexts to be at least as important as the personal characteristics most studies emphasize. In short, some systems offer citizens distinct advantages. All else equal, citizens benefit from the opportunities and incentives produced by parliamentary systems, proportional electoral systems, and other contextual factors.

If theorists agreed about the extent to which "information matters", we would only care about the sources of political knowledge. However, an increasingly influential body of theory asserts citizens do not need to be well informed to make rational vote choices or effectively monitor politicians. I challenge this view, showing better informed electorates would likely select different governments—left parties and non-incumbents in particular would benefit from informed citizenries. The findings strongly support the notion that "information matters" against contrary arguments that the widespread use of information shortcuts makes political ignorance an insignificant problem for representative democracy. The analysis also demonstrates, as might be expected, cross-national differences in the size of vote swings due to increased levels of information. Cross-national analysis supports my argument that these electoral changes should decline as democracies mature, since democratic experience increases voters' opportunities to use information shortcuts effectively and efficiently.

Additionally, contrary to arguments that individuals, regardless of their political knowledge, can effectively monitor politicians' behavior by responding to "fire alarms" about corruption reported in the media, I find not only are better informed citizens more effective corruption monitors, but societies composed of better informed electorates enjoy lower levels of corruption. An informed citizenry is less forgiving in between fire alarms, and can place a more powerful constraint on their government, achieving far better accountability results compared with a society composed mainly reactive "monitorial citizens".