Mobilized by Direct Democracy: Short-Term Versus Long-Term Effects and the Geography of Turnout in Ballot Measure Elections

Abstract

A number of recent studies find that direct democracy increases voter turnout. In this article, we ask: Who does direct democracy mobilize to vote and how are they mobilized? We distinguish between long-term and short-term effects on voter turnout, noting that much of the current literature has focused on participatory theory. Copyright (c) 2010 by the Southwestern Social Science Association.

Does Satisfaction with Democracy Really Increase Happiness? Direct Democracy and Individual Satisfaction in Switzerland

“…In this line of research we can now add a further aspect, namely that the frequent use of direct democracy tends to be related to higher satisfaction with democracy and in this sense strengthens citizens' confidence in government responsiveness. However, at the same time, our findings are in accordance with recent studies from the U.S. and Swiss context challenging this overly optimistic view of direct democracy and casting some serious (both empirical and theoretical) doubts on this line of reasoning (Dyck 2009;Dyck and Lascher 2009;Dyck and Seabrook 2010;Freitag and Stadelmann-Steffen 2010;Schlozman and Yohai 2008). As the results regarding individual life satisfaction show, direct democratic participation is not a panacea for everything: In this vein, subjective well-being is first and foremost an individual feature, which cannot be explained by politico-institutional factors such as direct democracy.…”

Does direct democracy make for better citizens? A cautionary warning based on cross-country evidence

“…Again, Schlozman and Yohai (2008) pour some water into the wine by finding no effects of initiatives on voter turnout in presidential elections. Dyck and Seabrock (2010) find that increased voter turnout in ballot initiatives is a short-term effect which is not caused by a more favorable attitude regarding participation. To sum up: Smith and Tolbert (2004) found positive effects of initiatives on voter turnout, political participation as well as confidence in government.…”

Sow the Wind, Reap the Whirlwind? Mobilization Cascades in Direct Democratic Initiatives.

“…Direct democratic voting behavior has been shown to be influenced by heuristics such as knowledge about the general stance of political actors [25]. In a broader sense, this finding holds true for Switzerland [26] as well as for the US [17]: Partisan cues matter for voting behavior. Voters' preferences, in this sense, will often take the form of "gut feelings", whereby the political decision-making that is voting will not be based on any sort of rational analysis of the issue at hand, but rather be a quasi-automatic response to cues.…”

“…Presidential elections are thought to have a relatively high salience on their own, but in mid-term elections that are, for the most part, shorter in terms of electoral campaigns and less salient, peripheral voters might be mobilized by the presence direct democratic ballot measures [15]. Additionally, there is some evidence that the strength of the mobilizing effect of direct democratic procedures on election turnout is influenced not only by the frequency of direct democratic ballot measures, but also by the campaign intensity for specific ballot measures [16,17]. Newer findings for the state-level context in the USA, thus, somewhat consistently show that direct democracy increases election turnout.…”