REVISTA DE CIENCIA POLГЌTICA / VOLUMEN 29/ NВ° 1 / 2009 / 23 – 55
The Utilization 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 is an increase that is considerable the amount of referendums global. The current literature on direct democracy has thus far neglected to explain this event by delivering a regular concept in the factors that cause referendums. This explorative research aims at undertaking steps toward shutting this gap by concentrating on the precise form of facultative government-initiated referendums (FGIR) and their used in presidential systems. Utilizing QC A (a case-sensitive technique based regarding the formal logic of Boolean algebra), this research systematically compares the governmental possibility structures of 49 presidential systems from 12 Latin US nations to identify the factors that spurred or obstructed the incident of FGIR. It concludes that FGIR are closely associated with high degrees of celebration system fragmentation and split government, for example. two factors that have always been considered problematic within the context of presidential systems, while their obstruction is especially owed to your particular constitutional conditions managing the referendum unit.
Keyword Phrases: 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. Por el contrario, la literatura existente sobre democracia directa no na sabido explicar el fenГіmeno mediante una teorГa consistente de las causas de los referendums. Este estudio exploratorio busca dar un paso adelante 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 estimulan that is que obstruyen la ocurrencia de FGIR. Se concluye que los FGIR estГЎn fuertemente ligados a altos niveles de fragmentaciГіn partidaria y gobiernos divididos, dos 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, various nations around the globe embraced the concept of direct democracy and within the last two years, the program of direct democratic instruments has grown dramatically (LeDuc, 2003). 2 This trend has attracted scholarly attention and over the past few years, considerable research investigating direct democracy is posted in recognized journals in neuro-scientific governmental technology. To date this literature has primarily centered on the 2 nations that many usually utilize referendums, Switzerland and the united states of america from the state degree (Ladner and Brandle, 1999; Gerber, 1996; Papadopulos, 2001; Tolbert and Hero, 1996; Vatter and Freitag, 2006), while an inferior wide range 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 publications have significantly added to your knowledge about the effect of referendums on politics as well as on diverse societal aspects. Nonetheless, they will have not yet produced a constant concept on the factors https://datingstreet.net/fetlife-review/ behind referendums. The goal of this paper would be to undertake steps that are initial bridging this gap.
Up To a big level, the ‘boom’ in direct democracy are credited toward the increased quantity of citizen-initiated referendums and, to a smaller degree, mandatory referendums (Morel, 2001) This development happens to be welcomed by advocates of direct democracy who emphasize 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 questions have been initiated by regulating bodies in other words. legislatures or professionals. Such government-initiated referendums, which are generally known as plebiscites, 3 a phrase that holds a small negative connotation, mostly retain control of political decision-making in the possession of of elected officials.
Despite adding small to the general boost in direct democracy, the event of facultative government-initiated referendums (FGIR) 4 poses a theoretical puzzle (Rahat, 2007).
Even though it is understandable that citizens will be involved in processes of decision-making when because of the directly to do this, governmental elites’ utilization of direct democratic instruments is harder to understand. Just exactly What motivates governing authorities to initiate referendums? Why should democratically legitimised representatives voluntarily offer up their monopoly to legislate, redistribute energy downwards, equal themselves with ordinary residents in governmental decision-making, and finally expose by themselves to your threat of losing during the ballot box? The main goal of this explorative research is to deliver potential answers to those concerns.