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Why do some municipalities use democratic innovations and others do not?
Determinants of local direct democracy in Finland
Maija Karjalainen & Maija Setälä
University of Turku
mhkarj@utu.fi, maiset@utu.fi
DRAFT – DO NOT QUOTE WITHOUT PERMISSION
Paper prepared for the ECPR General Conference in Bordeaux, 4-7 September 2013.
Section S19: Four Decades of Democratic Innovation Research: Revisiting Theories, Concepts and
Methods
Panel P413: What Explains (the Absence of) Participatory Reforms?
____________________________________________________________________ Abstract This paper discusses why some autonomous political units – municipalities – introduce democratic innovations while numerous others do not. While institutions that engage citizens directly in the democratic decision-making have become more and more common in advanced industrialized countries, representative elites play a significant role in their implementation. The decision to adopt democratic innovations often remains at the hands of elected representatives, as well as their impact on policies. It still seems rather unpredictable, where and under what institutional and political conditions they are used. In this paper, system-level data from municipalities in Finland are analyzed in order to identify conditions facilitating the use of democratic innovations. The focus is specifically on municipal referendums and citizens’ initiatives, which were introduced at the local level in Finland in 1990. Since then, more than a hundred referendums and initiatives have taken place. Data on the frequency, issues and effects of direct democratic instruments during 1991-2012 are compiled from official statistics and local newspapers. Two types of independent variables are used: Those related to representative democratic institutions include effective number of parties and particular parties’ share of votes. The other explanatory variables are population, geographical location of the municipality and turnout in the previous local elections. The preliminary analyses show that the more seats a leftist party has in the local council, the more likely it is that local referendums occur. Second, citizens’ initiatives are more likely to occur in municipalities that have large population and low electoral turnout.
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1. Introduction
Developed industrialized countries have seen a growing number of different
instruments of direct citizen participation during the last few decades (Fung, 2006;
Newton and Geissel, 2012; Smith, 2009). These instruments vary from referendums,
citizens’ initiatives and deliberative mini-publics to co-governance structures and
public consultation, to mention some. Common to all these so called democratic
innovations is that they have been designed to increase and deepen citizen
participation in political decision-making (Smith, 2009, 1). Quite expectedly,
alongside with the growing use and case research on innovations also the attempts to
evaluate them and to develop comprehensive frameworks for evaluation have
emerged during the last ten years (cf. Geissel, 2012, 213; Michels, 2011). However, it
still seems rather unpredictable, which political units adopt these innovations and
under what conditions.
After the deliberative turn in democratic theory (Dryzek, 2001) the institutions of
direct citizen participation have been no longer seen as substitutes for elections and
other representative institutions, whereas as complementary institutions capable of
strengthening democratic legitimacy (Chambers, 2003; Goodin, 2008; Warren and
Pearse, 2008, 3). Several authors have also reminded that institutions of deliberative
and direct democracy are always embedded in a representative democratic system and
should thus be studied in that context (Hoppe, 2011; Mansbridge et al., 2012;
Parkinson, 2003).
In stable democracies, elections usually take place on a regular basis and their results
are seldom contested. However, when it comes to democratic innovations, the elected
representatives must in most cases explicitly decide whether to adopt them or not and
whether to follow their results – the input from citizen participation – or not. Citizen
juries, co-governance and other democratic innovations are therefore often used on ad
hoc basis. Also large proportion of referendums around the world are initiated by
representative governments (Morel, 2001). The emergence of democratic innovations
is, thus, somewhat paradoxical. Their idea of engaging citizens is partly in
contradiction with the principles of representative government, yet their
implementation is decided by the elected representatives. Furthermore, one could ask
that why would we expect elected, rational representatives to let go of their hard-
earned, authorized democratic power (Rahat, 2009)?
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The aim of this paper is to study why some municipalities in Finland have experience
of direct democratic instruments while numerous others have not. The analysis is
restricted to two direct democratic innovations – referendum and citizens’ initiative –
and the empirical focus is on the local government in Finland. First, the instruments
of direct democracy in Finland are introduced and placed in the wider context of
direct democratic institutions. Then, the hypotheses are formed based on the
theoretical discussion about the motives for and determinants of the use of different
democratic innovations. After that, data on the use of local referendums and citizens’
initiatives as well as applied methods are described. Finally, after a brief description
of preliminary results, the implications of the findings and pathways for future
research are discussed.
