direct democracy

S

swatiraohnlu

Swati Rao
Direct democracy is the term used to describe particular forms of voting within any democratic system. The term direct democracy is commonly used to refer to three distinct types of vote: 1. referendums, which are votes on a specific single issue or piece of legislation (instead of a party or candidate) 2. citizen initiatives, whereby citizens can propose new legislation or constitutional amendments by gathering enough signatures in a petition to force a vote on the proposal; and recalls, under which citizens can force a vote on whether to oust an incumbent elected official by collecting enough signatures in a petition.

The common characteristic of these mechanisms is that they place greater power in the hands of voters, as opposed to elected representatives. Direct democracy is, therefore, frequently seen as conflicting with representative democracy, in which voters elect representatives to make decisions on their behalf.

What are the pros and cons of direct democracy?
 
Citizens are competent enough to make good policy As Lupia and Mc Cubbins argue, voters do not necessarily need perfect information to make reasonable decisions. They can rely on information shortcuts and cues - and even if they are sometimes affected by their emotions their decisions do not have to be worse than the politicians' ones. As an example we can look to Switzerland where direct democracy works perfectly well as the people are able to decide even on complex issues regarding taxes or other "complicated" policies. Citizens are best at determining their own interests. While politicians try to determine what's in the best interests of citizens, citizens themselves are better at making these kinds of determinations.
 
Direct democracy over-simplifies policies to a "yes/no" vote. In a representative democracy, laws in the parliamentary bodies undergo a lot of scrutiny, repeated rewritings, curbings, mitigations and other checks that in the end, the law that is passed is usually okay on principle with most of the representatives. These represent all kinds of voters -- and indeed, a democratic decision is one that implements the majority decision while keeping all minority rights, even though the result of that may be a little hard to read. However, direct democracy and its means (mostly referenda) need simplification (commonly to yes/no questions). As a result, most things passed by measures of direct democracy are unbalanced and that very often, measures of direct democracy contribute to majority rule without any respect for the minority.
 
Rep democracy is less accountabile than direct democracy. Once elected, representatives are free to act as they please. Promises made before the election are often broken, and they frequently act contrary to the wishes of their electorate. Although theoretically it is possible to have a representative democracy in which the representatives can be recalled at any time; in practice this is usually not the case.

Direct democracy avoids appointment of unaccountable officials. Elected individuals frequently appoint people to high positions based on their mutual loyalty, as opposed to their competence. And, these appointed officials are not appointed by citizens and cannot be recalled by them. In a direct democracy, these officials would be elected by, and could be recalled by, citizens. This means that these officials are much more accountable to citizens and the democratic process
 
Direct democracy generally reduces the risks of corruption. The concentration of power power intrinsic to representative government is seen by some as tending to create corruption. In direct democracy, the possibility for corruption is reduced. Rep government can lead to conflicts of interest. The interests of elected representatives do not necessarily correspond with those of their constituents. An example is that representatives often get to vote to determine their own salaries. It is in their interest that the salaries be high, while it is in the interest of the electorate that they be as low as possible, since they are funded with tax revenue. The typical results of representative democracy are that their salaries relatively high.
 
* Direct democracy is too slow and inefficient. Another objection to direct democracy is that of practicality and efficiency. Deciding all or most matters of public importance by direct referendum is slow and expensive (especially in a large community), and can result in public apathy and voter fatigue, especially when repeatedly faced with the same questions or with questions which are unimportant to the voter. Direct democracy makes politicians timid and ineffective James Boyle. "The initiative and referendum: its folly, fallacies, and failure." (1912): "The greatest of our American authorities Prof Oberholtzer says in the new edition 1911 of The Referendum in America that it will make officials timid shambling ineffective men."
 
Direct democracy is expensive "Direct democracy becomes too costly in other than very small political units when more than a few isolated issues must be considered. The costs of decision-making become too large relative to the possible reductions in expected external costs that collective action might produce." Direct democracy generally only works on a small scale. Direct democracy works on a small system. For example, the Athenian Democracy governed a city of, at its height, about 30,000 eligible voters (free adult male citizens.) Town meetings, a form of local government once common in New England, has also worked well, often emphasizing consensus over majority rule. The use of direct democracy on a larger scale has historically been more difficult, however. It requires intricate communication and information-campaigns, all which are expensive, complicated, and prone to break-downs of various kinds.
 
* American founders favored rep democracy over direct dem Direct democracy was mainly opposed by the framers of the United States Constitution and some signers of the Declaration of Independence. They saw a danger in majorities forcing their will on minorities. As a result, they advocated a representative democracy in the form of a constitutional republic over a direct democracy, and gave the Congress sole legislative authority in the first article of the Constitution: "All legislative powers herin granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which should consist of a Senate and House of Representatives."Jean-Jacques Rousseau advocated for direct democracy The famous French philosopher and revolutionary wrote: "No act of theirs can be a law unless it is ratified by the people in person; and without that ratification nothing is a law."
 
