Direct Democracy: A Real Choice?
Jim Reed examines the worldwide shift towards direct democracy: our journey from government of the people, to today’s government for the people, and perhaps towards a future of more government by the people.
What’s Changed?
When we hear the word ‘vote’ it is only natural to think of elections. It is partly obscured by the swirl of politics and, in Australia at least, the traditional sausage sizzle outside the booth, but that vote every few years is very special.
The power to control who represents and leads you is what marks out a true democracy.
Without that vote you can have no control over those who might appoint themselves and their own agenda. With a vote you can endorse, reject, reward or punish at the ballot box. To a limited extent it imbues you with control.
But elections are not the only place our votes are cast.
Indeed, single-issue votes – referenda, plebiscites and postal votes – are becoming almost as common. In the last term, Australia had a national vote on same-sex marriage, there is bipartisan support for a referendum on indigenous recognition in this term and, if Labor had been elected in May, we may have also seen a referendum on becoming a republic too.
Australia is far from alone on this score. Internationally, the number of public votes has risen dramatically over the last century (from around 50 to between 4-500 per decade). In the UK, for example, we have seen the Brexit, Scottish independence and AV votes in recent years, with the United States’ outlawing of such national votes making it an exception amongst developed democracies.
This increase is partly as a result of the birth of new countries, the fall of European empires, the collapse of the Soviet Union and all the national decisions that come with that. It is also a self-reinforcing cycle, with these new democracies more often asking questions of their peoples as they mature.
So, as the world has moved from monarchies, autocracies and oligarchies to democracy – from government of the people to government for the people – we also seeing a growing trend in government by the people via single-issue votes.
Why the Change?
This public voting is far from being adopted as a system of government in its own right, of course, or even a major component of any national system. But its employment by democratically elected governments is undeniably on the increase. Why?
The first reason, as we have already seen, is a very practical one. The endorsement of a nation’s people is often needed when that country is being born, reborn, merged, demerged or reorganised. This is the foundation of its new identity, sovereignty and governance.
Similarly, when a constitutional change is required further down the track a referendum is often mandated. Recent examples include Brexit, the votes on abortion rights and same-sex marriage in Ireland and the Scottish independence referendum.
Even when there is no legal compulsion to hold a vote, one may be deemed necessary in order to give change legitimacy. The most recent example here is the same-sex marriage ‘survey’ in Australia, but there are many other examples of non-binding plebiscites around the world being held on significant issues.
Significance denotes importance, but who it is important to and why can vary greatly. They may be used to empower the electorate or disempower an opposition; the electorate may demand a say or the political class may be too nervous to give theirs; it can be used to decide an issue or to sidestep making a decision; some may use a vote to affect change and others may use it to stifle one.
For example, recent unsuccessful votes on changing the New Zealand flag, on the UK's voting system and Scottish independence did not enjoy broad support, and in some cases not even the support of the incumbent government facilitating the vote.
The most successful single-issue votes tend to follow a similar pattern; bipartisan political support ‘for the right reasons’, a foundation of public campaigning and education, an important issue whose ‘time has come’, clarity of choice and simple question wording.
Regardless of result, what is certain is that the conditions required for these votes to flourish are present, at least in developed democratic countries where political, societal, cultural and technological trends are acting as an incubator.
Such countries are beginning to question some of their basic legal tenets, such as attitudes towards homosexuality and abortion, or to reconsider issues of sovereignty and union. And a more educated, informed and perhaps impatient electorate is able, willing and expecting to have a say on these issues outside an election choice.
In parallel, the politics and media coverage in these countries has sped up and often become more partisan in nature, forcing the need to break deadlocks more quickly and with minimal risk of backlash. Representatives are deferring to the diversity of views they are finding themselves representing, with the physical ability to do so increasingly within grasp.
Why not greater Change?
The effect of all this is to move power from elected representatives to those they represent, just as democracy has removed power from the few and given it to the representatives of the many. But its application is still relatively limited and at the behest of elected governments.
Governments still own and operate the system, so the decision whether to hold votes, on what issues and in what form lies with them. An established power system will rarely seek to destroy itself or knowingly relinquish too much power, of course, but this is an over-simplification.