2. Institutions of local direct democracy in Finland
The Finnish legislation recognizes national consultative referendums, municipal
consultative referendums and municipal referendum initiatives. Although there have
been only two national referendums in Finland since the independence, the agenda
initiative was introduced as a new national-level direct democratic instrument in
2011, in the footsteps of the European Citizens’ Initiative (European Union, 2011).
The history of Finnish direct democracy, however, spans over more than 20 years at
the level of local government. Until 1990 it had been possible for municipal councils
to organize referendums, but since 1991 municipal referendums and citizens’
initiatives have had their legal basis in the Local Government Act1.
The Local Government Act specifies that local councils may decide to hold a
referendum on an issue that concerns the municipality. These referendums are non-
binding, and all eligible voters have a right to vote in the ballot. The question of the
referendum can also concern only a part of the municipality. 2 The residents
representing at least five per cent of the eligible voters in the municipality also have
the right to submit a referendum initiative. The local council then has to decide as
1 Local Government Act 365/1995, unofficial English translation: The Association of Finnish Local 2 Local Government Act 365/1995, Section 30
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soon as possible, whether to hold a referendum on the issue referred to in the initiative
or not.3
Several authors have categorized and classified direct democratic instruments (cf.
Breuer, 2007; Schiller, 2011; Setälä, 1999; Suksi, 1993). The municipal referendums
in Finland can be classified as optional or facultative referendums in contrast to
mandatory referendums which are required on particular issues by a law (Setälä,
2009; Suksi, 1993). In optional referendums, the decision to organize a referendum is
made on an ad hoc basis, but the initiator may vary. In practice, the question of who
initiates the referendum has major impacts on the use and dynamics of referendums
(Morel, 2001). While the government may initiate a referendum in order to promote a
decision that favors government’s authority (ibid.), citizen-initiated referendums can
be used to overturn decision made by the parliamentary majority or to promote
propositions of a minority of the voting population (Vatter, 2000).
Finnish municipal referendums may be initiated either by a group of representatives
in the municipal council or by a group of residents of the municipality, in the form of
a referendum initiative. If the initiative is supported by at least five percent of the
municipality residents entitled to vote in municipal elections, the council has to decide
within six months whether to hold a referendum proposed in the initiative. There is,
however, one exception: A mandatory referendum in unsuccessful municipal merger
negotiations. This kind of situation is linked to the structural reform of the Finnish
local government 4 and gives the ministry responsible for structural reform the
authority to decide upon the organization of a referendum in a particular municipality
that has resisted the planned local government structure.
Suksi (1993, 29) divides referendums further into decisive and consultative. In
decisive referendums the expressed opinion of the people settles the matter definitely,
whereas in consultative referendums the final decision on the issue and the result of
the vote is reserved to another body – usually legislature. In Finnish local politics,
both the referendum initiative and referendum itself are consultative in the sense that
they dot not oblige the municipal council to take account the input of the residents. In
other words, the local council neither has to comply with the referendum result nor
3 Local Government Act 365/1995, Section 31 4 Article 16, Kuntajakolaki 1698/2009, later Kuntarakennelaki 478/2013.
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organize the referendum proposed in the citizens’ initiative. This consultative status
reflects the legislation of national referendums, which are also government-initiated
and non-binding5.
In Schiller’s terms (2011, 15), the Finnish direct democratic instruments can be
described as having some “direct-democratic quality” instead of constituting
procedures of full direct decision-making. Government-initiated advisory
referendums are sometimes also called as plebiscites or plebiscitary referendums. This
terminology bears a slightly negative connotation pointing to the fact that the
instruments are often used by political elites when they want to get public acceptance
for some pre-defined policies (Büchi, 2011; Rahat, 2009; Suksi, 1993). Binding
referendums and full-scale citizens’ initiatives which automatically lead to a decision
or to a referendum do exist at the local level in Switzerland and in some German
Länder (ibid., 19). However, in the Nordic countries direct democratic instruments are
in general of consultative sort.