Direct democracy creates risk of corrupt recall efforts. There are examples of recall elections being launched against elected officials that are corruptly conceived by smear campaigns that have a particular interest at heart, and are willing to spend massive amounts of money to convince the public of false rumors. This is just as problematic as other instances of corruption that can come from the actions of elected officials themselves. Unorganized minorities are vulnerable in direct democracy James Boyle. "The initiative and referendum: its folly, fallacies, and failure." (1912): "Not only is the Initiative and Referendum a game of dice against the unorganized majority but it is a cruel handicap and an eternal danger to unorganized minorities who are dumb and helpless against others of their fellow citizens who are organized and are possibly not as considerate of the rights of others as they ought to be. One of the glorious advantages of the Representative system is that it tends to protect the rights of the otherwise helpless minorities No system of government is truly democratic which does not do that."
 
Campaigns for ballot measures often have unfair resource advantages "Competing groups in a referendum do not necessarily possess equality in the resources which they have at their disposal and this may give one side an unfair advantage over the other in putting its case across to the electorate. This problem is accentuated if the government contributes to the financing of one side's campaign, as occured in the early stages of the 1995 Irish referendum on divorce." Referenda are often a malignant form of protestation. As the post-referendum survey in Ireland shows, one of the reasons people voted against the Lisbon Treaty was that some of them saw it as a good way to protest against the government's policies (instead of a reason one might expect - that they were against the treaty itself).
 
Voters tend to be self-centered in a direct democracy. Voters tend to look after their self-interests, rather than the bigger picture of what needs doing. NIMBYism ("Not in my back yard" thinking) is an example of this, where voters avoid making personal sacrifices in "their own back yard" even if the sacrifices are essential to the common good. Voters are too apathetic to make good laws The average voter may not be interested in politics and therefore may not participate. In a system with citizen initiatives and direct democracy, high voter apathy may make the subsequent decisions unrepresentative of broader public opinion or possibly just bad policy. Direct democracy fosters emotional decision-making. When presented with a single yes/no question, usually without any information on the issue at hand, people tend to make spur-of-the-moment decisions based on emotions, driven by anger, fear and hatred. For example, in the first Irish referendum on Lisbon Treaty, 15% of the voters made up their mind on the day of the referendum itself.
 
Direct democracy disables unpopular but necessary decisions. The problem with direct democracy is that the general public can hardly ever think about the issues at hand in the long-term. People may be aware of the fact that something needs to be done about some burning issue, however, they are unwilling to propose any plan if it entails some discomfort to them. An example of this is called NIMBYism: "Not In My Backyard" point of view. In practise it occurs when a broadly necessary thing, such as wind-turbines, are rejected "in my back-yard" due to selfish interests. Elected leaders can help push these kinds of necessary decisions through. Direct democracy often results in radical measures James Boyle. "The initiative and referendum: its folly, fallacies, and failure." (1912): "There seems to be little capacity for discrimination [in Direct Democracy]. Again very radical measures and many indeed of dangerous tendencies are not always rejected by the people or if they are there are not a few cases in which this result seems to have been brought about by accident rather than by serious moral purpose."
 
Direct democracy enables unfortunate minority rule James Boyle. "The initiative and referendum: its folly, fallacies, and failure." (1912): "An overwhelming objection to the system is that wherever it has been tried it has resulted in minority rule Even in Switzerland the most favorable State possible for the system Direct Legislation is always by minorities." Citizens prefer electing reps over passing referendums James Boyle. "The initiative and referendum: its folly, fallacies, and failure." (1912): "citizens take far greater interest the election of men than they do in the passage Laws All observers native and foreign are impressed with the apathy of voters to the propositions submitted to them."
 
One of the most important -- and probably indispensible -- sources of collective wisdom in a democracy is informed deliberation among people whose diversity approximates the diversity of their community or country. (Such a group can be large or small, as long as it meets that criteria. See the deliberation page on this site for democratic innovations that embody this understanding). Such deliberation produces public judgment, a far higher form of collective intelligence than mere public opinion. (See A Call to Move Beyond Public Opinion to Public Judgment..)
 
Broadly recognized citizen deliberation and public judgment bring public wisdom to the public power that is bestowed by direct democracy. Such a combination of power and wisdom begins to approach an ideal democratic form. An example of an effort to actually practice this level of advanced democracy is British Columbia's experiment with a Citizens Assembly on Electoral Reform, in which 160 randomly selected citizens explored different approaches to electoral reform and the outcome of their deliberations was submitted to British Columbia's electorate for a direct vote.
 
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