tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/direct-democracy-29989/articlesDirect democracy – The Conversation2024-03-21T12:23:10Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2221292024-03-21T12:23:10Z2024-03-21T12:23:10ZLegislative inaction and dissatisfaction with one-party control lead to more issues going directly to voters in ballot initiatives, with 60% of them in six states<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/581407/original/file-20240312-22-zrxl7z.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=6%2C6%2C4174%2C2776&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A home in rural Bingham, Maine, displays signs protesting a Quebec-to-New England hydropower corridor that voters rejected in a referendum vote. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/ElectionMaineUtilityReferendum/756beb8c0d884d4b9402ebbe911a140b/photo?Query=referendum%20voting%20state&mediaType=photo&sortBy=&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=416&currentItemNo=131">AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/548120/record-low-satisfied-democracy-working.aspx">Recent polls</a> show Americans are increasingly dissatisfied with their system of representative democracy, in which they choose candidates to represent their interests once in office. </p>
<p>When available, voters have bypassed their elected representatives and enacted laws by using direct democracy tools such as <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Initiative_and_referendum">ballot initiatives and veto referendums</a>. Ballot initiatives allow citizens or legislatures to propose policies for voter approval, while veto referendums permit challenges to legislative action. </p>
<p>The number of initiatives and veto referendums proposed nationally has been fairly stable over the past two decades. <a href="https://www.route-fifty.com/management/2024/02/states-look-rein-ballot-initiatives-more-ballot-initiatives/394254/">Over the past five years</a>, however, lawmakers have increasingly adopted measures making it harder to get these initiatives and referendums on the ballot. </p>
<p>Citizen-led ballot measures <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/List_of_ballot_measures_by_year">in recent years</a> have been used in various states to expand Medicaid, preserve abortion rights and raise minimum wages. The most <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/List_of_veto_referendum_ballot_measures">common topic for veto referendums</a> over the years has been taxation. </p>
<p>America’s founders were <a href="https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed10.asp">wary of direct democracy</a> and what they felt was the risk of <a href="https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed51.asp">the tyranny of the majority</a>, a situation wherein the majority places its own interests above the interests of a minority. Scholars have found that these direct democracy tools have <a href="https://www.idea.int/sites/default/files/publications/direct-democracy-primer.pdf">disproportionately been used to promote conservative policies</a> over progressive ones. They also note the <a href="https://theconversation.com/ohio-voters-kept-it-easy-to-pass-a-constitutional-amendment-protecting-abortion-but-also-for-the-majority-to-someday-limit-other-rights-211329">potential threats direct democracy poses to democratic rights</a>. </p>
<p>There is growing evidence, however, that these direct democracy tools are increasingly being used in a <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Ballot_initiative">more broadly representative manner</a>. And these measures often address a variety of progressive policies. Arizona, my home state, provides an interesting case study. </p>
<h2>Mostly Western states</h2>
<p>The citizen initiative and veto referendum process varies by state. In general, citizens collect signatures to have an issue placed directly on the ballot for the voters to decide.</p>
<p>Just <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/States_with_initiative_or_referendum">half the states</a> allow citizens to directly engage in this kind of policymaking. <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/States_with_initiative_or_referendum">Twenty-four states allow some form of initiative, and 26 allow for referendums</a>. The majority of these states allow both the initiative and veto referendum. </p>
<p>Most states that equip their citizens with direct democracy tools are in the West. About 60% of all initiative activity occurs in <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/History_of_initiative_and_referendum_in_the_U.S.">six states</a>: Arizona, California, Colorado, North Dakota, Oregon and Washington. The states with the <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/List_of_veto_referendum_ballot_measures">most veto referendums</a> are North Dakota, Oregon and California. </p>
<p>Initially, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/31/opinion/campaign-stops/ballot-measures-american-direct-democracy-at-work.html">Eastern and Southern states</a> left out these direct democracy tools from their state constitutions primarily out of fear that direct democracy would empower Black people and immigrants. </p>
<p>Direct democracy tools found fertile ground in the Midwest and West during the <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/History_of_initiative_and_referendum_in_the_U.S.">populist and progressive movements</a> of the late 19th century. As these territories became states, they often built these instruments into their state constitutions. </p>
<p>A total of <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/List_of_ballot_measures_by_year">2,536 citizen initiative measures</a> advanced in the 24 states that allow them from 2000 to 2023, with 1,631, or approximately two-thirds passing. </p>
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<h2>Defaulting to direct democracy</h2>
<p>Two trends are reshaping the use of initiatives and referendums. </p>
<p>The first is the continued <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/05/us-democrat-republican-partisan-polarization/629925/">partisan polarization</a> in the U.S. and voters’ frustration with the two-party system and the parties themselves. </p>
<p>Most Americans want their elected officials to <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/220265/americans-favor-compromise-things-done-washington.aspx">compromise on important public policy issues</a>, but the two major parties are increasingly embracing an uncompromising mindset that undermines their ability to address important public issues. <a href="https://search.asu.edu/profile/2408574">I explore</a> this in the book I co-authored with colleagues Jacqueline Salit and Omar Ali, “<a href="https://www.routledge.com/The-Independent-Voter/Reilly-Salit-Ali/p/book/9781032147338">The Independent Voter</a>.”</p>
<p>Second, many states are now controlled by one party. Forty states are currently under <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/State_government_trifectas">trifecta partisan control</a> – where one party dominates the governor’s office, House and Senate. By population, only 17.4% of Americans are living in states with divided state government.</p>
<p>When elected officials are unwilling or unable to compromise, and the majority of U.S. citizens are living in states where there is consolidated control of government by a major party, important problems can go unaddressed.</p>
<h2>‘Essential to a truly functioning democracy’</h2>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/581406/original/file-20240312-16-bwk2jd.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A woman at a protest holding a sign that says '750,000+ signed! Let us vote.'" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/581406/original/file-20240312-16-bwk2jd.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/581406/original/file-20240312-16-bwk2jd.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/581406/original/file-20240312-16-bwk2jd.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/581406/original/file-20240312-16-bwk2jd.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/581406/original/file-20240312-16-bwk2jd.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/581406/original/file-20240312-16-bwk2jd.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/581406/original/file-20240312-16-bwk2jd.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Pro-choice supporters gather outside the Michigan State Capitol on Sept. 7, 2022, after Michigan’s elections board rejected a voter initiative that would have enshrined abortion rights in the state Constitution.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/pro-choice-supporters-gather-outside-the-michigan-state-news-photo/1243016718">Jeff Kowalsky/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>The history of direct democracy tools in Arizona, where I live, provides an interesting example of how these tools have been used in a broadly representative manner. </p>
<p>In preparation for becoming a state, the <a href="https://digitalrepository.unm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1838&context=nmhr">framers of Arizona’s Constitution</a> in 1910 wanted legislators to be the primary method of making laws, but they were concerned that legislators might not act on key issues. They viewed the initiative and referendum as essential parts of a functioning democracy, in which citizens could get around legislative inaction. </p>
<p>During Arizona’s constitutional convention in 1910, the <a href="https://uair.library.arizona.edu/system/files/usain/download/azu_f811_r46_w.pdf">Los Angeles Express</a> newspaper urged its neighbor to push for direct democracy: “Let not Arizona be deterred from its purposes by menaces of the reactionaries or threats from such errant boys of big business… Let it write the initiative, the referendum, direct primaries, and the recall into the constitution and arm its people forever with the power of complete self-government.” </p>
<p>Ballot initiatives have been used by every kind of group for all kinds of purposes in the state. They have been passed both to increase and to curb public spending. Measures approved by voters <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/List_of_Arizona_ballot_measures">have opposed</a> affirmative action and immigrants’ access to state and local funds. </p>
<p><a href="https://ballotpedia.org/List_of_Arizona_ballot_measures">Other ballot measures</a> increased the minimum wage, established a redistricting commission to combat gerrymandering and allowed the use of medical and recreational marijuana. </p>
<p>In 2024, initiatives likely to appear on the ballot include measures to <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Arizona_Right_to_Abortion_Initiative_(2024)">expand abortion access</a> and <a href="https://www.makeelectionsfairaz.com/">mandate open primaries</a>.</p>
<p>While many state legislative bodies have been <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Legislative_alterations_of_ballot_initiatives">overturning or altering voter initiatives</a>, citizens in Arizona prevented this from taking place. </p>
<p>Arizonans passed a unique voter-initiated constitutional amendment in 1998 known as the <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Arizona_Proposition_105,_Prohibit_Legislative_Alteration_of_Ballot_Initiatives_Amendment">Voter Protection Act</a>. It prohibits a governor’s veto or legislative repeal of any voter-passed initiative. </p>
<p>The procedures to put such initiatives and referendums to vote, however, are still largely controlled by the state Legislature. Arizona lawmakers have been successful <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Laws_governing_the_initiative_process_in_Arizona">passing legislation</a> leading to a significant increase in rejected signatures. Because a certain number of signatures are required to get an initiative or referendum on the ballot, such legislation makes it harder to do that. </p>
<p>Direct democracy tools such as the ballot initiative and veto referendum have provided Arizonans with important alternatives to enacting public policy when elected representatives failed to do so. And these measures are being used to address a range of public policy issues, both conservative and liberal. Arizona can serve as a role model for how direct democracy can work for the rest of the states.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/222129/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Thom Reilly does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Voters frustrated by statehouse politics are bypassing elected representatives and enacting laws using direct democracy to preserve abortion rights, raise the minimum wage and rein in state spending.Thom Reilly, Professor & Co-Director, Center for an Independent and Sustainable Democracy, School of Public Affairs, Arizona State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2187642024-01-09T13:26:55Z2024-01-09T13:26:55ZVoters don’t always have final say – state legislatures and governors are increasingly undermining ballot measures that win<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566723/original/file-20231219-19-nsxbqv.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=14%2C7%2C4778%2C3176&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Supporters of Issue 1, which would codify reproductive rights, including abortion, in the Ohio Constitution, cheer election results on Nov. 7, 2023.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/supporters-of-ohio-issue-1-cheer-as-results-come-in-at-a-news-photo/1769693584?adppopup=true">Andrew Spear/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2023/11/14/confidence-in-scientists-medical-scientists-and-other-groups-and-institutions-in-society/">Less than half of Americans</a> trust elected officials to act in the public’s interest. </p>
<p>When voters want something done on an issue and their elected officials fail to act, they may turn to citizen initiatives to pursue their goals instead. The citizen initiative process varies by state, but in general, citizens collect signatures to have an issue put directly on the ballot for the voters to voice their preferences. Nearly half the states, 24 of them, <a href="https://www.ncsl.org/elections-and-campaigns/initiative-and-referendum-processes">allow citizen initiatives</a>. </p>
<p>These measures, also called “ballot initiatives,” often focus on the controversial issues of the day. Citizen initiatives <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Marriage_and_family_on_the_ballot">on same-sex marriage</a> and <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0955395922000056">marijuana legalization</a> have been on many state ballots through the years. Abortion rights have repeatedly <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/elections/abortion-rights-won-every-election-roe-v-wade-overturned-rcna99031">been on the ballot since 2022</a>, after the Supreme Court <a href="https://www.oyez.org/cases/2021/19-1392">overturned the constitutional protection for abortion</a>, and more voters can expect to <a href="https://apnews.com/article/abortion-ballot-measure-2024-state-vote-e7d635835dc3a440789ad87787553ec1">vote on the issue in 2024</a>.</p>
<p>I am an <a href="https://annewhitesell.com/research-2/">American politics scholar</a> who studies the connection between representation and public policy. In American democracy, the people expect to have a voice, whether that comes through electing representatives or directly voting on issues.</p>
<p>Yet it is <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-10-12/where-the-people-s-vote-can-be-negated-by-legislators">becoming increasingly common</a> for lawmakers across the country to not only ignore the will of the people, but also actively work against it. From 2010 to 2015, about 21% of citizen initiatives were <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Legislative_alterations_of_ballot_initiatives">altered by lawmakers</a> after they passed. From 2016 to 2018, lawmakers altered nearly 36% of passed citizen initiatives. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A big sign projected on a wall that says 'Eggs & Issues' with a man to the right at a lectern, talking." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566717/original/file-20231219-27-klyniy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=17%2C4%2C2977%2C1904&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566717/original/file-20231219-27-klyniy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=383&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566717/original/file-20231219-27-klyniy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=383&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566717/original/file-20231219-27-klyniy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=383&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566717/original/file-20231219-27-klyniy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=481&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566717/original/file-20231219-27-klyniy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=481&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566717/original/file-20231219-27-klyniy.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=481&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Maine Gov. Paul LePage refused to expand Medicaid in his state after voters in 2018 passed an initiative authorizing it.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/gov-paul-lepage-speaks-at-eggs-issues-breakfast-at-the-news-photo/987167644?adppopup=true">Gregory Rec/Portland Portland Press Herald via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Invalidate, weaken, repeal</h2>
<p>Here’s what some of those cases look like, from successful to unsuccessful efforts to alter the will of the people: </p>
<p>• In November 2023, <a href="https://apnews.com/article/ohio-abortion-amendment-election-2023-fe3e06747b616507d8ca21ea26485270">Ohio voters passed an amendment to their state’s constitution</a> protecting the right to abortion. Within a week, a group of Ohio Republican lawmakers <a href="https://ohiocapitaljournal.com/2023/11/13/some-ohio-gop-lawmakers-attempting-to-undermine-democratic-process-after-voters-protect-abortion/">declared the amendment to be invalid</a> and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/nov/17/ohio-abortion-rights-republicans-overturn">introduced legislation</a> that would strip state courts from having authority to rule on the issue of abortion. Ohio House Speaker, Republican Jason Stephens, <a href="https://ohiocapitaljournal.com/2023/11/15/pumping-the-brakes-ohio-house-speaker-dismisses-effort-to-limit-court-jurisdiction-on-issue-1/">rejected the proposed legislation</a>.</p>
<p>• In July 2018, Washington, D.C., voters approved an <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/11/08/dc-initiative-82-results-wage/">increase in the minimum wage</a> for tipped workers. Three months later, the City Council <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Washington,_D.C.,_Initiative_77,_Minimum_Wage_Increase_for_Tipped_Workers_(June_2018)">repealed the initiative</a>.</p>
<p>• In 2016, voters in South Dakota <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/elections/2016/results/south-dakota-ballot-measure-22-campaign-finance-overhaul">supported an initiative</a> to revise campaign finance and lobbying laws and create an ethics commission. Governor Dennis Daugaard <a href="https://www.argusleader.com/story/news/politics/2017/02/02/daugaard-signs-bill-eliminating-voter-approved-ethics-law/97399274/">signed a law</a> repealing the initiative in February 2017. Another citizen initiative to create an ethics commission was <a href="https://www.governing.com/archive/gov-campaign-finance-ethics-ballot-measures-2018.html">on the ballot in 2018</a>, but did not pass.</p>
<h2>Revise and amend</h2>
<p>Often lawmakers rewrite laws passed through initiative. Some revisions change key components of the initiatives, while others amend technical details.</p>
