1.1 The Use of Referendums in European Democracies
In the past decades, an extensive academic literature has been established on the use of referendums. This scholarly interest in referendums is driven by the numerous popular votes held in Europe in the second half of the twentieth and beginning of the twenty-first centuries. These votes primarily concerned constitutional consolidation and reform, the status of overseas territories, sovereignty transfers and European Union (EU) treaty ratifications (LeDuc 2003, 23â28; Qvortrup 2014; Morel and Qvortrup 2018). Referendum scholars often perceive the impressive number of referendums held in this period, in Europe and beyond, as representing a shift towards direct democracy in which âmore and more important questions are decided by referendumâ (Hug and Tsebelis 2002, 465; see also: Butler and Ranney 1978, 1994; Gallagher and Uleri 1996; Matsusaka 2005a; Qvortrup 2005, 2014; PĂĄllinger et al. 2007). A noteworthy argument is put forward by Bruce Cain, Russell Dalton, and Susan Scarrow (2003). They stress that the increased institutionalization and use of referendums across the world represent âa significant institutional change for contemporary democracies [that] influences political discourse and principles of political legitimacy beyond the policy at stake in any single referendumâ (Dalton et al. 2003a, 254). Or, as Dick Morris (1999, 23) puts it, âThe fundamental paradigm that dominates our politics is the shift from representational (Madisonian) to direct (Jeffersonian) democracyâ. While Morrisâ conclusion is primarily based on American politics, scholars studying the European context also underscore the notion of an âincrease in the real importance of the phenomenon of âdirect democracyââ (Marxer et al. 2007, 7).
On an aggregated level, the number of referendums in Europe has indeed increased significantly in the last half century, which is especially due to the large number of votes on EU affairs. These have dealt not least with the question of whether a country should be part of the EU (or its predecessor), which has been submitted to a referendum in many of the non-founding EU countries, such as Ireland, the United Kingdom (UK), Austria, Malta, the Scandinavian countries, and notably most of the Central and Eastern European countries (CEECs). Many votes have also been held on subsequent EU treaty changes, most extensively in Ireland and Denmark. In particular the European Constitutional Treaty (TCE), signed in 2004, generated a significant number of referendum pledges.
Today, too, the EU remains a prominent referendum topic, as illustrated by the Greek referendum on the countryâs bailout deal with the Eurogroup held in July 2015, the Danish referendum on its opt-out from the area of freedom, security and justice (formerly the Justice and Home Affairs pillar) in December 2015, the Dutch referendum on the EUâs Association Agreement with Ukraine in April 2016, the referendum on Britainâs renewed EU membership conditions in June 2016 and the Hungarian referendum on the EU migrant quota in October 2016. Such observations come close to Simon Hugâs sixteen-year-old prediction that âtogether with other referendums in the offing, it is likely that close to a dozen of votes [on the EU] will occur in the 2010sâ (Hug 2002, 115). Moreover, noteworthy other recent, non-EU related, referendums held in EU countries include, among others, the Slovakian, Slovenian and Irish same-sex marriage referendums held in 2015 (in February, December and May respectively), the Italian constitutional reform referendums in December 2016, the Slovenian railway referendums in September 2017 and May 2018, the Dutch referendum on the Intelligence and Security Services Act in March 2018 and the Irish abortion referendum in May 2018.
Although the increase in the use of referendums is largely associated with a declining relevance of representative decision-making, or as Matsusaka (2005a) coins it âthe eclipse of legislaturesâ, the academic literature so far has not provided sound evidence for the claim that this increase actually marks a pendulum swing from decision-making by representation to decision-making by direct citizensâ participation. This ambiguity stems from the fact that such claims are largely based on aggregated analyses of referendum practice that do not take into account cross-country variations in the frequency with which referendums are used. In practice though, only a few European countries can be considered as frequent users of referendums, and most countries have only experienced one or just a few referendums over the past sixty-seven years. Moreover, aggregated studies tend not to acknowledge the wide variety of referendum institutions available and used. This has led many scholars to overestimate the transformative character of European referendum practice. Although in all referendums citizens vote directly on issues rather than letting representatives do this for them, some referendums are more direct than others. Certain referendums indeed strengthen direct participation by the Rousseauian People, but most referendums held in EU countries in fact serve the political elites, most notably the executive â i.e. the Machiavellian Prince.
Assessing whether national-level referendum practice in Europe truly represents a direct democracy shift requires not only unravelling the various referendum forms and procedures, but also analyzing the reasons why referendums are institutionalized and used. It has become common wisdom to explain the alleged direct democratic shift as a consequence of an assumed crisis of representative democracy. The argument holds that referendums are increasingly institutionalized and used in response to discontent with representative democracy (Cronin 1999; Mendelsohn and Parkin 2001; Scarrow 2001; LeDuc 2003). For example, Dalton et al. (2003b, 1) speak of a âspreading dissatisfaction with the institutions and processes of representative democracyâ, which they see as trend that is âconcomitant with increasing demands for political reforms to expand citizen and interest group access to politics in new ways, as well as to restructure the process of democratic decision-makingâ. Lawrence LeDuc also stresses that the renewed interest in referendums as crisis-solving instruments around the turn of the century reflects the âmood of the timesâ (LeDuc 2003, 20). In similar vein, John Matsusaka emphasizes that the strengthened role of direct democracy is the outcome of a âgeneral meltdown in public confidence regarding legislatures (and government in general) over the last four decadesâ (Matsusaka 2005a, 162). Especially in relation to the EU, referendums are widely considered as legitimizing instruments capable of restoring citizensâ control over and trust in EU decision-making (Grande 1996, 2000; Hug 2002; Follesdal and Hix 2006).
This crisis discourse has in fact become the raison dâĂȘtre of a ârenaissanceâ of referendum literature in recent decades (Vatter 2000, 171). Yet, regardless of whether referendums have a legitimizing effect, it is questionable whether they are indeed pushed by citizensâ demands and motivated by concerns about the quality of representative democracy. Nevertheless, this assumption is not commonly challenged. Although scholarly attention has been given to the role authorities play in framing the referendum question and debate (cf. Schuck and de Vreese 2009), little comparative research has been done on whether the normative arguments by which authorities legitimize their referendum calls coincide with their real intentions. An exception is Matt Qvortrup (2007, 3), who states that âwhile support for increased participation is a constant theme in the political rhetoric of the elites, decisions to submit more issues to the voters do not always live up their idealistic billingâ. Carlos Closa (2007) also distinguishes normative motives for pledging a referendum from strategic ones, and concludes that in the case of ratifying the TCE, the referendum was seen as an âappropriate mechanismâ (Closa 2007, 1327), but that governments used this normative discourse strategically.
By drawing on this literature, this book examines whether referendums in Europe are indeed norm-driven responses to alleged flaws in representation and accountability or whether more attention should be given to political agency. And, given that referendums are not held with ...