3. Theory and hypotheses
Most broadly defined, democratic innovations are institutions of citizens’ non-
electoral participation. They can thus be distinguished from elections and other
institutions of ‘competitive representation’, in which citizens exercise their political
rights by voting for representatives (Fung & Cohen, 2004). There are, however, a
huge variety of these non-electoral institutions. Contemporary democratic theories
have put forward different – and partly contradictory – normative grounds related to
who should participate and how should citizens’ preferences be formed (cf. Budge,
2012; Dryzek, 2002; Gutmann and Thompson, 2009; Saward, 2001). The argument
made above can be, however, generalized to any other types of democratic
innovations: in terms of the real usage, functions and impacts of democratic
innovations it matters a great deal whether it is the elected representatives or citizens
who can initiate the use of a particular instrument (Morel, 2001; Setälä, 1999; Smith,
2009).
From the point of view of the elected representatives, democratic innovations appear
as optional add-ons to the traditional venues of decision-making (Hoppe, 2011). From 5 The Constitution of Finland 731/1999
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the pragmatic or administrative point of view, for example referendums can be
opposed because they cause delays in the decision-making, are expensive and produce
unexpected results (Setälä, 1999). Furthermore, in decentralized countries local
politicians have been delegated major resources and responsibilities, and it is thus
even more likely that elected politicians will not spontaneously let go their control
over the political decision-making process (Andersson & Laerhoven, 2007). Like
other Nordic welfare states, Finland is a highly decentralized country with a long
tradition of strong municipalities (OECD, 2012). In addition to health care,
municipalities are responsible for a variety of other tasks such as children’s day care,
all education except universities, water and energy supply, waste management and
development of public transportation6. Knowing that local councils make important
decisions, local politicians clearly have an incentive to keep the decision-making
power in their own hands.
On the other hand, there are both enlightened and pragmatic motivations why the
empowered local elites should introduce participatory reforms and democratic
innovations (Smith, 2009). The purpose can be sincerely to fix the misalignment
between the citizens and representatives or enrich the information input to decision-
making (Hoppe, 2011). An ideal democratic system should work like this, i.e.
perceived decrease in political support would lead to the transformation of decision-
making processes into more legitimate and participatory. Decreased voter turnout and
citizens’ negative attitudes towards representative institutions could in this case
explain the use of democratic innovations in some political units. Furthermore,
literature on the positive side effects of direct democracy and deliberation (cf.
Andersen and Hansen, 2007; Farrar et al., 2010; Lupia and Matsusaka, 2004) suggests
that the representative elites might use democratic innovations to educate the
citizenry.
In real-world politics, however, the time and economic resources of the empowered
elites are scarce, and the enlightened motives described above may often remain as
ideals. The explanation for why democratic innovations are introduced somewhere
but not everywhere should therefore be sought not only in the citizens’ attitudes
towards the democratic system but also – and perhaps even more importantly – in the
6 Finnish Association of Local and Regional Authorities, www.localfinland.fi, visited on the 3rd of May, 2013.
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representative democratic context such as government composition, party system and
political ideologies, and socio-demographic as well as economic factors (cf. Delli
Carpini et al., 2004; Hoppe, 2011).
The research on government-initiated referendums has identified several motives for
the use of these direct democratic instruments (Björklund, 1982; Morel, 2001;
Qvortrup, 2006). Rahat (2009, 102) categorizes these motives under avoidance,
addition and contradiction. Avoidance refers to situations where a decision might lead
to a split within a party, coalition or the electorate. Because all these three options
would be politically or re-election-wise difficult, parties may want to externalize the
decision to the anonymous public (cf. Breuer, 2009; Setälä, 2006). Addition refers to
situations where a decision already has the necessary majority support, but popular
opinion is asked anyhow. This may have the advantages of legitimizing the decision
further or giving extra credits to the individual representative or the group proposing
direct democracy. Looking at democratic innovations in general, Smith (2009, 23)
takes up these same two motives and argues that democratic innovations are often
initiated in order to legitimate some policies which could otherwise face much
opposition or confirm decisions that have been made elsewhere. The third motive –
contradiction – refers to situations where a decision (to change or preserve something)
has already been made, some minority group is dissatisfied with it and tries to
challenge it by creating a new decision-making forum (Rahat, 2009, 103).
In a representative democratic system these motives are shaped by electoral strategies
and salient political issues but they can also rise from the size of political groups and
the balance of power between them. Veto-player theory argues that political change is
the more difficult the more players are involved in deciding on policies (Tsebelis,
1995). Although binding referendums may add another veto-player in the game (Hug
& Tsebelis, 2002), government-initiated referendums on the other hand can serve as
facilitators of policy change. From this perspective, the avoidance strategy would
become especially useful in situations where there are many political groups or parties
in the government and a consensus is hard to reach (cf. Damore et al., 2012).
