The Perils of Direct Democracy

Ulrich Arnswald (University of Innsbruck, University of Innsbruck)

The Perils of Direct Democracy

For some time now, modern liberal democracies in Europe have been coming under increasing criticism. Due to rising polarization and radicalization, but also because of economic instability, migration, demographic changes, and technological transformation, the established patterns of democratic governance are under attack.

The resulting disillusionment with politics and the willingness to vote for protest parties pose major challenges for established parties. Many see a solution in forms of direct democracy, such as direct elections or communalism. Recently, direct democracy has increasingly been included in German-language debates on political philosophy as a conceivable voting procedure that is envisaged in Germany as a decision-making option at the municipal and state levels, but with few exceptions not at the federal level.

However, representative democracy is based on a party democracy, with the parties being “worldview parties” (“Weltanschauungsparteien”) in the sense of Max Weber. While direct democracy leads to further fragmentation and individualization of democracy, which amounts to a “pick and choose” of individual or group-specific preferences, representative democracy does not rely on individualized or group-based processes that do not require social consideration or concessions from other parts of the population and maximize one's own benefit. Party democracy, which is the subject of representative democracy, is rather designed and geared toward cross-party compromise.

The lecture attempts to answer several questions, including: Can more civil rights to make direct decisions through instruments such as initiatives and referendums be a solution to the current problems of representative democracy? Does direct democracy strengthen participation? Are citizens more free in a direct democracy? Or can referendums further divide a divided society? Can direct democracy be dangerous for a society? And if so, under what conditions? Does direct democracy favor demagogues?