<p>• <a href="https://boltsmag.org/ohio-voters-issue-2-legalized-marijuana-equity-provisions-expungement/">Ohioans voted in favor of legalizing marijuana</a> in November 2023. In that initiative, part of the tax revenue from marijuana sales would go to a financial assistance program for those who show “social and economic disadvantage.” The Ohio Senate <a href="https://www.cleveland19.com/2023/12/09/breaking-down-bud-ohio-senate-passes-bill-that-nixes-social-equity-fund-put-place-under-issue-2/">passed a bill</a> the following month that would instead use the tax revenue to fund jails and law enforcement.</p>
<p>• Massachusetts voters <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Massachusetts_Marijuana_Legalization,_Question_4_(2016)#:%7E:text=The%20law%20implemented%20the%20following,retailer%20operating%20within%20the%20locality.">passed recreational marijuana legalization</a> in 2016. In 2017, the Legislature passed a bill to <a href="https://apnews.com/3cbe8b27c83144f391713d6d1fb31978">increase the excise tax</a> on marijuana from the 3.75% set in the citizens’ initiative to 10.75%. </p>
<p>• In 2018, Utah voters made adults with income up to 138% of the federal poverty level eligible for Medicaid – a federal-state health insurance program for low-income individuals and those with disabilities. The state Legislature applied to the federal government for waivers to <a href="https://www.commonwealthfund.org/blog/2019/one-step-forward-two-steps-back-utahs-medicaid-expansion">lower the income limit to 100% of the federal poverty level</a>, which curtailed the expansion voters approved.</p>
<p>• Arizona voters <a href="https://apnews.com/article/business-education-arizona-971374029a2af7d8f67b8366bdd89c3b">approved a tax increase</a> on the wealthy to fund the state’s schools in 2020. In 2021, the Legislature responded by <a href="https://apps.azleg.gov/BillStatus/BillOverview/75928">exempting business earnings from the tax</a>. There was an attempt by citizen initiative later that year to <a href="https://apnews.com/article/business-arizona-phoenix-doug-ducey-arizona-supreme-court-b8adfe654d0a5aa12b5054170e0f7df4">repeal the legislature’s law exempting business earnings</a>, but it did not gather enough signatures from citizens to make it to the ballot.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566732/original/file-20231219-17-jxqxos.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A green-bordered sign on a window that says 'VOTE NO on Initiative #77.'" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566732/original/file-20231219-17-jxqxos.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566732/original/file-20231219-17-jxqxos.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566732/original/file-20231219-17-jxqxos.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566732/original/file-20231219-17-jxqxos.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566732/original/file-20231219-17-jxqxos.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566732/original/file-20231219-17-jxqxos.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566732/original/file-20231219-17-jxqxos.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Initiative #77 was a 2018 ballot measure to gradually raise the minimum wage that tipped workers receive; passed by Washington, D.C. voters, the City Council repealed it.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/man-walks-by-a-vote-no-on-initiative-poster-on-june-18-2018-news-photo/977876412?adppopup=true">Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
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<h2>Governors object</h2>
<p>In some cases, it is not the legislature that opposes the will of the voters, but the governor. In recent years, several Republican governors have refused to implement Medicaid expansions passed by voter initiatives.</p>
<p>• Maine’s former governor, Paul LePage, said he would go to jail before he would <a href="https://www.pressherald.com/2018/07/12/paul-lepage-says-hed-go-to-jail-before-he-expands-medicaid/">implement Medicaid expansion</a> after it passed by voter initiative in 2017. Medicaid was not expanded until <a href="https://www.pressherald.com/2019/01/03/mills-signs-executive-order-to-implement-medicaid-expansion/">Democrat Janet Mills took office</a> in 2019.</p>
<p>• <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/missouri-governor-won-t-fund-medicaid-expansion-flouting-state-constitution-n1267265">Missouri Governor Mike Parson</a> said he would not move forward with the 2020 voter-passed Medicaid expansion because it would not pay for itself. In 2021, the <a href="https://apnews.com/article/courts-michael-brown-medicaid-3690befde29aa1b27406a3472fb566aa">Missouri Supreme Court</a> ruled the initiative valid and Medicaid expansion moved forward.</p>
<h2>Why they do it</h2>
<p>Lawmakers who rewrite or overturn ballot initiatives sometimes argue that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s11109-014-9273-5">voters do not understand</a> what they are supporting. Lawmakers, unlike citizens, have to balance state budgets every year, and they often raise questions about how to pay for the policies or programs passed by initiative. </p>
<p>Lawmakers also argue that outside groups play an outsized role in passing ballot initiatives. While <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s11109-014-9282-4">political science research</a> provides some support for this claim, outside groups also have influence in the regular legislative process. And they often work to defeat initiatives as well.</p>
<p>Citizen initiatives became popular <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/History_of_initiative_and_referendum_in_the_U.S.">during the Progressive Era</a> of the early 20th century as a way to give power back to citizens. Then, as now, citizens felt political power was too concentrated in the hands of the wealthy. Initiatives were one way for everyday people to get more involved in their government. </p>
<p>That only half of states permit citizen initiatives suggests that political elites are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/153244000100100402">not always supportive</a> of a process that limits their own power. Historically, though, legislators have <a href="https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.polity.2300087">respected the results</a>. Some lawmakers, including Ohio Governor Mike DeWine, state they will continue to <a href="https://ohiocapitaljournal.com/2023/11/11/ohio-gov-dewine-accepts-will-of-the-people-on-abortion-marijuana-but-hold-on/">“accept” the will of the people</a>. To do otherwise undermines democracy.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/218764/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Anne Whitesell does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Election year 2024 will see citizen initiatives on the ballot across the country, some focused on abortion rights. But there’s a growing trend of lawmakers altering initiatives after they have passed.Anne Whitesell, Assistant Professor, Political Science, Miami UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2080422023-06-20T16:11:19Z2023-06-20T16:11:19ZHow the ancient Greeks kept ruthless narcissists from capturing their democracy – and what modern politics could learn from them<p>Ancient Greece was in many ways a brutal society. It was almost perpetually at war, slavery was routine and women could only expect a low status in society. </p>
<p>However, there is one important sense in which ancient Greeks were more advanced than modern European societies: their sophisticated political systems. The citizens of ancient Athens developed a political system that was more genuinely democratic than the present day UK or US. </p>
<p>Our modern concept of democracy is actually a degradation of the original Greek concept and has very little in common with it. Modern democracy is merely representative, meaning that we elect officials to make decisions on our behalf, who become members of legislative bodies like the British parliament or the US Congress.</p>
<p>The ancient Greeks practised direct democracy. It literally was “<a href="https://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/power-to-the-people">people power</a>”. And they took measures specifically to ensure that ruthless, narcissistic people were unable to <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/ancient-athenians-voted-kick-politicians-out-if-enough-people-didnt-them-180976138/">dominate politics</a>. </p>
<p>Recent political events show that we have a great deal to learn from the Athenians. Arguably, a key problem in modern times is that we aren’t stringent enough about the people we allow to become politicians. </p>
<p>There’s a great deal of research showing that people with negative personality traits, such as <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0956797613491970">narcissism</a>, ruthlessness, amorality or <a href="https://www.redpillpress.com/shop/political-ponerology-expanded/">a lack of empathy and conscience</a>, are attracted to <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1002/per.1893">high-status roles</a>, including politics.</p>
<p>In a representative democracy, therefore, the people who put themselves forward as representatives include a sizeable proportion of people with disordered personalities – people who crave power because of their malevolent traits. </p>
<p>And the most disordered and malevolent personalities –the most ruthless and amoral – tend to rise to the highest positions in any political party, and in any government. This is the phenomenon of <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-darkness-of-boris-johnson-a-psychologist-on-the-prime-ministers-unpalatable-personality-traits-177662">“pathocracy”</a>, which I discuss at length in my new book <a href="https://www.johnhuntpublishing.com/iff-books/our-books/disconnected-roots-human-cruelty-connection-heal-world">DisConnected</a>.</p>
<p>Numerous American mental health professionals have <a href="https://www.change.org/p/trump-is-mentally-ill-and-must-be-removed">argued</a> that Donald Trump has a serious personality disorder which made him unfit for the role of president. This included the president’s niece, Mary Trump – a qualified psychologist. </p>
<p>One of the key concerns was his apparent failure to take responsibility <a href="https://www.simonandschuster.co.uk/books/Too-Much-and-Never-Enough/Mary-L-Trump/9781471190162">for his actions or mistakes</a>. Under Trump, the US government effectively became a pathocracy.</p>
<p>In the UK, Boris Johnson has shown similar personality traits. The most recent example was his <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12179339/Boris-Johnsons-resignation-letter-quits-MP.html">petulant, narcissistic reaction</a> to the House of Commons report that found he had deliberately misled parliament on multiple occasions while in office. </p>
<p>Time and again, Johnson has arguably shown a self-deluded inability to admit to mistakes or take responsibility for his actions – along with traits of dishonesty and glibness – which are characteristic of a <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-darkness-of-boris-johnson-a-psychologist-on-the-prime-ministers-unpalatable-personality-traits-177662">“dark triad” personality</a>.</p>
<h2>Ancient democratic practices</h2>
<p>The ancient Athenians were very aware of the danger of unsuitable personalities attaining power. Their standard method of selecting political officials was <a href="https://www.scirp.org/journal/paperinformation.aspx?paperid=107594">sortition</a> – random selection by lot. This was a way of ensuring that ordinary people were represented in government, and of safeguarding against corruption and bribery.</p>
<p>The Athenians were aware that this meant a risk of handing responsibility to incompetent people but mitigated the risk by ensuring that decisions were made by groups or boards. Different members of the group would take responsibility for different areas and would act as a check on each other’s behaviour.</p>
<p>Athenian democracy was direct in other ways too. Political decisions, such as whether to go to war, the election of military leaders or the nomination of magistrates, were made at <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Ecclesia-ancient-Greek-assembly">massive assemblies</a>, where thousands of citizens would gather. </p>
<p>A minimum of 6,000 citizens was required to pass any legislation. Citizens usually voted by showing hands – also sometimes with stones or pieces of broken pottery – and decisions were carried by simple majority. </p>
<p>The ancient Athenians also practised a system of ostracism, not dissimilar to some egalitarian <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352250X19301174">hunter-gatherer groups</a> (who were also aware of the danger of alpha males dominating the group). Ostracisms took place annually, when disruptive people who threatened democracy were nominated for expulsion. </p>
<p>If a sufficient number of citizens voted in favour, the disruptors would be banished from the city for ten years. In a sense, the decision to deny Johnson a former member’s parliamentary pass can be seen as a form of ostracism to protect against his corrupting influence. </p>
<h2>A return to direct democracy</h2>
<p>Sortition is still used in modern democracies, most notably in jury service, but these ancient democratic principles could be used much more widely to positive effect.</p>
<p>In fact, in recent years, many political thinkers have recommended reviving sortition in government. In 2014, Alexander Guerrero, professor of philosophy at Rutgers University, published an influential <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/papa.12029">paper</a> advocating what he called “lottocracy” as an alternative to representative democracy. </p>
<p>In this system, government is undertaken by “single-issue legislatures” assemblies that focus on specific issues such as agriculture or healthcare. Members of the legislatures are chosen by lot and make decisions after consulting experts on the relevant topic. </p>
<p>The political scientists <a href="https://politicalscience.yale.edu/people/h-l-ne-landemore">Hélène Landemore</a> has advocated a similar model in which assemblies of randomly selected citizens (ranging in size from a 150 to 1,000) make political decisions. </p>
<p>Landemore’s model of <a href="https://politicalscience.yale.edu/publications/open-democracy-reinventing-popular-rule-twenty-first-century">“open democracy</a>” also includes referendums and “crowd-sourced feedback loops” (when large numbers of people discuss policies on internet forums, and the feedback is passed to legislators). </p>
<p>In addition, the political philosopher John Burnheim has used the term <a href="https://www.imprint.co.uk/product/the-demarchy-manifesto/">demarchy</a> for a political system made of small randomly selected “citizen’s juries” who discuss and decide public policies. </p>
<p>Such measures would be a way of reducing the likelihood of people with personality disorders attaining power since they would make leadership positions less attractive to ruthless and amoral people. </p>
<p>Direct democracy means less individual power and more checks and limitations to individual authority. Governments and organisations become less hierarchical, more cooperative than competitive, based on partnership rather than power. </p>
<p>This means less opportunity for disordered people to satisfy their craving for dominance in the political sphere. We would then become free of pathocracy, and all of the chaos and suffering it causes.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/208042/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Steve Taylor does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Those who seek power for the sake of power are less attracted to high office when more people get a say.Steve Taylor, Senior Lecturer in Psychology, Leeds Beckett UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1893532022-12-05T03:08:00Z2022-12-05T03:08:00ZCitizen assemblies and the challenges of democratic equality<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497184/original/file-20221124-15-btw172.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C8%2C1789%2C1184&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">France's Convention for the Climate, held from 2019 to 2020, brought together 150 randomly selected citizens and asked them define measures to reduce the country's greenhouse gas emissions by at least 40% by 2030 compared to 1990.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.conventioncitoyennepourleclimat.fr/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/convcit-Dossierdepresse_EN.pdf">Katrin Baumann/CCC</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>There are a wide range of ways to create decision-making bodies in democratic societies. Elections are one of the most common, with individuals stepping forward and seeking public support. If elected by their fellow citizens, they then take action on their behalf. This is known as <a href="https://www.liberties.eu/en/stories/representative-democracy/43508#">representative democracy</a>. An alternative form is <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/direct-democracy">direct democracy</a>, which involves all citizens voting on proposed government policies or legislation.<br>
af
Another form that’s growing in popularity are citizens’ assemblies – decision-making bodies created by random selection. While less widespread, they’re creating a sense of optimism about democracy among those who have heard about or taken part in them, as well as organisations <a href="https://read.oecd-ilibrary.org/governance/innovative-citizen-participation-and-new-democratic-institutions_056573fa-en#page1">such as the OECD</a>. Randomisation – also known as <a href="https://www.sortitionfoundation.org/">sortition</a> – holds out the possibility that everyone can have an equal chance of being selected; politically, it offers the hope of consensus because partisan engagements are not a prerequisite for participation. Randomisation also promises an assembly where diversity of experience and opinions promotes critical reflection and reasoned judgement, as with <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0032329218789892">criminal juries</a>.</p>
<p>Citizens’ assemblies can be asked to weigh in on major challenges to society – for example, France’s <a href="https://www.conventioncitoyennepourleclimat.fr/en/">Convention for the Climate</a> and the UK’s <a href="https://www.climateassembly.uk/">Climate Assembly</a>, both held from 2019-2020, brought together hundreds of people together and asked them define measures that will allow to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in an equitable manner. Other such bodies included the <a href="https://citizensassembly.co.uk/brexit/about/">Citizens’ Assembly on Brexit</a> (2017) and Germany’s <a href="https://participedia.net/case/5806">Citizens’ Assembly on Democracy</a>. Ireland even has a standing <a href="https://participedia.net/organization/5796">Citizens’ Assembly</a>, established in 2016.</p>
<h2>Reflecting society as a whole</h2>
<p>Creating a citizens’ assembly that truly reflects society as a whole isn’t so simple, however. In particular, only a very small percentage of those invited to participate actually agree to do so. According to a <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/313447022_Explaining_non-participation_in_deliberative_mini-publics">2017 study</a> published <em>European Journal of Political Research</em>, the precise percentage depends on how large, complex and time-consuming the process is likely to be. It ranges from 4% for larger, more onerous assemblies to 30% in a couple of exceptional cases, and averaging out at 15% across all countries and all forms of assembly. As a consequence, the formal equality of opportunity that unweighted lotteries promise tends to result in assemblies skewed to the socially advantaged, the partisan, and those most confident in their practical and cognitive abilities, whatever the reality.</p>