In Finland, the municipal councils are elected every four years in a proportional
election with open party lists. Traditionally, all parties that have succeeded in getting
candidates in the local council are also present in the executive board. This means that
there are no government-opposition divisions in the local politics, at least in the case
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of executive boards. However, in the councils’ decision-making the proportions of
political parties’ seats do make a difference, and the more parties are present, the
more difficult it is to make decisions. Based on the discussion above, it can thus be
assumed that the likelihood of referendums increases with the effective number of
parties in local councils.
• Hypothesis 1: The more parties there are in the local council, the more likely it
is that a municipal referendum occurs.
Direct participation of citizens is given different values and emphasis in different
political ideologies. In Europe, direct democracy and government transparency have
been one of the guiding principles of the green parties (Drummond et al., 2001). For
example in Germany, the Green party has demanded direct democracy in the
legislation, and attracted especially those who were actively doing the participatory
style of politics in the 1960s (ibid., 143-6). Traditionally also the Left has demanded
more popular control over collective decisions to foster social justice, community and
other values (Fung and Cohen, 2004). The introduction of Participatory Budgeting in
Latin America has often taken place under a leftist government (Sintomer, 2008 in
Font and Galais, 2011). It can therefore be assumed that the more seats the green and
leftist parties have in the local council, the more government-initiated referendums
are organized.
• Hypothesis 2: The bigger share of seats the leftist and green parties have in the
local council, the more likely it is that a municipal referendum occurs.
In citizens’ initiatives, however, a group of voters puts an issue to the political agenda
or proposes a referendum. Initiative can thus be regarded as a means of influence of
some minority group, which does not have a broad basis in the legislative (Vatter,
2000). In practice, the campaigns to collect signatures are seldom put forward by
individual citizens but civic associations or smaller political parties (Gerber &
Phillips, 2005). Of the aforementioned motives, contradiction would thus seem to be a
potential motive for citizens’ initiatives. It would make sense for an opposition party
or a small political group to start collecting signatures if a decision that they oppose
will be or already was supported by a majority in the government.
Therefore, the more inclusive the government is in relation to parties in the
parliament, the less likely would it be that minorities would have to push forward
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policies with initiatives (cf. Vatter, 2000). Applied to Finnish local politics, one could
assume that the more political parties – or other groups – are represented in the local
council, the less likely it is that initiatives occur. This hypothesis is supported also by
prior studies showing that large number of government parties and fragmentation of
party system decrease the likelihood of citizen-initiated direct democratic processes in
consensus democracies (Vatter, 2000).
• Hypothesis 3: The more political parties or other groups are represented in the
local council, the less likely it is that referendum initiatives occur.
Some authors also suggest that the difficulty to predict voter preferences is linked to
policy proposals put forward by the citizens (Matsusaka and McCarty, 2001; Vatter,
2000). If the decision-making body constantly ignores some policy that has wide
support in (some part of) the citizenry, and the legislation allows for direct
democracy, it is no surprise that a citizens’ initiative is used. Predicting voter
preferences can be especially challenging the bigger the population is, the more
sparsely people live in the municipality area and the more evenly balanced the urban
and rural shares of the population are (Matsusaka and McCarty, 2001).
• Hypothesis 4: The more unpredictable are the voter preferences, the more
likely it is that referendum initiatives occur.
4. Data and methods
The data on the use of direct democratic innovations in Finnish municipalities were
compiled from government statistics7, Association of Local and Regional Authorities
in Finland and by a self-conducted electronic survey, which was sent to all 336
municipalities in January 2013. These data were completed by a systematic regional
newspaper and media review for the period 1991-2012. It is noteworthy, that while
basic information concerning municipal referendums have been recorded by the
Ministry of Justice (responsible for elections), no authority has systematically
collected data on the occurrence and outcomes of referendum initiatives.
4.1. Experience of direct democratic innovations in Finnish local politics 7 Ministry of Justice Finland: Municipal referendums
10
Since the instruments of local direct democracy were introduced in the legislation in
1990, there have been altogether 60 municipal referendums in the Finnish
municipalities. As can be seen in table 1., referendums have been mostly organized on
municipal mergers. Other issues include road construction (traffic), building a waste
burning plant (waste and energy) and changing province or name of the municipality
(municipal identity). The use of referendums has remained quite stable over time; on
average there have been ten referendums during every four years, which is the term of
local councils.