It is truer to say that politicians and bureaucracies would like to maintain some measure of control over the outcome of public votes, or at the very least have a good idea of whether the proposition will be successful or not.
For example, the Australian Government has recently stated that they are reluctant to hold a referendum on recognition of indigenous peoples in the Constitution unless it has a good chance of being successful. This is not an unreasonable aim when the consequences of a failure to secure a majority are arguably much worse than a failure to hold a vote.
And single-issue votes are notoriously difficult to pass without immense groundwork – just 20 percent of Australia’s referenda have been successful – and are equally tricky to predict. An analysis of polling covering six recent single-issue votes across the Anglosphere shows that only 30 percent of the final polls were within error margins of the actual result. Most tended to overstate the mood for change.
Though there are pressures to hold more votes, there are also other factors that restrict them. Notably, this includes voter fatigue. In focus groups today Australians will still rally against more votes like that held for marriage equality on the basis that they are “not needed when we elect people to lead”, that they create unwelcome debate and division on sensitive issues, that they slow down decision-making or simply “cost too much”.
The qualitative detection of this emerging voter rejection is particularly apparent on issues that are not important to or do not affect a majority, and can lead to political backlash, a protest vote or low turnout.
Turnout might be considered a litmus test of voter permission for and engagement on single-issue votes, and the fact that turnout on recent votes has matched contemporary general elections suggests that outright fatigue has not yet been reached.
That is, in many cases voters are tuning out to vote on one issue at the same rate they are turning out to vote on many issues and the government to handle them. However, the qualitative evidence is that the electorate can stomach public votes only if they cover important issues and are not held too frequently.
Why should we limit Change?
Whilst there are natural handbrakes on the wider use of single-issue votes, their increased use, if left unchecked, has but one logical conclusion. Public votes would become a system in their own right and replace representative democracy.
We might term this more direct form of democracy ‘omnicracy’: government by all. I do not think this will happen any time soon, but should it be something we should consider, embrace or be afraid of?
The truth is that most systems of governance can be made to work on a small scale or drawn on for particular purposes, and forms of direct democracy are currently applied with success at local levels or infrequently within the frame of representative democracy. However, it is difficult to see how omnicracy would be workable in its own right at larger scales.
For one, pure democracy – red in tooth and claw – can be a dangerous thing.
If the electorate were allowed to both set the questions and answer them there is no room for legislative responsibility or executive expertise. It is highly likely that the death penalty and zero immigration, for example, would be the law of the land within weeks. And with majority rule comes erosion of the rights and support of the minority.
Beyond outcomes, the processes and procedural problems seem insurmountable.
We have greater leisure time now, but to be involved with mass votes on a much more frequent basis would be inconvenient to say the least, especially where complex issues and policy must be weighed up without being dumbed down. We would govern our lives at the cost of living them.
The electorate would soon fatigue, lose interest and drop out of the system. And low turnout means that votes would be unrepresentative and could be controlled by the engaged extremes who can motivate their base supporters to ‘get out and vote’. This is one of the arguments levelled at voluntary voting in general elections, and it applies to a much greater extent here.
Even if a society could take steps to ensure adequate national turnout (or a randomly selected group of voters took turns), and the security of that system could be guaranteed, the basic questions of who controls the topics, timing, voting rules, information and question wording remain.
Absolute power of this sort would corrupt absolutely. You can change elected governments and representatives, but you cannot vote out those setting or answering the questions in an omnicratic system. Ironically, more freedom to choose would inevitably remove free choice.
Democracy Rules OK!
Given all this, it is likely that the number of single-issue votes will plateau, rather than grow exponentially or become a stand-alone system. Instead, it will occupy its rightful place as a consultation tool within representative democracy which, despite its many foibles and failings, is still the best system of those that have been tried from time to time.
Jim Reed is the Founder of Resolve, and a pollster with over two decades of campaign experience across the Anglosphere.
This article is based loosely on a speech given by Jim Reed at the 2018 International Association of Political Consultants (IAPC), and the concept of ‘omnicracy’ stems from his earlier work on the theory and practice of direct democracy.