<p>To create an assembly that is more descriptively representative of the population – or one that looks more like us – <a href="https://www.oecd.org/gov/innovative-citizen-participation-and-new-democratic-institutions-339306da-en.htm">several approaches are used</a>. One is to have an initial phase of unweighted selection followed by a second phase that uses weighted lotteries. Another is to use stratified sampling or forms of stratification from the beginning. </p>
<p>For the Climate Assembly UK, organisers sent out 20% of its 30,000 letters of invitation to people randomly selected from the lowest-income postcodes, and then used random stratified sampling by computer to select <a href="https://www.climateassembly.uk/detail/recruitment/index.html">110 participants from all the people who were over 16 and free on the relevant dates</a>.</p>
<p>Because citizen assemblies are very small compared to the population as a whole – France’s Convention for the Climate was made up of just 150 people – the descriptively representative character of the assembly can occur on only a few dimensions. Organisers must therefore decide what population characteristics the assembly should embody and in what proportion. Randomisation thus does not preclude difficult moral, political and scientific choices about the assembly to be constructed, any more than it precludes voluntariness or self-selection.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497189/original/file-20221124-15-fdtm9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497189/original/file-20221124-15-fdtm9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497189/original/file-20221124-15-fdtm9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=325&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497189/original/file-20221124-15-fdtm9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=325&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497189/original/file-20221124-15-fdtm9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=325&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497189/original/file-20221124-15-fdtm9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=409&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497189/original/file-20221124-15-fdtm9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=409&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497189/original/file-20221124-15-fdtm9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=409&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Convention for the Climate was made up of 150 French citizens from all walks of life.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.conventioncitoyennepourleclimat.fr/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/convcit-Dossierdepresse_EN.pdf">Katrin Baumann/CCC</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The use of <a href="https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/707212">weighted lotteries</a> means that individuals will <em>not</em> have a formally equal chance to be selected to it – nor, of course, a substantively equal one. Assemblies created by <a href="https://www.investopedia.com/terms/stratified_random_sampling.asp">stratified random selection</a> offer a much wider set of opportunities to serve than is typical of other deliberative bodies. It is thus important to remember that even when a randomly selected assembly “looks like us”, everyone will not have had the same chance to be selected to it, nor to take up the invitation if they want to.</p>
<h2>Making the debate truly open</h2>
<p>The most egalitarian element of citizen assemblies, then, may lie in their commitment to <a href="https://delibdemjournal.org/article/525/galley/4532/view/">deliberative equality</a> among participants, rather than in the social profiles of their members. That commitment means that organisers ensure that all members get to share the same high-quality, impartial information. Otherwise, it would be difficult for assembly members who have limited knowledge about the topic of deliberation to discuss as equals with those who are already well informed (or convinced that they are).</p>
<p>Assemblies also use facilitators to ensure that all members feel free to contribute, that some don’t dominate the discussion or intimidate others, intentionally or otherwise. The importance of facilitation to good deliberation is brought out by the <a href="https://books.google.fr/books?hl=en&lr=&id=yXfO1gsosBgC">experience of one facilitator</a>, who stated “In every single citizens’ jury we have done, we’ve been thrown out – and asked back in.”</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497185/original/file-20221124-20-uy40xe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497185/original/file-20221124-20-uy40xe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497185/original/file-20221124-20-uy40xe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=534&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497185/original/file-20221124-20-uy40xe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=534&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497185/original/file-20221124-20-uy40xe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=534&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497185/original/file-20221124-20-uy40xe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=671&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497185/original/file-20221124-20-uy40xe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=671&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497185/original/file-20221124-20-uy40xe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=671&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">France’s Convention for the Climate took place from October 2019 to June 2020, and involved seven sessions that helped build understanding, defined the challenges, and reached formal conclusions.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Convention for the Climate</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>While the importance of having equality among participants and between organisers, experts and participants should not be underestimated, democratic equality does not require that deliberative bodies be composed of social groups in proportion to their share of the population. </p>
<p>Trying to ensure that the membership of a small assembly matches that of the population along lines of sex, age, level of education, professional status, geography, means that it is impossible to match them in other ways – for example, in terms of their different beliefs, or in terms of the proportion of women who are farmers rather than bank managers. In short, trying to create a microcosm of the population along certain lines prevents the deliberative representation of the population on others.</p>
<h2>Giving the disadvantaged a real voice</h2>
<p>As a consequence, political philosophers who are concerned with the adequate representation of disadvantaged social groups often suppose that what we should be aiming for sufficient representation to ensure that their voices, opinions and internal differences are taken seriously in public assemblies, rather than representation in proportion to population. As <a href="https://books.google.fr/books?hl=en&lr=&id=K2A9AwAAQBAJ">Anne Phillips puts it</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“The underlying preoccupation is not with pictorial adequacy – does the legislature match up to the people? – but with those particularly urgent instances of political exclusion which a ‘fairer’ system of representation seeks to resolve.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>For example, the over-representation is likely to be important for groups such as the homeless, the very poor, those with limited education, or those who suffer from chronic illness. They may be relatively small compared to the total population, but they also suffer from severe disadvantages that make it difficult to participate in public deliberations, and to be heard and respected as the equal of others. For them, adequate representation will likely require membership that is much greater than their share of the population.</p>
<p>In short, such groups are likely to suffer from <a href="https://mrdevin.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/five-faces-of-oppression.pdf">“cultural imperialism”</a>, as Iris Marion Young called it. This means that the creation of an assembly that “looks right” is insufficient. Instead, forms of assembly created specifically to maximise their opportunities to be heard may be necessary, even at the cost of underrepresenting members from more advantaged groups, such as university-educated middle-aged men, whose perspectives are likely to figure disproportionately in public discussion. </p>
<h2>Consensus, but not at any price</h2>
<p>It may also be desirable to rethink the practice of having a single report with policy recommendations, rather than allowing for separate majority and minority reports. Pressure to reach consensus can impede deliberation, <a href="https://www.cairn.info/revue-archives-de-philosophie-du-droit-2020-1-page-399.htm">as seems to have happened with France’s Convention for the Climate</a>, and reinforce social and political inequalities. Understanding why citizens disagree when faced with the same evidence and arguments is, itself, a contribution to public knowledge and reflection.</p>
<p>Seeking consensus is important, because citizens need to know what they can agree on in matters of public policy. But deliberators may have important disagreements to air publicly, and these should not be a source of shame or embarrassment, nor seen as a threat to the success of an assembly, rather than as evidence of the complexity of the issues with which it grappled. In short, while trained moderators are essential to citizen assemblies – and might profitably be used in many other deliberative fora – securing the inclusion and diversity that make citizen assemblies so appealing, requires confronting cultural imperialism more explicitly in future.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/189353/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Annabelle Lever a reçu des financements de EC Coordination and Support Grant: Reconstructing Democracy in Times of Crisis: A Voter-Centred Perspective (REDEM). Project 870996. Call H2020-SC6-GOVERNANCE-2019. </span></em></p>Decision-making bodies created by random selection, citizens’ assemblies are creating a sense of optimism about democracy among those who have heard about or taken part in them.Annabelle Lever, Chercheuse permanente, Cevipof, professeur de philosophie politique, Sciences Po Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1676222021-09-10T12:27:48Z2021-09-10T12:27:48ZCalifornia recall: There’s a method to what looks like madness<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/420306/original/file-20210909-23-1056rga.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=54%2C7%2C5154%2C3389&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">California Gov. Gavin Newsom (standing) talks with volunteers who are phone-banking against the recall on Aug. 13, 2021, in San Francisco. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/california-gov-gavin-newsom-talks-with-volunteers-who-are-news-photo/1333995829?adppopup=true"> Justin Sullivan/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/upcoming-elections/2021-ca-gov-recall">The California governor recall election</a> has been yet another opportunity <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/article/california-recall-election-gavin-newsom.html">to portray California as a strange place</a> with very odd practices. </p>
<p>And the recall truly has bizarre quirks that could, for example, <a href="https://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/upcoming-elections/2021-ca-gov-recall/newsom-recall-faqs?ltclid=4cc29b6b-6cc2-4250-98f2-055dc9ef7a1cif%20it">produce a replacement governor with much less voter support</a> than the incumbent governor – Gavin Newsom – facing recall. With <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Gavin_Newsom_recall,_Governor_of_California_(2019-2021)">46 recall challengers vying for Newsom’s job</a> and only a plurality required to win, it’s possible a winning candidate could become governor with far less than 50% of the vote. </p>
<p>But California’s direct democracy, which is <a href="https://www.mercurynews.com/2021/09/03/editorial-california-needs-to-change-recall-law">being savaged by writers from within California – “Elections are supposed to represent the will, not the whim, of voters” says a Mercury News editorial</a> – as well as from the usual suspects who are outside the state, reflects an important, even if flawed, vehicle to update America’s durable but staid democratic institutions. </p>
<h2>Founders not keen on direct democracy</h2>
<p>By the standards of the American republic founded in 1789, <a href="https://www.voanews.com/usa/all-about-america/todays-democracy-isnt-exactly-what-wealthy-us-founding-fathers-envisioned">direct democracy is, much like California itself, a new kid on the block</a>. </p>
<p>The founding doctrine of American government was a stable representative republic in which elected leaders would <a href="https://nccs.net/blogs/our-ageless-constitution/separation-of-powers">check and balance each other</a> by their service in governing bodies that were formally separate, but with shared authority. In other words, the officeholders would hold their fellow officeholders accountable. This same plan forms the basis of all 50 state governments today.</p>
<p>The Founding Fathers hated any type of direct democracy and made their feelings known about it. “Nothing but a permanent body can check the imprudence of democracy,” <a href="https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Hamilton/01-04-02-0098-0004">wrote Alexander Hamilton</a>. “Their turbulent and uncontrouling disposition requires checks.” </p>
<p>The Progressives of the late 1800s and early 1900s, however, thought that direct democracy was the essential solution to a problem the Constitution did not address: What if elected leaders were neither willing nor able to hold one another accountable? </p>
<p>In more contemporary terms, direct democracy also addresses cases in which the popular will is frustrated by the arcane, slow and even obstructive legislative process. Checks and balances can mean no progress at all.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/420322/original/file-20210909-16-pq8he0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Gov.-election Arnold Schwarzenegger and Governor Gray Davis standing behind Davis' desk at the state Capitol." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/420322/original/file-20210909-16-pq8he0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/420322/original/file-20210909-16-pq8he0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420322/original/file-20210909-16-pq8he0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420322/original/file-20210909-16-pq8he0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420322/original/file-20210909-16-pq8he0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=510&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420322/original/file-20210909-16-pq8he0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=510&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420322/original/file-20210909-16-pq8he0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=510&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Gov.-elect Arnold Schwarzenegger (left) meets with Gov. Gray Davis, who lost to him in a recall election, on Oct. 23, 2003, at the State Capitol in Sacramento, California.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/governor-elect-arnold-schwarzenegger-meets-with-governor-news-photo/2634336?adppopup=true">Rich Pedroncelli-Pool/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Protecting the peoples’ needs</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.britannica.com/place/United-States/The-Progressive-era">The Progressive movement</a> enjoyed great popularity in the western and southwestern states that were not part of the original 13 states. It built on a deep suspicion that representative government could not protect the needs of the people because it could not resist the power of special interests.</p>
<p><a href="https://journals.openedition.org/siecles/1109?lang=en">In California, where the Progressives put down deep roots</a>, reformers loathed the <a href="https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/oi/authority.20110810105158910">Southern Pacific Railroad, which managed to corrupt elected leaders</a> all over the State Capitol. No matter how many elections could be won by well-intended candidates for state assembly or state senate, the railroad would still dominate. </p>
<p>To the Progressives, the solution was to vest some legislative power directly in the hands of the voters, where presumably the Railroad could not reach through its control of elections and lobbying. As a result of a <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/History_of_Initiative_and_Referendum_in_California">voter-approved constitutional amendment passed in 1911</a>, California voters gave themselves the power to make a law – initiative – or to remove a law – referendum. Those were the original pillars of direct democracy envisioned by the Progressives. </p>
<p><a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Forms_of_direct_democracy_in_the_American_states">Many other states</a>, not just those in the original Progressive stomping grounds, adopted direct democracy. The initiative proved to be the workhorse of direct democracy, used far more often than either the referendum or the recall. Voter initiatives have even managed to get <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Utah_Proposition_3,_Medicaid_Expansion_Initiative_(2018)">Medicaid expansion onto the legislative agenda in a state like Utah</a>, whose elected officials refused to expand the program. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/420325/original/file-20210909-21-9u8hwp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Six photos of candidates in a magazine story about " src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/420325/original/file-20210909-21-9u8hwp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/420325/original/file-20210909-21-9u8hwp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=587&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420325/original/file-20210909-21-9u8hwp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=587&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420325/original/file-20210909-21-9u8hwp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=587&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420325/original/file-20210909-21-9u8hwp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=737&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420325/original/file-20210909-21-9u8hwp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=737&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420325/original/file-20210909-21-9u8hwp.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=737&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">With almost four dozen candidates in the race to replace Newsom, the recall has been easy to poke fun at.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.lamag.com/citythinkblog/colorful-recall-election-candidates/">Screenshot, LA Magazine</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Big stick</h2>
