Referendum
A referendum, plebiscite, or ballot measure is a direct vote by the electorate (rather than their representatives) on a proposal, law, or political issue.
[1] A referendum may be either binding (resulting in the adoption of a new policy) or advisory (functioning like a large-scale opinion poll).
The addition of the verb sum (3rd person singular, est) to a gerundive, denotes the idea of necessity or compulsion, that which "must" be done, rather than that which is "fit for" doing.
[7]It is closely related to agenda, "those matters which must be driven forward", from ago, to impel or drive forwards; and memorandum, "that matter which must be remembered", from memoro, to call to mind, corrigenda, from rego, to rule, make straight, those things which must be made straight (corrected), etc.
The term 'plebiscite' has a generally similar meaning in modern usage and comes from the Latin plebiscita, which originally meant a decree of the Concilium Plebis (Plebeian Council), the popular assembly of the Roman Republic.
[30] Other people regard a non-majoritarian methodology like the Modified Borda Count (MBC) as more inclusive and more accurate.
In the Swedish case, in both referendums the 'winning' option was chosen by the Single Member Plurality ("first past the post") system.
In the 1977 Australian referendum, the winner was chosen by the system of preferential instant-runoff voting (IRV).
Quorums are typically introduced to prevent referendum results from being skewed by low turnout or decided by a motivated minority of voters.
In 2021, the European Court of Human Rights extended its jurisdiction to referendums in its judgment Toplak and Mrak v. Slovenia, initiated by two disabled voters over polling place access.
[35] In Political Governance states that voters in a referendum are more likely to be driven by transient whims than by careful deliberation, or that they are not sufficiently informed to make decisions on complicated or technical issues.
Some opposition to the referendum has arisen from its use by dictators such as Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini who, it is argued,[37] used the plebiscite to disguise oppressive policies as populism.
Dictators may also make use of referendums as well as show elections to further legitimize their authority such as António de Oliveira Salazar in 1933; Benito Mussolini in 1934; Adolf Hitler in 1934, 1936; Francisco Franco in 1947; Park Chung Hee in 1972; and Ferdinand Marcos in 1973.
as the reason why, since World War II, there has been no provision in Germany for the holding of referendums at the federal level.
In recent years, referendums have been used strategically by several European governments trying to pursue political and electoral goals.
A 2009 article in The Economist argued that this had restricted the ability of the California state government to tax the people and pass the budget, and called for an entirely new Californian constitution.
Both these problems can be moderated by a combination of other measures as Referendums occur occasionally rather than periodically as elections are and they don’t offer the same kind of formal opposition.
Because referendums affect for a longer term than legislative deliberation, a turnout and supermajority requirement is necessary to maintain principles of majoritarianism.
Zurcher argues that the use of the Nazi referendums was ending turnout requirements to advance intrinsic advantages in an otherwise slower and more demanding manner to constitutional and policy changes.