Table 1. The use of referendums in Finnish municipalities 1991-2012
Local council term
Issue 1991-92 1993-96 1997-2000 2001-04 2005-08 2009-12 Total
Municipal merger 9 8 10 9 12 7 55
Traffic 2
2
Waste and energy
1
1
Municipal identity
1
1 2
Total 11 8 11 9 13 8 60
The approximate number of referendum initiatives is equivalent to referendums;
based on research conducted for this study there have been altogether 59 initiatives
demanding a local referendum during 1991 and 2012. The variety of policy issues put
forward with initiatives is much wider than in referendums. Municipal merger still
comes as the most popular issue, but many initiatives have also concerned the
construction of roads, underground car parks and bridges (traffic) or the preservation
of the existing network of local schools (education). The fourth common issue area in
initiatives is municipal identity, which consists of questions such as coat of arms, type
– city or municipality – and regional orientation of the municipality. Other issues
raised on the decision-making agenda with initiatives include for example social and
health services, leisure activities, waste and energy. The full list of referendum and
initiative questions and their categorization is presented in the Appendix.
Unlike the use of referendums, the occurrence of referendum initiatives seems to have
increased since they were introduced in the legislation. In the beginning of 1990s,
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only a few municipalities experienced citizens’ initiatives, whereas during the latter
half of the 2000’s there were initiatives in more than 20 municipalities.
Table 2. The use of referendum initiatives in Finnish municipalities 1991-2012
Local council term
Issue 1991-92 1993-96 1997-2000 2001-04 2005-08 2009-12 Total
Municipal merger 4 12 7 23
Traffic 2 2 2 1 2 9
Social and health services 1 1 1 3
Education 1 3 4 8
Leisure activities 1 2 3
Waste and energy 1 2 3
Municipal identity 1 1 3 5
Other 1 1 1 2 5
Total 3 2 5 9 23 17 59
The use of direct democratic innovations is quite clearly intertwined with structural
reforms in the Finnish local government. The structure of local government has
changed quite extensively from the 1960s to date. The first wave of municipal
mergers took place in the 1960s-1970s and the second in 2005-2011, resulting in a
local government structure of 304 municipalities in the beginning of 20138. There are
even more municipal mergers in the horizon, because a radical reform of local
government is one of the main objectives of the current national government,
suggesting that the number of municipalities in Finland should be reduced to 66-70.
As can be seen in the previous tables 1. and 2., the issue of municipal mergers is
dominating especially local referendums but also referendum initiatives. As much as
92 percent of the referendums have dealt with municipal mergers, and for the
initiatives the figure is 39 percent. Central government policies to reduce the number
of local authorities also play a part in the timing and frequency of the two direct
democratic innovations. The PARAS-policy programme started in 2005 encouraged
8 The Åland Islands – an autonomous, demilitarized region of Finland – is divided into 16 municipalities. Due to the structure of official statistics these municipalities are not included in this study.
12
municipalities to form bigger administrative units with various sticks and carrots, and
led to a major bunch of municipal mergers in the beginning of 2007. The prospect of
these mergers did most likely intensify the debate on local democracy and
government in several municipalities, which is reflected in the bigger number of
referendums and initiatives during the local council term 2005-2008 in tables 1. and 2.
It is therefore plausible that the prospect of municipal merger is one of the
explanatory factors of the use of these instruments. It would be, however, too hasty to
assume that it explained all of the variation between local administrations. Since 1990
at least 140 municipal units have participated in successful merger negotiations and
even more have been involved in discontinued negotiations at some point during this
time period9. Some municipalities have even merged into bigger units of local
government several times. There are, however, only 79 cases when a referendum has
been initiated by the local government or by the citizens on the issue of municipal
merger indicating that there must be some other conditions conducive to the use of
direct democratic innovations.
4.2 Operationalization and methods
The unit of analysis is municipal administration, i.e. a four-year term in a given
municipality. Due to the changes in the structure of local government the names and
territories of municipalities have changed quite extensively during the last 20 years.
Municipality is therefore not a suitable unit of analysis, because direct democratic
innovations have been used in several municipalities that no longer exist.