<p>The recall, which vested devastating power in the hands of the voters, joined the Progressive agenda rather late. Its adoption was pioneered by a leading Los Angeles philanthropist, doctor, socialist and Progressive named <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1937/10/31/archives/dr-john-r-haynes-surgeon-dies-at-84-civic-leader-in-los-angeles-and.html">John Randolph Haynes</a>. His advocacy led voters in <a href="https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2003-jul-13-me-history13-story.html">Los Angeles to create the first recall provision in the nation</a> in its 1903 city charter. Haynes tirelessly pushed state Progressives to <a href="https://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=303">include the recall in the landmark 1911 constitutional amendment</a> – and they did. </p>
<p>The California recall applies to <a href="https://elections.cdn.sos.ca.gov/recalls/recall-procedures-guide.pdf">all statewide elected officials, members of the state legislature and judges of the appellate and supreme courts</a>. There’s a low bar to get a recall of statewide elected officials on the ballot: signatures from 12% of the number of those who voted in the previous election for the same office. The provision features simultaneous recall and replacement elections: If the voters choose to remove the incumbent, the candidate who receives a plurality of the votes becomes governor.</p>
<p>The recall is a powerful device to hold over the heads of state elected officials. Recall elections usually happen outside of the usual election cycle, when voters are not expected to be called upon to participate. It has more in common with “snap elections” in parliamentary democracies than the more predictable American election cycle. </p>
<p>Compared to the widely used initiative, <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Recall_(political)">state recalls are very rare</a>. Since 1911, only 11 California state officials have faced recall campaigns that gathered enough signatures to make the ballot. <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Recall_campaigns_in_California">Of those, only six were actually removed from office</a>: Sen. <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Marshall_Black_recall,_California_(1913)">Marshall Black</a>, a Republican-Progressive, was removed in 1913 on charges of embezzlement. A year later, <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Edwin_Grant_recall,_California_(1914)">Democrat Edwin E. Grant was removed for sponsorship of Red Light Abatement legislation</a>, which was wildly unpopular in his San Francisco district. Republican assembly members <a href="https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1995-05-17-mn-2826-story.html">Paul Horcher</a> and <a href="https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1995-07-19-mn-25636-story.html">Doris Allen</a> were recalled in an effort spearheaded by their own party in 1994 and 1995, respectively, for crossing party lines in the vote for speaker. </p>
<p>The most famous recall campaign came in 2003, when Democratic Gov. Gray Davis, beleaguered by a power grid crisis, <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Gray_Davis_recall,_Governor_of_California_(2003)">was driven from office and replaced by actor and Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger</a>, who received more votes than Davis received for staying in office. </p>
<p>While the success rate of state recalls is small, there seems to be an acceleration in effective efforts, driven by Republicans facing a deep electoral hole in regular elections. <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Recall_campaigns_in_California">The last three recalls to make the ballot</a> have been aimed at Democrats: Davis in 2003, a successful recall of Democratic state Sen. Josh Newman, and the current campaign. </p>
<p>The California state recall may be on its way to becoming the low-visibility political tool of the minority party looking for vulnerable incumbents. Of all four governors in the nation who ever faced recall elections, <a href="https://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/recalls/recall-history-california-1913-present">two were California Democrats during the heyday of their party’s ascendancy in state politics</a>.</p>
<p>While the public may love direct democracy, it has <a href="https://www.law.berkeley.edu/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/92-S.-Cal.-L.-Rev.-557-CALIFORNIA-CONSTITUTIONAL-LAW-DIRECT-DEMOCRACY.pdf">more critics than defenders</a> among students of politics. But it remains one of the few long-term structural reforms that has the potential to fix some of the problems of the American governmental system.</p>
<p>Voters may be able to improve direct democracy, keeping in mind its original purpose: to activate and mobilize a well-informed citizenry to correct the flaws of a democratic system of surprising longevity, but with a deep resistance to change.</p>
<p>[<em>Understand what’s going on in Washington.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/politics-weekly-74/?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=politics-most">Sign up for The Conversation’s Politics Weekly</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/167622/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Raphael J. Sonenshein does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>It’s easy to make fun of California politics. But a longtime scholar of those politics says the attempt to recall Gov. Gavin Newsom is part of a long-running attempt to hold government accountable.Raphael J. Sonenshein, Executive Director, Pat Brown Institute for Public Affairs, California State University, Los AngelesLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1251052019-10-10T22:55:45Z2019-10-10T22:55:45ZTurkish attack on Syria endangers a remarkable democratic experiment by the Kurds<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/296566/original/file-20191010-188792-l4zhjx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=35%2C8%2C5955%2C3979&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Kurdish fighters in Syria say the U.S. is abandoning its allies and potentially empowering the Islamic State by withdrawing from northeastern Syria and allowing a Turkish assault, Oct. 7, 2019.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Syria/01b7c48ed1bc400e99cac09047706a55/13/0">AP Photo</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Turkey’s attack on Kurdish-run territory in northern Syria will likely snuff out a radical experiment in self-government that is unlike anything I have seen in more than <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-new-middle-east-what-everyone-needs-to-know-9780190653989?cc=us&lang=en&">30 years studying the Middle East</a>.</p>
<p>In a surprise Oct. 6 <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/statement-press-secretary-85/">statement</a>, President Donald Trump announced the U.S. would withdraw <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/trump-administration-to-pull-troops-from-northern-syria-as-turkey-readies-offensive/2019/10/07/a965e466-e8b3-11e9-bafb-da248f8d5734_story.html">its troops from northern Syria</a>. </p>
<p>Approximately 1,000 American soldiers had been stationed in that region as a buffer separating Kurdish forces – who had been working with the Americans in the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2019/10/07/brief-history-syrian-democratic-forces-kurdish-led-alliance-that-helped-us-defeat-islamic-state/">fight against the Islamic State</a> – from Turkish troops. Turkey feared that the Syrian Kurds would link up with Turkey’s Kurdish minority who have <a href="https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/10102610/why-turkey-attacking-syria-border-map-background-tension-explained/">demanded autonomy or independence</a>. </p>
<p>On Oct. 9, the Turkish military <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/09/politics/syria-turkey-invasion-intl-hnk/index.html">began its assault</a>, pummeling Kurdish-held territory with artillery and airstrikes. Kurds are rapidly evacuating the region and <a href="https://www.cnn.com/middleeast/live-news/syria-turkey-military-offensive-dle-intl/index.html">at least 24 people</a> have been killed in northern Syria. Retaliatory strikes from Syria have <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/the-latest-finland-condemns-turkeys-offensive-into-syria/2019/10/10/8f29cd60-eb42-11e9-a329-7378fbfa1b63_story.html">killed civilians</a> in southern Turkey.</p>
<p>According to Turkish president Recep Erdogan, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2019/10/09/turkey-plans-syrian-safe-zone-advocates-fear-death-trap/">Turkey’s goal</a> is to create a buffer zone separating Syria’s Kurds from the Turkish border. </p>
<p>But his country’s attack will do much more than that. If successful, it will destroy the most full-fledged democracy the Middle East has yet to see.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/296563/original/file-20191010-188835-ujglip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=30%2C7%2C5065%2C3407&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/296563/original/file-20191010-188835-ujglip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=403&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296563/original/file-20191010-188835-ujglip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=403&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296563/original/file-20191010-188835-ujglip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=403&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296563/original/file-20191010-188835-ujglip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=506&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296563/original/file-20191010-188835-ujglip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=506&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296563/original/file-20191010-188835-ujglip.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=506&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Turks look toward northern Syria, which has been under attack by Turkey since Oct. 9.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Turkey-US-Syria/58f92d9fae874674973ce05e73000364/16/0">AP Photo/Lefteris Pitarakis</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A different way to govern</h2>
<p>The Kurds call their autonomous region in Syria “Rojava,” meaning “the land where the sun sets.” </p>
<p>Kurdish-led forces took possession of this <a href="https://www.economist.com/middle-east-and-africa/2019/05/23/the-kurds-are-creating-a-state-of-their-own-in-northern-syria">swath of territory in northern and eastern Syria</a> from <a href="https://rojavainformationcenter.com/background/rojava-timeline/">direct Syrian government control in 2012</a>. Then they successfully defended it against the Islamic State.</p>
<p>Kurdish Syria is a small portion of a territory, known as Kurdistan, that includes parts of Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran. Kurdistan is home to approximately <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/aljazeeraworld/2019/01/independence-iraqi-kurds-190122043558455.html">25-35 million Kurds</a>, a cultural and ethnic minority in the Middle East.</p>
<p>The key to understanding the Rojava project, as those involved often refer to it, is the notion of “<a href="https://www.ft.com/content/50102294-77fd-11e5-a95a-27d368e1ddf7">confederalism</a>.” In this form of government, local units – in this case, Kurdistan’s “autonomous regions” – come together in a federation yet retain a great deal of autonomy. </p>
<p>Because sovereign power belongs to the local units and not to a central government, Kurdish confederalism differs from an American-style federal system.</p>
<p>The Kurds are so serious about devolving power to the local level that <a href="https://www.kurdishinstitute.be/en/charter-of-the-social-contract/">Rojava’s charter</a> requires each of its three regions to have its own flag. And within each region, local elected councils are in charge. They organize garbage collection, adjudicate disputes and manage public health and safety.</p>
<p>Confederalism sets the Kurds apart from almost every other government in the Middle East. </p>
<p>Across the region, power is <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/blog/markaz/2016/11/22/want-to-stabilize-the-middle-east-start-with-governance/">concentrated at the top</a>. Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, is an authoritarian leader who has ruthlessly crushed his opponents in the country’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-syrian-uprising-began-and-why-it-matters-112801">eight-year civil war</a>. Egypt has a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/04/world/middleeast/egypt.html">military government</a>. Saudi Arabia has a king. </p>
<p>But Rojava would be an exceptional society almost anywhere.</p>
<p>Rojava’s charter guarantees freedom of expression and assembly and equality of all religious communities and languages. It mandates direct democracy, term limits and <a href="https://theconversation.com/kurds-targeted-by-turkish-attack-include-25000-female-fighters-whove-battled-islamic-state-125100">gender equality</a>. Men and women share every position in government. Kurdish women have <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2017/05/15/syrias-kurds-are-not-the-pkk-erdogan-pyd-ypg/">fought the Islamic State in Syria as soldiers</a> in an all-female militia.</p>
<p>In a region where religion and politics are often intertwined, the Kurdish state is secular. Religious leaders cannot serve in politics. Rojava’s charter even affirms the right of all citizens to a healthy environment.</p>
<p>Surrounding countries, <a href="https://theconversation.com/syrias-forgotten-pluralism-and-why-it-matters-today-76206">including Syria</a>, also have constitutions with eloquent endorsements of political and human rights. </p>
<p>In Rojava, however, the constitution is <a href="https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/2016-10-14/rojava-model">actually in effect</a>. Syrian Kurds have realized the dream of the 2010-2011 pro-democracy uprisings across the Arab world.</p>
<h2>Rojava’s downsides</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.kurdistan24.net/en/news/d49f0ab9-1c99-4a85-89e2-7953ab6d31a4">Internal cleavages</a> in Syria’s Kurdish community undermine the Rojava project – namely, the perpetual jockeying for power between rival Kurdish clans and the struggle for preeminence among Turkish, Syrian and Iraqi Kurds. </p>
<p>The Kurds also have a troubled relationship with Syria’s Arabs and other groups. <a href="https://www.hrw.org/report/2009/11/26/group-denial/repression-kurdish-political-and-cultural-rights-syria">Beginning in the 1960s</a>, the Syrian government began moving other populations to Kurdish territory to challenge Kurdish dominance there, sparking Kurdish resentment. </p>
<p>The devastation wrought by the Islamic State – such as the mass murder of the Yazidis, a religious minority within the Kurdish community, and sexual enslavement of their women – further fueled this resentment.</p>
<p>There have been numerous reports of Kurdish soldiers taking violent revenge against captured Islamic State members, alleged collaborators and even entire villages suspected of <a href="https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2015/10/syria-us-allys-razing-of-villages-amounts-to-war-crimes/">aiding the Islamic State enemy</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/296558/original/file-20191010-188807-9mubsz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/296558/original/file-20191010-188807-9mubsz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/296558/original/file-20191010-188807-9mubsz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296558/original/file-20191010-188807-9mubsz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296558/original/file-20191010-188807-9mubsz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296558/original/file-20191010-188807-9mubsz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=512&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296558/original/file-20191010-188807-9mubsz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=512&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296558/original/file-20191010-188807-9mubsz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=512&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">People in Akcakale, Turkey, run for cover after mortars were fired from northern Syria in retaliation for Turkey’s military attack, Oct. 10, 2019.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/APTOPIX-Turkey-US-Syria/62d861712a3a414c9e0ac86795157758/3/0">Ismail Coskun/HA via AP</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The Kurdish region of Syria also has some politically problematic origins. </p>
<p>The Syrian-Kurdish Democratic Union Party – Rojava’s leading political party – played an outsized role in the creation of Rojava. The party is <a href="https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/menasource/the-ypg-pkk-connection/">affiliated with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party</a>, or PKK, a far-left militant group that has fought against the Turkish government, first for the <a href="https://nationalinterest.org/feature/its-time-acknowledge-pkks-evolution-42482">independence of Kurds from Turkey in the 1980s and 1990s</a>, then – in the early 2000s – for their autonomy within Turkish borders. </p>
<p>Many Kurds in Rojava consider <a href="https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2019/10/syria-kurds/">PKK founder Abdullah Ocalan</a> a national hero. It was Ocalan who came up with the idea of confederalism in the first place, back in 2005. </p>
<p>But both Turkey and the United States consider the PKK to be a <a href="https://theconversation.com/us-foreign-terrorist-designation-is-more-punishment-than-threat-detector-116049">terrorist organization</a>. The PKK is currently conducting an insurgency against the Turkish government.</p>
<h2>Danger ahead</h2>
<p>The Rojava project is now in imminent peril. </p>
<p>Even if Turkey hadn’t launched its military offensive, Rojava would probably still have a tenuous future.</p>
<p>The Syrian-Kurdish Democratic Union Party has refused to <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-crisis-syria-kurds-explainer/where-do-the-kurds-fit-into-syrias-war-idUSKCN1OX16L">take sides in the Syrian civil war</a>. Its vision, now realized, lay elsewhere. </p>
<p>Nevertheless, it is doubtful that the Syrian regime will reward Kurds for their relative impartiality during the civil war. Nor is it likely that the regime will reward them for limiting their goal to autonomy instead of independence. </p>
<p>The reason: Rojava <a href="https://www.bakerinstitute.org/files/13492/">sits atop Syria’s largest oil fields</a>.</p>
<p>[ <em>Insight, in your inbox each day.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=insight">You can get it with The Conversation’s email newsletter</a>. ]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/125105/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>James L. Gelvin does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Since defending northern Syria from the Islamic State, Kurdish people have established an egalitarian society where women are equal, democracy is direct and religious freedom is guaranteed.James L. Gelvin, Professor of Modern Middle Eastern History, University of California, Los AngelesLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1191172019-06-26T14:22:29Z2019-06-26T14:22:29ZCitizens’ assemblies: how to bring the wisdom of the public to bear on the climate emergency<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/281139/original/file-20190625-81745-179jopx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/sydney-australia-march-15-2019-20-1340782703?src=PjUpm5obho892-6AnIQiHQ-1-0&studio=1">Holli/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>A new form of politics is gaining steam as a solution to the climate crisis. Six parliamentary committees in the UK are to <a href="https://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/business-energy-industrial-strategy/news-parliament-2017/climate-change-and-net-zero-chairs-comments-17-19/">commission a citizens’ assembly</a>, in which randomly selected citizens will consider how to combat climate breakdown and achieve the pathway to net zero emissions. </p>
