Abstract
ABSTRACT The models of direct and deliberative democracy are broadly considered the major alternatives to representative democracy. So far, the two models have been merged under the broad umbrella of participatory democracy and thus little is known about why citizens support direct democracy and/or deliberation. They are distinct procedures, driven by different logics and outcomes and this makes it likely that the preference for them rest on different premises. This article fills this gap in the literature and distinguishes between the models proposing two central arguments. First, we expect that several general determinants have a positive impact on the support for both direct democracy and deliberation because they are different from representative democracy. Second, we test the effect of specific determinants that drive people towards supporting more one of the two alternative models of democracy. We use individual level data from an original survey conducted in December 2018 on a representative sample of 1094 respondents in the UK. The results indicate that the supporters of direct democracy differ from those of deliberative democracy in several ways.
Highlights
The flaws of contemporary representative democracies have determined citizens and politicians to look for alternatives
We argue that several general determinants such as interest in politics, consumption of political news, internal efficacy and dissatisfaction with institutions of representative democracy have a positive impact on the support for both direct democracy and deliberation
We argue that civically engaged citizens are more inclined towards deliberative procedures because these create a broader sense of community involvement and deliberation instead of majoritarian decision-making
Summary
The flaws of contemporary representative democracies have determined citizens and politicians to look for alternatives. An extensive body of literature acknowledges the various demands of citizens and focuses on their preferences for alternative models of political decision-making (Hibbing and Theiss-Morse 2001; Esaiasson, Gilljam, and Persson 2012; Bengtsson and Christensen 2016; Gherghina and Geissel 2017). This coincides with a momentum gained by participatory institutions and procedures in real-life politics. In the last three decades, an increasing number of countries introduced direct democratic procedures to enable citizens to make final political decisions (Scarrow 2001; Gherghina 2017).
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