In order to avoid selection biases, the sample must not consist only of positive cases,
i.e. those municipal administrations where the participatory process has occurred
(Gerring, 2008). Therefore, a purposive sample was selected consisting of all known
cases with either a referendum or citizens’ initiative (n=111) and some negative cases
(n=198) selected randomly among the whole population of municipal administrations
in 1991-2012 (n=approx. 2600). The final sample therefore consists of 309
purposively and randomly selected municipal administrations. Finally, one of the
9 Finnish Association of Local and Regional Authorities: Document ”The number of municipalities and cities 1900-2013”, http://www.kunnat.net/fi/tietopankit/tilastot/aluejaot/kuntien-lukumaara/Sivut/default.aspx, visited on the 20th of May, 2013.
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referendum cases was removed before the statistical analyses because it was the rare
type of mandatory referendum described in chapter 2.
The dependent variables – use of both two direct democratic innovations – are coded
as dummy variables10. Independent variables related to the representative democratic
context include the effective number of parties in the municipal council (Laakso and
Taagepera, 1979), the Green party’s share of seats and two leftist parties’ – moderate
Social Democratic Party (SDP) and the Left Alliance (VAS) – share of seats in the
council11. The unpredictability of voter preferences is measured with population size.
In addition, turnout in the last municipal elections and geographical location of the
municipality are used as control variables.12 Finally, the existence of a citizens’
initiative is also used as a predictor for the use of referendums. The coding of these
variables is presented in the Appendix.
Binary logistic regression is applied to analyse the predictors of the use of municipal
referendums and citizens’ initiatives. Logistic regression is a technique to predict
group membership for individual cases and it is especially suitable for research in
which there are both continuous and discrete explanatory variables, which is the case
in this study (Tabachnick and Fidell, 2007, 439).
5. Results
Direct logistic regressions were conducted in two steps in order to analyze the impact
of party system factors alone and also together with control variables. The first model
does seem to fit to the data, although it is only able to explain approximately eight per
cent of the variation. As can be seen in table 3., the first hypothesis, which assumed
that government-initiated referendums are used more in fragmented party systems,
does not get support from the data. However, the share of seats of the bigger and more
moderate left-wing party SDP does seem to increase the likelihood of government-
initiated referendums (p<0.01). Therefore, the second hypothesis can be at least partly
confirmed. The share of seats of the other leftist party (VAS), on the other hand, is not
a statistically significant predictor.
10 Yes/no initiative, yes/no referendum. 11 The data were compiled from Statistics Finland official election statistics. 12 The data were compiled from Statistics Finland official demographic statistics.
14
The non-significance of the fifth independent variable – the use of citizens’ initiative
– is an interesting result, as well. Considering the existing legislation of the citizens’
initiative and also their increased use during 1991-2012, one could have assumed that
they explained the use of referendums at least to some extent.
Table 3. Party system determinants of the use of referendums (binary logistic regression)
B S.E. Wald Sig. Exp(B) 95% C.I.for EXP(B)
Lower Upper
Proportion of seats, SDP .046 .014 10.806 .001 1.048 1.019 1.077
Proportion of seats, Green party .063 .044 2.031 .154 1.065 .977 1.160
Proportion of seats; VAS -.006 .019 .086 .770 .994 .958 1.032
Effective number of parties -.282 .220 1.646 .200 .754 .490 1.161
Use of citizens’ initiative -.702 .430 2.662 .103 .496 .213 1.152
Nagelkerke
-2 Log likelihood
Chi-square (Omnibus tests)
N
.079
288.45
15.744 (p<.05)
308
When population, geographical location and turnout in the last local elections are
added into the model in table 4., it is able to explain slightly more of the variation in
the use of municipal referendums (Nagelkerke = 0.091). The control variables do not
turn out to be statistically significant predictors of the use of referendums. However,
when more predictors are included, the share of seats of the Green party almost
becomes statistically significant (p<0.1). The moderate left-wing party SDP also
remains as a significant predictor of the referendum use. Although statistically
insignificant, the regression coefficient for population size indicates that smaller
municipalities are more likely to have referendums than municipalities with large
population. Adding the control variables did not, however, improve the model fit
(Chi-square 2.38, 3 degrees of freedom, p>0.05).