<p>This unexpected move complements increasing experimentation with assemblies across the world. Having struggled to realise necessary action on climate breakdown through traditional routes, citizen assemblies could well help governments kick-start the tough but urgently needed steps to safeguard a healthy and stable world.</p>
<p>In a nutshell, these assemblies bring together 50 or more citizens over a number of days or weeks to learn about a particular policy challenge, deliberate together and recommend how to deal with it. Citizens are selected to reflect the demographic diversity of the population. The process is typically facilitated by an independent and apolitical organisation, which brings in experts across a wide range of disciplines, as well as competing interest groups and the voices of those personally affected by the issue in question. </p>
<p>A <a href="https://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198747369.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780198747369-e-27">growing evidence base</a> suggests that this form of participatory politics works. The balanced and structured process of deliberation results in more informed preferences. A requirement to justify opinions, for example, counteracts the bias of prior beliefs. Opinions tend to be neither polarised nor uniform, with participants developing increased respect and understanding for opposing viewpoints.</p>
<p>Such a respectful and deliberative context gives rise to considered judgements that can cut through political deadlock on even the most complex and contentious issues. Most famously, Ireland used such an assembly to decide on the constitutional status of abortion. Bridging charged emotions on both sides, the assembly <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/08/how-99-strangers-in-a-dublin-hotel-broke-irelands-abortion-deadlock">confidently recommended liberalisation</a>, which was backed by a national referendum and enshrined into law.</p>
<p>Evidence from citizens’ assemblies and similar deliberative processes <a href="https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/680078?journalCode=jop">suggests</a> that the broader public have confidence in the judgements of such bodies, especially when compared to traditional political institutions. This is true even of populist-minded voters, who appreciate that decisions are being made by citizens like themselves.</p>
<h2>Fixing the climate crisis</h2>
<p>As a particularly <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/climate-change-is-the-single-most-divisive-political-issue-says-poll_n_5b574e9ee4b0cf38668fa427">politically divisive</a> issue, citizens’ assemblies could be vital in uniting populations around the challenges of responding to the climate breakdown – but the devil is in the detail. Past assemblies offer valuable lessons in how they can most effectively address the climate emergency.</p>
<p>Ireland is the only country to have <a href="https://www.citizensassembly.ie/en/How-the-State-can-make-Ireland-a-leader-in-tackling-climate-change/How-the-State-can-make-Ireland-a-leader-in-tackling-climate-change.html">already run</a> a national citizens’ assembly that addressed climate breakdown. The assembly considered a wide and diverse range of issues from transport to peat extraction – but only had two weekends to do so. This was not enough time to consider these challenges in depth, and made it easier for the government <a href="https://dccae.gov.ie/documents/Climate%20Action%20Plan%202019.pdf">to drop</a> more controversial proposals, such as the significant reduction of agricultural emissions.</p>
<p>Given the diverse areas of policy that the climate crisis cuts across, it would be a herculean task for a single assembly to deal with. The amount of time it would take to consider issues in enough depth would place excessive demands on the selected citizens.</p>
<p>Aspects of the climate crisis can be treated individually, as successful citizen assemblies and other similar deliberative models in the <a href="https://jefferson-center.org/rural-climate-dialogues/">US</a>, <a href="https://www.newdemocracy.com.au/">Australia</a>, <a href="https://www.masslbp.com/">Canada</a>, and the Polish city of <a href="https://citizensassemblies.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Citizens-Assemblies_EN_web.pdf">Gdansk</a> have shown.</p>
<p>An alternative would be to run separate assemblies in parallel, each considering a digestible chunk of the agenda, with time set aside for assemblies to coordinate with each other when cross-cutting issues emerge. This has never been done before, but nor have humans ever encountered a problem of the scale of climate breakdown. </p>
<h2>Empowering citizens</h2>
<p>More radically, citizens’ assemblies on the climate emergency may need to be empowered to make binding decisions, not just advisory recommendations. Politicians are in a bind: they know that they need to act, but are constrained by their concerns over a <a href="https://theconversation.com/to-tackle-the-climate-crisis-we-need-more-democracy-not-less-119265">public backlash</a> and vested social and economic interests that profit from the status quo. Radical policy suggestions emerging from these assemblies are likely to be watered down – as may have been the case in Ireland, whose strong agricultural lobby cannot be ignored.</p>
<p>Empowering assemblies could break political deadlocks on climate. In Poland for example, activist <a href="https://citizensassemblies.org">Marcin Gerwin</a> <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/citizens-assembly-towards-a-politics-of-considered-judgement/">successfully persuaded</a> city mayors to implement any decision supported by 80% of an assembly, with the mayor having discretion when support is below that threshold. Resulting changes have for instance helped the city <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2017-11-22/solutions-how-the-poles-are-making-democracy-work-again-in-gdansk/">respond faster</a> to severe flooding.</p>
<p>Social movement Extinction Rebellion has been <a href="https://rebellion.earth/2019/06/20/response-to-select-committees-announcing-a-citizens-assembly-have-we-achieved-our-third-demand/">quick to criticise</a> the proposed assembly in the UK for lacking such power. As it stands, the plans fall short of the direct action movement’s <a href="https://rebellion.earth/the-truth/demands/">demand</a> for a citizens’ assembly to have authority to tackle both the climate and biodiversity emergencies. </p>
<p>But the UK citizens’ assembly on climate breakdown can be seen as a positive development. The details of how focused the task will be, including whether the assembly will be empowered to consider a <a href="https://theconversation.com/new-net-zero-emissions-target-wont-end-uks-contribution-to-global-warming-heres-why-116386">more demanding transition</a> than the government’s current 2050 target, are yet to be made public. Nor do we know how much time the assembly will have to deliberate.</p>
<p>And while it is primarily structured to <a href="https://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/business-energy-industrial-strategy/news-parliament-2017/climate-change-and-net-zero-chairs-comments-17-19/">inform parliamentary committees</a>, its high profile means it could make a real difference to climate policy. If successful, it may well give rise to the type of empowered citizens’ assemblies that bring the wisdom of citizens fully to bear on the climate and ecological emergency.</p>
<hr>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=176&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=176&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=176&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/imagine-newsletter-researchers-think-of-a-world-with-climate-action-113443?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=TCUKengagement&utm_content=Imagineheader1119117">Click here to subscribe to our climate action newsletter. Climate change is inevitable. Our response to it isn’t.</a></em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/119117/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Graham Smith advises a wide range of organisations and individuals on citizens' assemblies, including various politicians, civil servants, and civil society organisations.</span></em></p>Citizens’ assemblies could be vital in kick-starting the tough steps needed to safeguard a healthy world – but the detail for how they will work will be important.Graham Smith, Professor of Politics, University of WestminsterLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1053432018-11-29T21:16:28Z2018-11-29T21:16:28ZLópez Obrador takes power in Mexico after an unstable transition and broken campaign promises<p>Five months after he won <a href="https://centralelectoral.ine.mx/2018/07/08/confirma-ine-resultados-de-eleccion-presidencial-2018/">a landslide victory in</a> Mexico’s <a href="https://www.ine.mx/voto-y-elecciones/elecciones-2018/">2018 presidential election</a> on promises to “<a href="https://theconversation.com/andres-manuel-lopez-obrador-was-elected-to-transform-mexico-can-he-do-it-99176">transform</a>” the country, leftist <a href="https://lopezobrador.org.mx/">Andrés Manuel López Obrador</a> was sworn into office on Dec. 1. </p>
<p>The prolonged transition period – currently one of the <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.com.mx/2018/08/08/por-que-amlo-durara-menos-de-seis-anos-como-presidente_a_23498739/">the world’s lengthiest</a> – gave Mexicans a preview of what presidential leadership will look like under López Obrador: aggressive.</p>
<p>Between its July 1 election and Dec. 1 inauguration, Mexico was effectively been run by parallel governments with <a href="https://www.bbc.com/mundo/noticias-america-latina-45027501">very different agendas</a>. President Enrique Peña Nieto, Mexico’s conservative and highly unpopular outgoing leader, all but <a href="https://elpais.com/internacional/2018/11/27/mexico/1543340967_772231.html">disappeared</a> from the public eye, even as tensions with the United States over the treatment of Central American migrants run high. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, López Obrador was increasingly visible, <a href="https://theconversation.com/dozens-of-migrants-disappear-in-mexico-as-central-american-caravan-pushes-northward-106287">offering asylum and temporary work permits</a> to refugees, pushing his legislative priorities and deciding the fate <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2018/11/16/world/americas/16reuters-mexico-politics-referendum.html">of major infrastructure projects</a> – though, strictly speaking, he could not follow through on any of these decisions as president-elect.</p>
<p>López Obrador’s disregard for constitutional restrictions before the official transfer of power has many political analysts in the country, <a href="https://theconversation.com/andres-manuel-lopez-obrador-was-elected-to-transform-mexico-can-he-do-it-99176">myself included</a>, concerned about how he will use his executive power in office. </p>
<h2>A regressive transformation of Mexico</h2>
<p>As presdident-elect, López Obrador unilaterally called two “people’s polls,” circumventing a <a href="https://t.co/fm41zAFPfh">constitutional</a> requirement that all popular referenda be approved by the Supreme Court and administered by the national election authority.</p>
<p>In October, his Morena party hired a private polling firm to ask Mexicans <a href="https://www.eluniversal.com.mx/articulo/jose-woldenberg/nacion/deberia-suspenderse">in 538 towns near the nation’s capital</a> to vote on whether to <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-10-29/mexico-votes-to-scrap-13-billion-airport-in-amlo-s-first-test">cancel</a> Mexico City’s controversial, extravagantly over-budget and <a href="https://theconversation.com/mexico-citys-new-airport-is-an-environmental-disaster-but-it-could-become-a-huge-national-park-95992">environmentally disastrous</a> – but much-needed – new international airport.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/mexicans-vote-to-cancel-13-3-billion-mexico-city-airport-project-1540789177">Seventy percent</a> of the nearly 1.1 million people who cast their ballots wanted to scrap the $13.3 billion project, which López Obrador had harshly <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mexico-election-airport/mexico-presidential-front-runner-plans-steps-to-halt-corrupt-new-airport-idUSKBN1GY3E9">criticized</a> on the campaign trail. </p>
<p>Opposition lawmakers and protesters retorted that Mexican law requires a 40 percent voter turnout for a popular referendum to be considered binding. López Obrador polled 1.1 million people in a country of 130 million. </p>
<p>Nonetheless, the president-elect immediately announced the termination of the airport project in favor of revamping an unused military air base north of the capital. </p>
<p>As <a href="https://www.forbes.com.mx/ingenieros-a-favor-de-seguir-la-construccion-del-nuevo-aeropuerto/">engineers</a>, <a href="https://www.nexos.com.mx/?p=39800">academics</a> and the <a href="https://elpais.com/internacional/2018/10/23/actualidad/1540328737_866495.html">business</a> sector also denounced the decision to scrap the new airport, the Mexican peso plummeted amid investor concern about national stability.</p>
<p>López Obrador responded to criticism with a populist evasion, saying simply that “<a href="http://www.milenio.com/politica/el-pueblo-es-el-que-manda-amlo-a-jp-morgan">the people are wise</a>.” </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/248040/original/file-20181129-170226-luhp8y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/248040/original/file-20181129-170226-luhp8y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/248040/original/file-20181129-170226-luhp8y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/248040/original/file-20181129-170226-luhp8y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/248040/original/file-20181129-170226-luhp8y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/248040/original/file-20181129-170226-luhp8y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=491&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/248040/original/file-20181129-170226-luhp8y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=491&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/248040/original/file-20181129-170226-luhp8y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=491&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A ‘national consultation’ on the fate of Mexico City’s new airport polled just 1.1 million people in 535 towns.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Mexico-New-Airport/d888d0a26efe4d1581d9f201aa2747be/19/0">AP Photo/Eduardo Verdugo</a></span>
</figcaption>
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<p>A month later, López Obrador’s transitional government called another unconstitutional referendum to decide the fate of another major infrastructure project. In late November, <a href="https://github.com/segasi/analisis_votacion_consulta_10_programas">900,000 voters</a> determined that the Mexican government should build the “<a href="https://noticieros.televisa.com/historia/que-preguntas-incluidas-consulta-ciudadana-tren-maya/">Maya Train</a>,” a 932-mile rail line that would connect five southern Mexican states and the Yucatan Peninsula.</p>
<p>Not <a href="http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/nacion/sociedad/se-debe-consultar-pueblos-indigenas-sobre-tren-maya-cndh">consulted prior to the referendum</a>: the Mayan communities traversed by the proposed railroad and who, by <a href="https://www.ilo.org/dyn/normlex/en/f?p=NORMLEXPUB:12100:0::NO::P12100_ILO_CODE:C169">law</a>, must be included in all decision-making that impacts their indigenous territories.</p>
<p>Nonetheless, López Obrador has declared that the rail project will be completed by the end of his six-year term.</p>
<h2>Mexico’s powerful presidency</h2>
<p>López Obrador’s misuse of direct democracy to expand his executive powers sends worrisome signals about how he will govern Mexico. </p>
<p>The Mexican presidency is already an <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books/about/El_sistema_pol%C3%ADtico_mexicano.html?id=2FpMAAAAMAAJ&redir_esc=y">enormously powerful office</a>. It was designed that way in the 1920s by the authoritarian Revolutionary Institutional Party, known as the PRI, which ruled the country <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=WyKyD7on22QC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false">virtually uncontested</a> for nearly the entire 20th century. </p>
<p>After 80 years in power, the PRI lost the presidency in 2000 but was restored to power with President Peña Nieto in 2012. </p>
<p>López Obrador, a former Mexico City mayor who has unsuccessfully run for president twice before, won this year in large part because he promised to make Mexico’s centralized, stagnant political system more inclusive and consultative.</p>
<p>He pledged to <a href="https://elpais.com/internacional/2018/06/05/mexico/1528152744_392051.html">root out corruption</a>, <a href="http://www.milenio.com/politica/abrazos-balazos-amlo-promete-reducir-violencia">reduce violence</a>, <a href="https://www.telesurtv.net/news/lopez-obrador-estatus-contratos-pemex-cfe-20180525-0018.html">restructure Mexico’s energy sector</a>, respect the <a href="https://theconversation.com/mexico-seeks-to-become-country-of-refuge-as-us-cracks-down-on-migrants-97668">human rights of migrants</a> and <a href="https://www.eleconomista.com.mx/politica/Las-propuestas-economicas-de-Lopez-Obrador-20180131-0095.html">spur growth</a> in the country’s most impoverished areas. </p>
<p>Legislatively, López Obrador will have the power to push through his transformative agenda. </p>
<p>His political party, Morena, secured majorities in both the Mexican <a href="http://www.puntoporpunto.com/web/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/INTEGRACION-LEGISLATURA-FEDERAL-DATOS-COMPUTOS-DISTRITALES-version-completa-09072018.pdf">Senate</a> and lower <a href="https://www.scribd.com/document/383608686/Integracion-Legislatura-Federal-Datos-Computos-Distritales-Version-Completa-09072018">Chamber of Deputies</a> in July’s election. That also gives López Obrador the right to <a href="http://www.elfinanciero.com.mx/opinion/javier-risco/andres-manuel-y-la-suprema-corte">replace</a> up to two justices on Mexico’s Supreme Court.</p>
<h2>Extreme austerity</h2>
<p>But some recently announced policies have surprised Mexicans who thought they elected a leftist <a href="https://jacobinmag.com/2018/06/morena-lopez-obrador-amlo-mexico-elections">champion of workers rights and social inclusion</a>.</p>
<p>As part of his <a href="https://www.animalpolitico.com/2018/07/amlo-austeridad-corrupcion-puntos/">plan to slash public spending and eradicate corruption</a>, López Obrador has released an austerity budget that includes laying off 70 percent of non-unionized Mexican government workers. An estimated <a href="https://twitter.com/Viri_Rios/status/1018880589850701824">276,290</a> public employees will lose their jobs, according to Viridiana Ríos, an <a href="https://www.wilsoncenter.org/person/viridiana-rios">expert</a> on the Mexican economy.</p>
<p>Bureaucrats who remain will be asked to work from Monday through Saturday for over eight hours a day. </p>
<p>López Obrador justifies the downsizing by quoting Benito Juárez, the celebrated indigenous president who ruled Mexico from 1858 to 1872. Juárez thought public officials should live in “<a href="https://www.jornada.com.mx/2018/07/16/opinion/019a2pol#">honorable modesty</a>,” avoiding idleness and excess. </p>
<p>Few doubt that Mexico’s government bureaucracy is bloated, and that expunging the <a href="https://theconversation.com/governors-gone-wild-mexico-faces-a-lost-generation-of-corrupt-leaders-76858">rampant corruption of Peña Nieto’s PRI party</a> will require serious restructuring. However, the working conditions López Obrador proposes violate <a href="https://t.co/fm41zAFPfh">Mexican labor standards</a>, which guarantee job security and an eight-hour work day. </p>
