Abstract
In some countries, direct democracy is used successfully to increase legitimacy of decisions or mitigate conflict, and in other countries, authoritarian leaders seem to instrumentalize and manipulate referendums. How can referendum integrity be analyzed? This article presents an empirical instrument to evaluate the variety and integrity of referendums. This encompasses criteria for the analysis of direct democracy. First, we develop a referendum cycle model based on the electoral cycle framework, assessing referendum quality in a number of dimensions from electoral laws and electoral procedures, thematic limitations of referendums, to voter registration, the initiation of referendums, campaign and media coverage as well as campaign financing. The empirical instrument is designed to be used in expert surveys, and piloted in the Turkish constitutional referendum of 2017. The article presents the results of the pilot study, draws out opportunities and limitations of this approach and suggests avenues for its future development.
Highlights
Referendums1 are seen as important vote-centric instruments of democratic innovation and a panacea against the crisis of representative democracy (Setälä and Schiller 2009)
As the 2016 Brexit vote suggests, declining trust in public officials, under-funded electoral authorities, misinformation, and late additions to the legal framework may undermine the procedural quality of a referendum (James and Clark 2020)
The instrument is implemented in a pilot study surveying 45 election experts on the Turkish constitutional referendum in 2017
Summary
Referendums1 are seen as important vote-centric instruments of democratic innovation and a panacea against the crisis of representative democracy (Setälä and Schiller 2009). Keywords Direct democracy · Electoral integrity · Expert survey · Referendums · Turkey The instrument is implemented in a pilot study surveying 45 election experts on the Turkish constitutional referendum in 2017.
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