REVISTA DE CIENCIA POLГЌTICA / VOLUMEN 29/ NВ° 1 / 2009 / 23 – 55

The Usage Of Government-Initiated Referendums in Latin America. Towards a Theory of Referendum Causes

El uso de los referendos de iniciativa gubernamental en AmГ©rica Latina. Hacia una teorГ­a las that are sobre del uso de votaciones populares iniciadas por el gobierno

ANITA BREUER

Department of Comparative Politics, University of Cologne

Within the last two years there’s been a substantial boost in the sheer number of referendums worldwide. The current literary works on direct democracy has thus far did not explain this event by delivering a regular concept from the reasons for referendums. This study that is explorative at undertaking steps toward shutting this space by concentrating on the particular sort of facultative government-initiated referendums (FGIR) and their use within presidential systems. Utilizing QC A (a technique that is case-sensitive in the formal logic of Boolean algebra), this research systematically compares the governmental opportunity structures of 49 presidential systems from 12 Latin US nations to detect the factors that spurred or obstructed the incident of FGIR. It concludes that FGIR are closely connected to high quantities of celebration system fragmentation and split government, in other words. two facets which may have always been considered problematic when you look at the context of presidential systems, while their obstruction is especially owed into the particular provisions that are constitutional the referendum device.

Keywords: Referendums, Latin America, Fragmentation, Direct Democracy.

RESUMEN

En las Гєltimas dos dГ©cadas Ma existido alrededor del mundo un considerable aumento en el nГєmero de votaciones populares. No na sabido explicar el fenГіmeno mediante una teorГ­a consistente de las causas de los referendums sin embargo, la literatura existente sobre democracia directa. Este estudio exploratorio busca paso that is dar un para cerrar esta brecha, enfocГЎndose en los referendum facultativos iniciados por poderes polГ­ticos formales (facultative government-initiated referendums – FGIR) y su uso en los sistemas presidenciales. Utilizando OCA (tГ©cnica basada en lГіgica formal de ГЎlgebra booleanas), este estudio hace una comparaciГіn sistemГЎtica de la estructura de oportunidades polГ­ticas de 49 sistemas presidenciales de 12 paГ­ses de AmГ©rica Latina, para detectar los factores que estimulan u obstruyen la ocurrencia de FGIR. Se concluye que los FGIR estГЎn fuertemente ligados a altos niveles de fragmentaciГіn partidaria y gobiernos divididos, 2 factores que han sido problemГЎticos en los contextos de sistemas presidenciales. Por su parte, la se that is obstrucciГіn principalmente a provisiones constitucionales especГ­ficas que regulan los dispositivos de las votaciones populares iniciadas por el gobierno.

Palabras Clave: Plebiscito, AmГ©rica Latina, fragmentaciГіn, democracia directa.

I. INTRODUCTION 1

From the 1960s onwards, different countries regarding the world embraced the concept of direct democracy and within the last two years, the request of direct democratic instruments has grown quite a bit (LeDuc, 2003). 2 This trend has attracted scholarly attention and over the last few years, considerable research investigating direct democracy happens to be anotherdating.com/zoosk-review/ posted in recognized journals in the area of governmental technology. To date this literary works has primarily dedicated to the 2 countries that many often utilize referendums, Switzerland therefore the united states of america in the state level (Ladner and Brandle, 1999; Gerber, 1996; Papadopulos, 2001; Tolbert and Hero, 1996; Vatter and Freitag, 2006), while a smaller sized quantity of magazines have centered on the revolution of referendums entailed in the act of European integration (Hug and Sciarini, 2000; Franklin et ah, 1995). These magazines have actually significantly added to your knowledge about the effect of referendums on politics as well as on diverse societal aspects. But, they will have perhaps perhaps not yet produced a constant concept on the factors that cause referendums. The goal of this paper is always to undertake steps that are initial bridging this gap.

To a large level, the ‘boom’ in direct democracy may be credited toward the increased quantity of citizen-initiated referendums and, to a smaller level, mandatory referendums (Morel, 2001) This development happens to be welcomed by advocates of direct democracy whom stress the possibility of the tools to foster bottom-up involvement and straight accountability (Barber, 1984; Schmitter, 2000). Nonetheless, on a few occasions, non-mandatory referendums on essential governmental concerns have already been initiated by regulating bodies for example. legislatures or professionals. Such government-initiated referendums, which can be known as plebiscites, 3 a phrase that carries a small connotation that is negative largely retain control of governmental decision-making in the possession of of elected officials.

Despite adding small to the general upsurge in direct democracy, the event of facultative government-initiated referendums (FGIR) 4 poses a theoretical puzzle (Rahat, 2007).

Even though it is understandable that residents will take part in processes of decision-making when because of the straight to do this, governmental elites’ usage of direct democratic instruments is harder to grasp. Just just What motivates authorities that are governing initiate referendums? Why should democratically legitimised representatives voluntarily provide their monopoly up to legislate, redistribute energy downwards, equal themselves with ordinary citizens in governmental decision-making, and finally expose on their own to your threat of losing in the ballot package? The central purpose of this study that is explorative to supply possible responses to those concerns.