<p>There’s a logistical problem here, too. Implementing López Obrador’s ambitious policy agenda asks a lot of Mexico’s federal government. The president-elect now intends to transform his nation with an underpaid, overworked and understaffed bureaucracy.</p>
<h2>Broken promises</h2>
<p>López Obrador has angered other supporters by breaking his campaign <a href="https://www.bbc.com/mundo/noticias-america-latina-44681165">pledge</a> to stop using the Mexican armed forces to fight the drug war in Mexico.</p>
<p>Rather than using soldiers to fight cartels, as Mexico has done since 2006, he said he would professionalize the Mexican police and grant <a href="https://theconversation.com/amnesty-for-drug-traffickers-thats-one-mexican-presidential-candidates-pitch-to-voters-96063">pardons</a> to low-level drug traffickers willing to leave their illicit business.</p>
<p>The security plan was underdeveloped, and when pressed for details on the campaign trail, López Obrador simply responded that Mexico needs “justice,” not “revenge.”</p>
<p>But voters recognized the sound logic behind his diagnosis. Numerous <a href="https://www.nexos.com.mx/?p=25468">studies</a> show that Mexico’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-record-29-000-mexicans-were-murdered-last-year-can-soldiers-stop-the-bloodshed-90574">military crackdown on organized crime</a> actually caused violence to skyrocket. </p>
<p>The number of criminal groups operating in Mexico surged from 20 in 2007, the year after the full-frontal war on drugs began, to <a href="https://www.letraslibres.com/mexico/politica/el-panorama-la-violencia-en-mexico">200 in 2011</a>, according to the Mexican university CIDE. By last year, Mexico had <a href="https://www.sintesis.mx/2018/07/30/2017-85-homicidios-diarios-mexico-inegi/">85 homicides a day</a> – the highest murder rate since record-keeping began in the 1980s. </p>
<p>López Obrador has since radically changed his strategy for “pacifying” Mexico.</p>
<p>On Nov. 14, the president-elect released a <a href="https://lopezobrador.org.mx/2018/11/14/presidente-electo-presenta-plan-nacional-de-paz-y-seguridad-2018-2024/">National Security Plan</a> that continues to rely on the Mexican armed forces for fighting crime. Lawmakers from his Morena party have introduced a <a href="http://gaceta.diputados.gob.mx/Gaceta/64/2018/nov/20181120-II.html#Iniciativa225">bill</a> to create a National Guard, a new crime-fighting force that would combine military and civilian police under a single military command. </p>
<p>Mexican political pundit Denise Dresser has <a href="https://twitter.com/denisedresserg/status/1062974872584966144?lang=en">dubbed</a> López Obrador’s strategy as the current cartel war “on steroids.” Security expert Alejandro Madrazo wrote in The New York Times that the decision is a “<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/es/2018/11/28/opinion-lopez-obrador-guardia-nacional/">historic error</a>” that squanders the opportunity to have a national dialogue about the role of the military in law enforcement.</p>
<p>Mexicans gave López Obrador a mandate to revolutionize the government so that it finally works for them. His power grabs, austerity budget and U-turn on security are early signs that he may not deliver the transformation they so eagerly await.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/105343/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Luis Gómez Romero does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Mexicans want leftist Andrés Manuel López Obrador to transform the country. But the months leading up to his inauguration sent worrying signs about how he he will use the massive power of his office.Luis Gómez Romero, Senior Lecturer in Human Rights, Constitutional Law and Legal Theory, University of WollongongLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1053422018-10-31T10:39:54Z2018-10-31T10:39:54ZMarijuana is on the ballot in four states, but legalization may soon stall, researchers say<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242527/original/file-20181026-7074-1d7zu9j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Utah residents show support for a ballot initiative that would legalize medical marijuana in the state.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Medical-Marijuana-Utah/375aff1181844c17b161a156d27233b8/47/0">AP Photo/Rick Bowmer</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/2018_ballot_measures">midterm elections</a> could loosen marijuana restrictions in the United States, as four states put ballot initiatives on legalization to a vote.</p>
<p>Voters in Utah and Missouri will choose whether patients should gain access to medical marijuana. </p>
<p>In Michigan and North Dakota, where medical marijuana is already legal, residents will decide whether to allow it for recreational use. If so, they would join <a href="http://www.governing.com/gov-data/safety-justice/state-marijuana-laws-map-medical-recreational.html">nine U.S. states</a>, Washington, D.C., <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/17/health/canada-legalizes-recreational-marijuana/index.html">Canada</a> and Uruguay in launching a regulated recreational marijuana market.</p>
<p>Another 22 American states have adopted comprehensive medical marijuana programs since 1996, when California became the first to recognize the <a href="http://www.mm-ma.org/sites/default/files/JAMA%20Clinical%20Review%20of%20Medical%20Marijuana%20forTreatment%20of%20Chronic%20Pain.pdf">medicinal uses</a> of marijuana in <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/health-benefits-of-medical-marijuana-2014-4">easing the symptoms of serious illnesses</a> like HIV, cancer, epilepsy, PTSD and glaucoma. Recently, marijuana’s <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2018/03/09/592305410/questions-and-answers-about-opioids-and-chronic-pain">potential value for treating chronic pain</a> has garnered attention as an alternative to opioids. </p>
<h2>No tipping point</h2>
<p>Support for marijuana legalization has <a href="http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/10/08/americans-support-marijuana-legalization/">never been stronger</a> in the United States. </p>
<p>Seventy-two percent of Democrats and a <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/221018/record-high-support-legalizing-marijuana.aspx">narrow majority of Republicans</a> – 51 percent – support legalization, according to <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/221018/record-high-support-legalizing-marijuana.aspx">Gallup</a>. </p>
<p>Polling suggests that the upcoming marijuana initiatives in <a href="https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/michigan/2018/09/11/michigan-poll-marijuana-legalization-redistricting-commission/1267142002/">Michigan</a>, <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/news/politics/2018/10/16/new-poll-finds-approval/">Utah</a> and <a href="https://mjbizdaily.com/chart-strong-support-for-marijuana-legalization-ballot-initiatives-ahead-of-2018-election/">Missouri</a> will pass, while legalizing marijuana seems less likely in conservative <a href="https://mjbizdaily.com/chart-strong-support-for-marijuana-legalization-ballot-initiatives-ahead-of-2018-election/">North Dakota</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.cnn.com/2018/06/27/politics/marijuana-legalization-tipping-point/index.html">Strong public support</a> and successive <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2016/11/8/13520486/marijuana-legalization-california-election-2016">waves of state-level legalization</a> in election years has led many <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2018/04/19/how-legal-weed-reached-a-tipping-point-in-time-for-4-point-20.html">policy analysts</a> to <a href="https://cannabinomics.com/">argue</a> that <a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/marijuana-legalization-reach-national-tipping-point-election-day">marijuana</a> has reached a <a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2016/10/24/advocates-see-tipping-point-marijuana-legalization/4ECGGUa6hHEyemzOTnymoJ/story.html">tipping point</a> in the United States.</p>
<p>Two-thirds of all U.S. states will likely have some kind of legal marijuana by the end of this year. After that, the argument goes, its nationwide expansion is inevitable. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242067/original/file-20181024-71023-u9p02i.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242067/original/file-20181024-71023-u9p02i.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242067/original/file-20181024-71023-u9p02i.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242067/original/file-20181024-71023-u9p02i.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242067/original/file-20181024-71023-u9p02i.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242067/original/file-20181024-71023-u9p02i.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242067/original/file-20181024-71023-u9p02i.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242067/original/file-20181024-71023-u9p02i.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Map of marijuana adoption in the United States.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Authors</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>As marijuana policy researchers, we <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2018/07/23/has-the-u-s-reached-a-tipping-point-in-marijuana-legalization/?utm_term=.92d84ee9ef35">question</a> that narrative. </p>
<p>Our <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/psj.12211">research</a> indicates that medical marijuana progress may well stall after this latest round of ballot initiatives. Recreational marijuana may continue to expand into states with legal medical marijuana but will ultimately hit a wall, too.</p>
<p>The reason for our caution has to do with the particular way marijuana legalization has occurred in the United States: at the ballot box.</p>
<h2>Ballot initiatives have power</h2>
<p>So far, all but one of the recreational marijuana laws passed has occurred via ballot initiative, not through the state legislative process. Seven of the first eight medical marijuana laws – those in California, Alaska, Oregon, Washington, Maine and Nevada – were also adopted via ballot initiative.</p>
<p>Such <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Direct_Initiative">direct initiatives</a> – where citizens can put a policy on the ballot for approval – are a <a href="https://theconversation.com/direct-democracy-may-be-key-to-a-happier-american-democracy-52417">powerful</a>, if nontraditional, form of policymaking in the United States. </p>
<p>Rather than relying on lawmakers to write and pass legislation on certain issues – often, controversial ones – ballot initiatives harness public opinion. They have been used to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/nov/07/same-sex-marriage-ballot-initiatives">legalize</a> or <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Marriage_and_family_on_the_ballot">restrict</a> same-sex marriage, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/17/us/the-california-ballot-measure-that-inspired-a-tax-revolt.html">place limitations on taxing and spending</a>, <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Minimum_wage_on_the_ballot">raise the minimum wage</a> and <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/2018_ballot_measures">much more</a>. Some are <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/17/us/politics/california-ballot-initiatives-dominated-by-the-very-rich.html">funded by wealthy individuals</a> with specific business interests. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242531/original/file-20181026-7062-uzxb0x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242531/original/file-20181026-7062-uzxb0x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=344&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242531/original/file-20181026-7062-uzxb0x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=344&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242531/original/file-20181026-7062-uzxb0x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=344&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242531/original/file-20181026-7062-uzxb0x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242531/original/file-20181026-7062-uzxb0x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242531/original/file-20181026-7062-uzxb0x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Canada legalized recreational marijuana on Oct. 17, becoming only the second country in the world, after Uruguay, to regulate a national marijuana market.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Canada-Marijuana-Legalization/2ca2bdfcc62a4bb4bf27887b9cd6066d/19/0">AP Photo/Ted S. Warren</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Even in states where ballot initiatives have little hope of passing, they can be an important force for policy change.</p>
<p>In <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3184650">Ohio</a>, marijuana advocates in 2015 <a href="https://www.cleveland.com/open/index.ssf/2015/12/issue_3_backers_spent_215_mill.html">spent over US$20 million</a> in an effort to legalize both medical and recreational marijuana in the same ballot initiative. Ohio voters overwhelmingly said no – but the campaign revealed <a href="https://www.cleveland.com/open/index.ssf/2015/04/ohio_voters_favor_legalizing_m.html">broad support for a medical marijuana policy</a>. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.mpp.org/">Marijuana Policy Project</a>, an advocacy organization, said it would put <a href="https://www.cleveland.com/open/index.ssf/2016/01/national_marijuana_group_plans_ohio_medical_marijuana_amendment_for_2016_ballot.html">medical marijuana</a> on Ohio’s ballot in 2016. In response, Ohio’s legislature <a href="https://www.clevescene.com/cleveland/what-you-need-to-know-about-ohios-medical-marijuana-law-in-effect-for-seven-months-and-changing-every-day/Content?oid=6827613">moved quickly</a> to craft and pass its own medical marijuana legislation.</p>
<p>Something similar may happen in Utah this fall. Gov. Gary Herbert opposes the expansive medical marijuana ballot initiative up for vote in his state but would support a more restrictive medical marijuana program. </p>
<p>Herbert says <a href="http://www.governing.com/topics/health-human-services/Despite-Upcoming-Medical-Marijuana-Vote-Utah-Governor-Promises-Special-Session-on-Issue-After-Election.html">he will call a special session of the legislature</a> to work on medical marijuana regardless of whether it succeeds at the ballot. Lawmakers are already working on <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/news/politics/2018/10/18/utah-lawmakers-hold/">compromise legislation</a> that would be acceptable to conservative state legislators and the influential Mormon Church. </p>
<h2>The limits of direct initiative</h2>
<p>So the ballot initiative is powerful. But our analysis suggests its potential for liberalizing marijuana access in the U.S. is nearly tapped out. </p>
<p>Of the 19 U.S. states that have no form of legal marijuana, only six – Idaho, Wyoming, South Dakota, Nebraska, Utah and Missouri – <a href="http://www.ncsl.org/research/elections-and-campaigns/chart-of-the-initiative-states.aspx">allow for direct initiatives</a>. </p>
<p>The remaining 13 states without legal marijuana are mostly conservative places like South Carolina and Alabama, where <a href="https://www.al.com/news/index.ssf/2018/05/_not_ready_for_that_how_alabam.html">legislatures have indicated</a> <a href="https://merryjane.com/news/south-carolina-lawmakers-fiercely-debate-new-medical-marijuana-bill">reluctance</a> to loosen restrictions. If voters there wanted medical or recreational marijuana, they would not have the option of bypassing policymakers to get the issue on the ballot.</p>
<p>Marijuana legalization won’t end with the 2018 midterms. There is still room for recreational marijuana to expand into the 22 states that currently have legal medicinal marijuana. </p>
<p><a href="https://gazette.com/news/road-to-legalization-many-factors-including-tax-revenue/article_6b09995c-9761-54a9-8c74-3a05dca54633.html">History shows</a> that once people grow comfortable with medical marijuana – seeing its impacts on patients and tax revenues – full legalization often follows. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242545/original/file-20181026-7068-1d444wb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242545/original/file-20181026-7068-1d444wb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242545/original/file-20181026-7068-1d444wb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242545/original/file-20181026-7068-1d444wb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242545/original/file-20181026-7068-1d444wb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242545/original/file-20181026-7068-1d444wb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=511&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242545/original/file-20181026-7068-1d444wb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=511&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242545/original/file-20181026-7068-1d444wb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=511&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">California fully legalized marijuana in 2016, 20 years after legalizing medical marijuana, following a national trend.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Travel-California-Marijuana/230b114f08d44c129f300c756ab0c90f/12/0">AP Photo/Richard Vogel</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In our analysis, the remaining 13 states are very unlikely to liberalize access to marijuana without a significant push by the federal government.</p>
<p>That’s unlikely, but not impossible, under the Trump administration.</p>
<p>Federal law still considers marijuana an illegal Schedule I drug under the <a href="https://www.dea.gov/controlled-substances-act">Controlled Substances Act</a>, meaning that, as far as the U.S. government is concerned, the plant has no medical value.</p>
<p>The Obama administration took a hands-off approach to states’ legalization, <a href="https://www.justice.gov/iso/opa/resources/3052013829132756857467.pdf">allowing them to experiment</a>. But Attorney General Jeff Sessions has <a href="http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/usappblog/2018/01/09/why-it-will-be-difficult-for-jeff-sessions-to-put-the-genie-back-into-the-bottle-on-marijuana-policy/">directed Justice Department attorneys</a> to fully enforce federal law in legal-marijuana states.</p>
<p>Quietly, however, the Trump administration has also <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/tomangell/2018/10/10/trump-administration-seeks-public-comments-on-marijuana-reclassification/#4b3f65f5749a">sought public comments on reclassifying marijuana</a>. And the president himself has at times <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/kriskrane/2018/07/11/why-president-trump-could-be-marijuanas-savior/#760b895c20a0">signaled support</a> for leaving marijuana up to the states. </p>
<p>If Sessions <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-is-mulling-candidates-who-could-replace-jeff-sessions-1539290740">leaves the Trump administration</a>, as rumor has long suggested, the DOJ’s position on marijuana enforcement could change.</p>
<p>Democrats have indicated that if they win back one or both houses of Congress on Nov. 6, they could <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/weed-federally-legal-2019-blumenauer-739165/">push to remove marijuana as a Schedule I drug</a> as soon as next year.</p>
<p><em>This article has been updated to correct a factual error. Vermont’s recreational marijuana law was adopted via the legislative process, not a ballot initiative.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/105342/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Midterm voters in Utah, Missouri, Michigan and North Dakota will decide whether to join the 31 US states that have some form of legal marijuana. But ballot initiatives can only take pot so far.Daniel J. Mallinson, Assistant Professor of Public Policy and Administration, School of Public Affairs, Penn StateLee Hannah, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Wright State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/843542017-09-26T11:49:41Z2017-09-26T11:49:41ZThe world needs a new generation of citizen lobbyists<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187557/original/file-20170926-19571-jl2ly6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=77%2C73%2C2563%2C1695&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/many-hands-air-718475959?src=3feOIDsSyem3EKj33hEL1Q-4-33">pratilop prombud/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Elections aren’t sports events with winners and losers, despite how it is sometimes presented. As our nations grow increasingly polarised and political discourse more toxic, electoral victory – <a href="https://theconversation.com/angela-merkel-wins-a-fourth-term-in-office-but-it-wont-be-an-easy-one-84578">be it in Germany</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/britains-new-political-tribes-need-something-different-from-their-parties-84001">or the UK</a> – delivers no honeymoon period of societal acceptance.</p>
<p>Once upon a time, when communication and access to knowledge were limited, delegating the workings of democracy to elected representatives made sense. But things have changed. Today, a growing number of people not only demand, but also play, a more active role in political life through tiny participatory acts: likes, shares, petition signatures, donations. </p>
<p>Participation now happens with little cost or effort. And it means that a greater number of citizens – who have traditionally not participated – are becoming <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jefffromm/2016/06/22/new-study-finds-social-media-shapes-millennial-political-involvement-and-engagement/#58add29e2618">more politically active</a>, or at least more open to persuasion by those that are. People have also become politically more promiscuous. Today’s digitally-empowered citizens express allegiances to multiple issues, without necessarily adhering to a political organisation. They may support causes that don’t traditionally fit, often without a political motivation.</p>
<p>If citizens are offering up a pluralistic, chaotic input into the political conversation, then there is an urgent need for new forms of participation that can make sense of it. People are disillusioned with traditional politics, but there is also a resurgence of interest in politics. The gap needs to be filled.</p>
<h2>Five Stars</h2>
<p>Mainstream parties are reluctant to innovate, and so this space has been left to two disparate forces which were the first to realise how the internet might affect political participation. On the one hand, we have self-proclaimed “direct democracy” movements from across the political spectrum. They include Italy’s <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Star_Movement">Five Star Movement</a>, Germany’s anti-Islam <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pegida">Pegida</a> and the left-wing populist <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Podemos_(Spanish_political_party)">Podemos</a> in Spain. They aim to capitalise on popular discontent, challenging the structure of representative democracy with direct democracy which establishes new channels of communication with their membership. </p>
<p>On the other hand, we have a new generation of political advocacy groups, including online petition platforms such as <a href="https://front.moveon.org/">MoveOn</a> or <a href="https://secure.avaaz.org/page/en/">Avaaz</a>, as well as the more community-oriented UK-based <a href="https://home.38degrees.org.uk/">38degrees</a> and its European transnational version <a href="https://www.wemove.eu/">WeMove</a>. These have shaped the <a href="https://medium.com/obama-white-house/in-review-the-most-memorable-we-the-people-petitions-2f26797d00c">emerging political space</a> in between elections. In addition, there is a host of experimental initiatives across liberal democracies, including transnational movements like <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulse_of_Europe">Pulse of Europe</a>. </p>
<p>These new players have novelty and potential aplenty, but they struggle to translate their mobilising capacity into meaningful forms of political participation. Technology-enabled experiences of direct democracy haven’t proven to be viable responses to many of society’s challenges. </p>
<p>Too often they distort popular input to match an agenda as you can argue <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/546be098-989f-11e7-a652-cde3f882dd7b">is happening</a> with the Five Star Movement. Online petition platforms, meanwhile, are one-click wonders that may briefly make us feel better about ourselves but fall short on empowerment. They do not mobilise a citizen’s talents, expertise and desire to gain a voice in the policy process. Have you ever gone on to more direct action after signing a petition?</p>
<p>If there’s anything we have learned from recent political events, it is that citizens have a growing desire to contribute to the political debate, and that they deserve the means to do so. <a href="http://assets.cambridge.org/97811070/39261/frontmatter/9781107039261_frontmatter.pdf">Research</a> supports this claim by demonstrating that societies which enable citizens to be assertive and critical of public authorities tend to have governments that are more effective and accountable.</p>
<p>What better way then to render citizens assertive than to turn them into lobbyists? This is the provocative suggestion I make <a href="http://www.iconbooks.com/ib-title/lobbying-for-change/">in my new book</a>.</p>
<h2>Interest groups</h2>
<p>Now, while most people associate lobbying with “bad guys” such as Big Tobacco or powerful financial interests, lobbying can be a powerful force for good. This is illustrated by several successful instances of citizen lobbying in the UK, Europe and around the world. </p>
<p>Think of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Schrems">Max Schrems</a>, the Austrian student who challenged Facebook’s use of private data and won. My own students have got involved too. They petitioned the EU Commission to put to an end to mobile roaming charges in 2012, adding their voice to a growing clamour that eventually <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/unitedkingdom/news/agreement-end-roaming-charges-june-2017_en">forced a change in policy</a>. </p>
<p>A citizen lobbyist taps into the repertoire of techniques generally used by professional lobbyists to promote a cause they care about deeply. It is more than than merely voting, donating, or signing a petition. Here, citizens set the agenda and prompt policymakers to act, or react to a policymaker’s agenda with potential solutions.</p>
<p>A citizen concerned about fracking might go to a protest or campaign meeting, but to think like a lobbyist means filing requests for access to documents to learn government plans, identifying key decision-makers to lobby, and preparing an advocacy plan to counter lobbying from corporate interests. </p>
<p>Citizen lobbying might sound like an oxymoron. Surely lobbyists represent the interests of the few rather than the many? That needn’t be the case. Organised interests, notably corporations, have historically monopolised lobbying, but the same factors which have prompted the rise of direct democracy movements and online petitions mean lobbying itself can be democratised. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187564/original/file-20170926-32444-db7mng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187564/original/file-20170926-32444-db7mng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187564/original/file-20170926-32444-db7mng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187564/original/file-20170926-32444-db7mng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187564/original/file-20170926-32444-db7mng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187564/original/file-20170926-32444-db7mng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187564/original/file-20170926-32444-db7mng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187564/original/file-20170926-32444-db7mng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Last straw?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/straw-glass-orange-drink-661415743?src=s2L3q0m8nOkulRksgwS91A-3-2">Sergey Granev/Shutterstock</a></span>
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<p>Citizen lobbyists can take full advantage of opportunities for participation: public consultations; administrative complaints; and unconventional forms of campaigning. They can help level the playing field. By challenging the undue influence of special interests, they can help elected representatives to better identify the public interest of the many. We have seen this already on issues like whistle-blower protection or even <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/aug/16/sugar-tax-industry-opponents-launch-campaign-levy-soft-drinks-obesity">soda taxes</a>. Brexit, with its potential effect on millions of people around Europe, looks a prime target for citizen lobbyists of all political stripes.</p>
<p>At its heart, citizen lobbying is not really about giving everyone an equal voice but about delivering a plausible, legitimate form of civic participation that complements rather than antagonises representative democracy. Much of the political engagement we see is about rousing support or driving emotions; lobbying, by contrast, is rooted in practical efforts to meet achievable goals.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/84354/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alberto Alemanno ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>At a time when our political future is uncertain, the only way to guarantee change is to do it yourself.Alberto Alemanno, Chair professor of European Union Law, HEC Paris; Global Professor, NYU School of Law; Founder The Good Lobby, HEC Paris Business SchoolLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/734232017-03-20T01:32:40Z2017-03-20T01:32:40ZCan Silicon Valley’s autocrats save democracy?<p>In late February, Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg <a href="https://www.facebook.com/notes/mark-zuckerberg/building-global-community/10154544292806634">published an essay</a> that laid out the social network’s vision for the coming years. </p>
<p>The 5,700-word document, immediately dubbed a “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/shortcuts/2017/feb/17/facebook-manifesto-mark-zuckerberg-letter-world-politics">manifesto</a>,” was his most extensive discussion of Facebook’s place in the social world since it went public in 2012. Although it reads to me in places like a senior honors thesis in sociology, with broad-brush claims about the evolution of society and heavy reliance on terms like “social infrastructure,” it makes some crucial points.</p>
<p>In particular, Zuckerberg outlined five domains where Facebook intended to “develop the social infrastructure to give people the power to build a global community that works for all of us.” This included making communities “supportive,” “safe,” “informed,” “civically engaged” and “inclusive.”</p>
<p>Silicon Valley <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/how-silicon-valley-nails-silicon-valley">has long been mocked</a> for this kind of “our products make the world a better place” rhetoric, so much so that some companies are asking their employees to rein it in. Still, while apps for sending disappearing selfies or summoning on-street valet parking may not exactly advance civilization, Facebook and a handful of other social media platforms are undoubtedly influential in shaping political engagement. </p>
<p>A case in point is the Egyptian revolution in 2011. One of the leaders of the uprising created a Facebook page that became a focal point for organizing opposition to ousted leader Hosni Mubarak’s regime. <a href="http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/1102/11/bn.02.html">He later told CNN</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“I want to meet Mark Zuckerberg one day and thank him… This revolution started on Facebook.” </p>
</blockquote>
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<p><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Changing-Your-Company-Inside-Intrapreneurs/dp/1422185095">As I have written elsewhere</a>, Facebook and Twitter have become essential tools in mobilizing contemporary social movements, from changing the corporate world to challenging national governments. Zuckerberg’s manifesto suggests he aims to harness Facebook in this way and empower the kind of openness and widespread participation necessary to strengthen democracy. </p>
<p>But while he’s right that social media platforms could reinvigorate the democratic process, I believe Facebook and its Silicon Valley brethren are the wrong ones to spearhead such an effort. </p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">The HBO show ‘Silicon Valley’ focuses on skewering the industry’s inflated sense of itself.</span></figcaption>
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<h2>Technology and democracy</h2>
<p>The <a href="https://theconversation.com/if-facebook-ruled-the-world-mark-zuckerbergs-vision-of-a-digital-future-73459">initial reaction</a> to Zuckerberg’s manifesto was largely negative. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/02/the-mark-zuckerberg-manifesto-is-a-blueprint-for-destroying-journalism/517113/">The Atlantic</a> described it as “a blueprint for destroying journalism” by turning Facebook into “a news organization without journalists.” <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-02-17/mark-zuckerberg-s-manifesto-for-facebook-offers-a-social-dystopia">Bloomberg View</a> referred to it as a “scary, dystopian document” to transform Facebook into “an extraterritorial state run by a small, unelected government that relies extensively on privately held algorithms for social engineering.” </p>
<p>Whatever the merits of these critiques, Zuckerberg is correct about one central issue: Internet and mobile technology could and should be used to enable far more extensive participation in democracy than most of us encounter. </p>
<p>In the United States, <a href="https://theconversation.com/american-elections-ranked-worst-among-western-democracies-heres-why-56485">democracy</a> can feel remote and intermittent, and sees only limited participation. The 2016 election, which pitted radically different visions for the future of democracy against each other, <a href="http://prospect.org/article/first-official-2016-turnout-report-has-some-good-news">attracted only 60 percent of eligible voters</a>. In the midterm elections between presidential campaigns, <a href="http://time.com/3576090/midterm-elections-turnout-world-war-two/">turnout drops sharply</a>, even though the consequences <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/nov/03/us-midterm-election-results-tea-party">can be equally profound</a>. </p>
<p>Moreover, whereas voting is compulsory and nearly universal in countries such as Brazil and <a href="http://www.aec.gov.au/FAQs/Voting_Australia.htm">Australia</a>, legislators in the U.S. are actively trying to discourage voting by <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-voter-fraud-crusades-undermine-voting-rights-71966">raising barriers</a> to participation through voter ID laws, sometimes <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/30/us/federal-appeals-court-strikes-down-north-carolina-voter-id-provision.html">targeted very precisely</a> at depressing black turnout.</p>
<p>Democratic participation in the U.S. could use some help, and online technologies could be part of the solution.</p>
<h2>Toward a truer democracy</h2>
<p>The <a href="https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/constitution-transcript">“social infrastructure” for our democracy</a> was designed at a time when the basic logistics of debating issues and voting were costly. </p>
<p>Compare the massive effort it took to gather and tabulate paper ballots for national elections during the time of Abraham Lincoln with the instantaneous global participation that takes place every day on social media. The <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Here-Comes-Everybody-Organizing-Organizations/dp/0143114948">transaction costs for political mobilization</a> have never been lower. If appropriately designed, social media could make democracy more vibrant by facilitating debate and action. </p>
<p>Consider how <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/local/wp/2017/01/31/the-woman-who-started-the-womens-march-with-a-facebook-post-reflects-it-was-mind-boggling/?utm_term=.bee164ecc06c">one Facebook post germinated one of the largest political protests in American history</a>, the Jan. 21 Women’s March in Washington and many other cities around the world. But getting people to show up at a demonstration is different from enabling people to deliberate and make collective decisions – that is, to participate in democracy.</p>
<p>Today’s information and communication technologies (ICTs) could make it possible for democracy to happen on a daily basis, not just in matters of public policy but at work or at school. Democracy is strengthened through participation, and ICTs dramatically lower the cost of participation at all levels. <a href="http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/S/bo8056093.html">Research on “shared capitalism”</a> demonstrates the value of democracy at work, for workers and organizations. </p>
<p>Participation in collective decision making need not be limited to desultory visits to the voting booth every two to four years. The pervasiveness of ICTs means that citizens could participate in the decisions that affect them in a much more democratic way than we typically do. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.loomio.org/">Loomio</a> provides a platform for group decision-making that allows people to share information, debate and come to conclusions, encouraging broad and democratic participation. <a href="https://www.opavote.com/">OpaVote</a> allows people to vote online and includes a variety of alternative voting methods for different situations. (You could use it to decide where your team is going to lunch today.) <a href="http://budgetallocator.com/">BudgetAllocator</a> enables participatory budgeting for local governments. </p>
<p>As Harvard Law School Professor <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0032329213483108">Yochai Benkler</a> points out, the past few years have greatly expanded the range of ways we can work together collaboratively. Democracy can be part of our daily experience.</p>
<h2>Silicon Valley isn’t the answer</h2>
<p>This ICT-enabled democratic future is unlikely to come from the corporate world of Silicon Valley, however. </p>
<p>Zuckerberg’s own kingdom is one of the most autocratic public companies in the world when it comes to <a href="http://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev.soc.31.041304.122249">corporate governance</a>. When Facebook went public in 2012, Zuckerberg held a class of stock that allotted him 10 votes per share, giving him an absolute majority of roughly 60 percent of the voting rights. The company’s <a href="https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1326801/000119312512034517/d287954ds1.htm">IPO prospectus</a> was clear about what this means: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Mr. Zuckerberg has the ability to control the outcome of matters submitted to our stockholders for approval, including the election of directors and any merger, consolidation, or sale of all or substantially all of our assets.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>In other words, Zuckerberg could buy WhatsApp for US$19 billion and Oculus a few weeks later for $2 billion (after <a href="http://www.polygon.com/2017/1/17/14297046/zenimax-zuckerberg-testify">just a weekend of due diligence</a>). Or, a more troubling scenario, he could legally sell his entire company (and all the data on its 1.86 billion users) to, let’s say, a Russian oligarch with ties to President Vladimir Putin, who might use the info for nefarious purposes. While these actions technically require <a href="https://investor.fb.com/corporate-governance/default.aspx">board approval</a>, directors are beholden to the shareholder(s) who elect them – that is, in this case, Zuckerberg. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Vanishing-American-Corporation-Navigating-Hazards/dp/1626562792/">It is not just Facebook</a> that has this autocratic voting structure. Google’s founders also have dominant voting control, as do leaders in <a href="http://digitalcommons.law.seattleu.edu/sulr/vol39/iss2/13/">countless tech firms that have gone public since 2010</a>, including Zillow, Groupon, Zynga, GoPro, Tableau, Box and LinkedIn (before its acquisition by Microsoft).</p>
<p>Most recently, Snap’s public offering on March 2 <a href="http://www.cnbc.com/2017/02/22/snap-like-facebook-and-zynga-strong-founders-control-voting-rights.html">took this trend to its logical conclusion</a>, giving new shareholders no voting rights at all. </p>
<p>We place a lot of trust in our online platforms, sharing intimate personal information that we imagine will be kept private. Yet after Facebook acquired WhatsApp, which was <a href="http://www.theverge.com/2016/8/25/12638698/whatsapp-to-start-sharing-user-data-with-facebook">beloved for its rigorous protection of user privacy</a>, many were dismayed to discover that some of their personal data <a href="https://techcrunch.com/2016/08/25/whatsapp-to-share-user-data-with-facebook-for-ad-targeting-heres-how-to-opt-out/">would be shared</a> across the “Facebook family of companies” unless they actively chose to opt out. </p>
<p>For its part, Facebook has made <a href="https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/facebook/acquisitions">over 60 acquisitions</a> and, along with Google, controls <a href="https://www.cnet.com/news/facebook-google-top-out-uss-most-popular-apps-in-2016/">eight of the 10 most popular smartphone apps</a>. </p>
<h2>Zuckerberg the benevolent dictator?</h2>
<p>The idea that founders know best and need to be protected from too many checks and balances (e.g., by their shareholders) fits a particular cultural narrative that is popular in Silicon Valley. We might call it the “strongman theory of corporate governance.”</p>
<p>Perhaps Zuckerberg is the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/23/world/asia/lee-kuan-yew-founding-father-and-first-premier-of-singapore-dies-at-91.html">Lee Kuan Yew</a> of the web, a benevolent autocrat with our best interests at heart. Yew became the “founding father” of modern-day Singapore after turning it from a poor British outpost into <a href="https://www.indexmundi.com/g/r.aspx?v=67">one of the wealthiest countries</a> in the world in a few decades. </p>
<p>But that may not be the best qualification for ensuring democracy for “users.”</p>
<p>ICTs offer the promise of greater democracy on a day-to-day level. But private for-profit companies are unlikely to be the ones to help build it. Silicon Valley’s elites run some of the least democratic institutions in contemporary capitalism. It is hard to imagine that they would provide us with neutral tools for self-governance. </p>
<p>The scholar and activist Audre Lorde <a href="https://www.micahmwhite.com/on-the-masters-tools/">famously said</a> that “the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house.” By the same token, I doubt nondemocratic corporations will provide the tools to build a more vibrant democracy. For that, we might look to <a href="https://www.loomio.org/about">organizations that are themselves democratic</a>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/73423/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jerry Davis does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>While Facebook’s Zuckerberg suggested as much recently, companies run like autocracies cannot fulfill technology’s promise of reinvigorating the democratic process.Jerry Davis, Professor of Management and Sociology, University of MichiganLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/689542016-12-12T03:41:07Z2016-12-12T03:41:07ZTrump trolls, Pirate Parties and the Italian Five Star Movement: The internet meets politics<p>We blame the internet for a lot of things, and now the list has grown to include our politics. In a turbulent year marked by the U.K.’s decision to leave the European Union and the election of Donald Trump, some have started to wonder to what extent the recent events have to do with the technology that most defines our age.</p>
<p>In the aftermath of Trump’s victory, commentators accused Facebook of being <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/markrogowsky/2016/11/17/facebook-with-great-power-comes-great-responsibility/#380f552d6e7d">indirectly responsible</a> for his election. Specifically, they point to the role of social media in spreading virulent political propaganda and fake news. The internet has been increasingly presented as a possible cause for the <a href="https://theconversation.com/in-a-post-truth-election-clicks-trump-facts-67274">post-truth culture</a> that allegedly characterizes contemporary democracies.</p>
<p>These reactions are a reminder that new technologies often stimulate <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/10.1080/13688804.2014.898904">both hopes and fears</a> about their impact on society and culture. The internet has been seen as both the harbinger of political participation and the main culprit for the decline of democracy. The network of networks is now more than a mere vehicle of political communication: It has become a powerful rhetorical symbol people are using to achieve political goals. </p>
<p>This is currently visible in Europe, where movements such as the <a href="http://piratar.is/en/">Pirate Parties</a> and the Italian <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-is-italys-five-star-movement-69596">Five Star Movement</a>, which we have <a href="http://mcs.sagepub.com/content/36/1/105.abstract">studied</a>, build their political messages around the internet. To them, the internet is a catalyst for radical and democratic change that channels growing dissatisfaction with traditional political parties.</p>
<h2>Web utopias and dystopias</h2>
<p>The emergence of political enthusiasm for the internet owes much to U.S. culture in the 1990s. Internet connectivity was spreading from universities and corporations to an increasingly large portion of the population. During the Clinton administration, Vice President Al Gore made the “<a href="http://www.ibiblio.org/icky/speech2.html">Information Superhighway</a>” a flagship concept. He linked the development of a high-speed digital telecommunication network to a new era of enlightened market democracy. </p>
<p>The enthusiasm for information technology and free-market economics spread from Silicon Valley and was dubbed <a href="http://www.imaginaryfutures.net/2007/04/17/the-californian-ideology-2">Californian Ideology</a>. It inspired a generation of digital entrepreneurs, technologists, politicians and activists in Silicon Valley and beyond. The <a href="http://time.com/3741681/2000-dotcom-stock-bust/">2000 dot-com crash</a> only temporarily curbed the hype.</p>
<p>In the 2000s, the rise of sharing platforms and social media – often labeled as “<a href="http://www.oreilly.com/pub/a/web2/archive/what-is-web-20.html">Web 2.0</a>” – supported the idea of a new era of increased participation of common citizens in the production of cultural content, software development and even political revolutions against authoritarian regimes.</p>
<p>The promise of the unrestrained flow of information also engendered deep fears. In 1990s, the web was already seen by critics as a vehicle for poor-quality information, hate speech and extreme pornography. We knew then that the Information Superhighway’s dark side was worryingly <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1996/01/15/business/limiting-medium-without-boundaries-you-let-good-fish-through-net-while-blocking.html">difficult to regulate</a>.</p>
<p>Paradoxically, the promise of decentralization has resulted in few massive advertising empires like Facebook and Google, employing sophisticated <a href="https://theconversation.com/western-democracys-new-maxim-surveillance-and-soft-despotism-48879">mass surveillance techniques</a>. Web-based companies like Uber and Airbnb bring new efficient services to millions of customers, but are also seen as <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-uber-opens-cities-only-to-close-them-59067">potential monopolists</a> that threaten local economies and squeeze profits out of impoverished communities.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://techliberation.com/2011/01/31/the-case-for-internet-optimism-part-1-saving-the-net-from-its-detractors/">public’s views</a> on digital media are rapidly shifting. In less than 10 years, the stories we tell about the internet have moved from praising its democratic potential to imagining it as a dangerous source of extreme politics, polarized echo chambers and a hive of misogynist and racist trolls.</p>
<h2>Cyber-optimism in Europe</h2>
<p>While cyber-utopian views have lost appeal in the U.S., the idea of the internet as a promise of radical reorganization of society has survived. In fact, it has become a defining element of political movements that thrive in Western Europe.</p>
<p>In Italy, an anti-establishment party know as the Five Star Movement became the second most-voted for party in Italy in the 2013 national elections. According to <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-italy-politics-5star-idUSKCN0ZM130">some polls</a>, it might soon even win general elections in Italy.</p>
<p>In <a href="http://mcs.sagepub.com/content/36/1/105.abstract">our research</a>, we analyzed how the Italian Five Star Movement uses a mythical idea of the internet as a catalyst for its political message. In the party’s rhetoric, declining and corrupt mainstream parties are allied with newspapers and television. By contrast, the movement claims to harness the power of the web to “kill” old politics and bring about direct democracy, efficiency and transparency in governance.</p>
<p>Similarly in Iceland, the Pirate Party is now poised to lead a <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/pirate-party-may-step-in-as-iceland-hits-election-stalemate-a7435971.html">coalition government</a>. Throughout the few last years, other Pirate Parties have emerged and have been at times quite successful in other European countries, including <a href="https://newrepublic.com/article/137305/rise-fall-pirate-party">Germany</a> and <a href="http://pol.sagepub.com/content/31/3/121?patientinform-links=yes&legid=sppol;31/3/121">Sweden</a>. While they differ in many ways from the Five Star Movement, their leaders also insist that the internet will help enable new forms of democratic participation. Their success was made possible by the powerful vision of a new direct democracy facilitated by online technologies. </p>
<h2>A vision of change</h2>
<p>Many politicians all over the world run campaigns on the promise of change, communicating a positive message to potential voters. The rise of forces such as the Five Star Movement and the Pirate Parties in Europe is an example of how the rhetoric of political change and the rhetoric of the digital revolution can interact with each other, merging into a unique, coherent discourse.</p>
<p>In thinking about the impact of the internet in politics, we usually consider how social media, websites and other online resources are used as a vehicle of political communication. Yet, its impact as a symbol and a powerful narrative is equally strong.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/68954/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>While the US is reeling from rampant fake online news, political movements in Europe are using the internet as a powerful democratic symbol to win elections. Will cyber-optimism or pessimism win?Andrea Ballatore, Lecturer in Geographic Information Science, Birkbeck, University of LondonSimone Natale, Lecturer in Communication and Media Studies, Loughborough UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/628282016-08-25T20:21:13Z2016-08-25T20:21:13ZAustralia needs to lead again on democratic innovation<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/133044/original/image-20160804-12201-1krqfpr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The imperative for major reform of Australia’s political and policy processes is more real and urgent than ever.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP/Lukas Coch</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>A week has always been a long time in politics, but now it is longer than ever. In a world of increasingly truncated media cycles, short-term politics and fragmented parliaments, the political world is being splintered into more and more singular events.</p>
<p>This means more news, events and antics are crammed into a political week and analysed in blow-by-blow detail. Combine that with an increasingly volatile electorate and the question is: what’s the use of predicting the political week ahead in this age of democratic disruption, let alone an entire electoral cycle?</p>
<p>But sometimes when micro-events seem chaotic and disconnected, the overall patterns are more obvious.</p>
<h2>What will prevail?</h2>
<p>The outcome of the 2016 federal election – with its <a href="http://insidestory.org.au/the-upside-of-the-falling-big-party-vote">unprecedented voter support of independents and minor parties</a> – highlighted that the dam wall of public dissatisfaction with the major parties and their disconnected way of “doing” democracy is near-to-bursting.</p>
<p>This makes both the longer-term trends and dynamics of federal politics and parliament predictable. It also makes the imperative for major reform of Australia’s political and policy processes more real and urgent than ever.</p>
<p>Here’s a snapshot of the dynamics that will prevail in the 45th federal parliament if the reform agenda continues to exclude major change to Australia’s system of democratic governance.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>The major parties will triple-down on their combative tactics, fearmongering and negative short-termism for no other reason than these were their key take-outs on <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-scare-campaigns-like-mediscare-work-even-if-voters-hate-them-62279">what “worked” in the election</a>. </p></li>
<li><p>There’ll be no lasting attempt to reach across parliament’s aisles to tackle a great and growing list of national challenges. Parliament will achieve little of real policy substance. </p></li>
<li><p>Standards as well as public perceptions of political leadership will <a href="https://theconversation.com/now-for-the-big-question-who-do-you-trust-to-run-the-country-58723">continue to deteriorate</a>. </p></li>
<li><p>The combination of the above will leave voters feeling even more disconnected and disillusioned with the state of politics. </p></li>
<li><p>Independents and minor parties will secure more seats in the next election, accelerating the process of fragmenting the House of Representatives into the same unworkable political kaleidoscope as the Senate. </p></li>
</ol>
<p>This will set up a dynamic of negativity and dysfunction for the 46th parliament more pervasive than the one now starting. Parliament will become just about unworkable. And Australia’s economy and polity will begin a painful and potentially irreversible submergence.</p>
<h2>What can be done?</h2>
<p>It’s all depressing stuff. This is even more the case given several innovations going in other levels of government around Australia that would help solve these federal ills.</p>
<p>The <a href="http://indaily.com.au/news/2015/08/13/weatherills-plan-to-create-a-new-democracy/">South Australian</a> and <a href="http://www.premier.vic.gov.au/citizens-jury-to-decide-on-future-council-for-geelong/">Victorian</a> governments have been trialling <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/futuretense/citizens-juries-and-deliberative-democracy/5762684">new systems of decision-making</a> at both state and local government level to bring citizens directly into the policymaking process. </p>
<p>Innovations like <a href="https://theconversation.com/city-calls-on-jury-of-its-citizens-to-deliberate-on-melbournes-future-59620">citizens’ juries</a> and <a href="http://www.participatorybudgeting.org">participatory budgeting</a> are being piloted. These two states understand growing citizen anger with being shut out from real policymaking. They realise this is not politically sustainable.</p>
<p>These innovations are based on the very logical view that ordinary Australians – in this age of unprecedented information access and connectivity – have as much knowledge and expertise on key policy issues as traditional decision-makers like ministers and departmental experts.</p>
<p>And, by giving citizens a direct, collaborative say in the decisions that most affect them, they assume “ownership” of policy decisions, even if they do not agree with the final outcome.</p>
<p>This in turn leads to greater political consensus, citizen engagement and policy depth. These are the commodities most in short supply in our increasingly combative, fragmented federal political system.</p>
<p>While governance reforms such as these are gathering pace outside Canberra, those inside the federal bubble are effectively ignoring them. The “high” politics of federal policy and parliament, according to this view, is far too complex and important for ordinary citizens to have direct and continuous involvement.</p>
<p>Therefore, citizens should continue to delegate policymaking entirely to their elected representatives on the assumption that the latter, being at the top of the political or policy tree, continue to see and know more, and faster.</p>
<p>This was definitely true in the 19th century, when the current system of representative democracy emerged. It might have been the case until two or three decades ago. But as information continues to become dispersed more widely and more quickly to everyone, those who continue to have a monopoly on national policymaking – our federal politicians, bureaucrats and peak group lobbyists – are now not in the right place to know consistently what is going on.</p>
<p>As a result, just like in the US, the UK and other major Western democracies organised around <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-end-of-representative-politics-41997">19th-century representative democracy</a>, ordinary citizens are increasingly judging so-called high politics as out of touch and contemptibly “low”.</p>
<p>Australia in the 19th century set new global benchmarks for democratic innovation, such as secret ballots and extending voting rights. These changes were all ground-breaking because they reconstituted politics and policymaking to respond better to new and fast-changing times.</p>
<p>Today we are at the same inflexion point in history. Australia’s national politicians again need to step up and lead the way on the inevitable process of national and global democratic innovation.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/62828/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mark Triffitt is a member of the Academic Advisory Council of the newDemocacy Foundation.</span></em></p>Australia’s national politicians again need to step up and lead the way on the inevitable process of national and global democratic innovation.Mark Triffitt, Lecturer, Public Policy and Politics, The University of MelbourneLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.