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Table 4. Party system, demographic and other determinants of the use of referendums (binary logistic regression)
B S.E. Wald Sig. Exp(B) 95% C.I.for EXP(B)
Lower Upper
Proportion of seats, SDP .050 .015 11.462 .001 1.051 1.021 1.082
Proportion of seats, Green party
.082 .047 3.128 .077 1.086 .991 1.190
Proportion of seats, VAS -.004 .020 .031 .860 .996 .957 1.037
Effective number of parties -.206 .244 .713 .398 .813 .504 1.314
Use of citizens’ initiative -.596 .439 1.847 .174 .551 .233 1.302
Population -.190 .158 1.450 .228 .827 .606 1.127
Region -.010 .031 .101 .751 .990 .932 1.052
Turnout in local elections .004 .023 .032 .857 1.004 .961 1.049
Nagelkerke
-2 Log likelihood
Chi-square (Omnibus tests)
N
.091
286.07
18.121 (p<.01)
308
The results of the logistic regressions for the use of referendum initiatives in Finnish
municipalities are presented in the following tables 5. and 6. The model with only
particular parties’ share of votes and the effective number of parties explains again
approximately eight per cent of the variation in the occurrence of initiatives. But here,
the share of seats of the Green party seems to be a statistically significant (p<0.1)
predictor. The third hypothesis assumed that the fewer parties are included in the
council, the more policy issues are put forward with citizens’ initiatives. This
hypothesis has to be, however, rejected because the effective number of parties is not
a statistically significant predictor.
Table 5. Party system determinants of the use of citizens’ initiatives (binary logistic regression)
B S.E. Wald Sig. Exp(B) 95% C.I.for EXP(B)
Lower Upper
Proportion of seats, SDP .011 .014 .592 .442 1.011 .983 1.040
Proportion of seats, Green party
.077 .041 3.590 .058 1.080 .997 1.169
Proportion of seats, VAS .003 .019 .020 .888 1.003 .967 1.040
Effective number of parties .306 .208 2.166 .141 1.358 .903 2.042
Nagelkerke
-2 Log likelihood
Chi-square (Omnibus tests)
N
.081
285.36
15.97 (p<0.01)
308
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In the second model with control variables, the fourth hypothesis concerning the
unpredictability of voter preferences gets some support from the data. As can be seen
in table 6., larger municipalities in terms of the number of inhabitants are more likely
to experience citizens’ initiatives than smaller municipalities (p<0.1). Green party’s
share of votes, on the other hand, is no longer a significant predictor.
Two other independent variables also turn out to be significant predictors in this
model. Geographical location of the municipality is significant at level 0.05 indicating
that the municipalities in the Southern Finland are more likely to experience citizens’
initiatives than those in the North. Municipalities where elections attract less people
are also more likely to experience initiatives than municipalities with high turnout
(p<0.05).
Adding the population, geographic location and turnout in the last municipal elections
did improve the model fit statistically significantly (Chi-square 12.38, degrees of
freedom 3, p<0.05). Therefore it can be concluded that, as expected, party system and
power relations play a very different role in the use of citizens’ initiatives than in
municipal referendums.
Table 6. Party system, demographic and other determinants of the use of citizens’ initiatives
B S.E. Wald Sig. Exp(B) 95% C.I.for EXP(B)
Lower Upper
Proportion of seats, SDP -.005 .016 .100 .751 .995 .965 1.026
Proportion of seats, Green party
.025 .047 .285 .594 1.026 .935 1.125
Proportion of seats, VAS .017 .021 .676 .411 1.017 .977 1.059
Effective number of parties -.039 .240 .027 .870 .961 .601 1.538
Population .283 .161 3.064 .080 1.326 .967 1.820
Region -.065 .032 4.005 .045 .937 .880 .999
Turnout in last elections -.048 .024 3.981 .046 .953 .910 .999
Nagelkerke
-2 Log likelihood
Chi-square (Omnibus tests)
N
.142
272.78
28.544 (p<0.001)
308
17
6. Discussion
Although some scholars argue that democratic innovations should ideally be
implemented at the national or international levels of government (Newton 2012;
Parkinson 2006), looking at the local level may give us some ideas of favorable
preconditions for the implementation and political impacts of democratic innovations
in general. In this paper it has been analyzed, how party system and some other
indicators predict the use of local government-initiated referendums and referendum
initiatives. The context of the study is a proportional electoral system, which has
adopted two instruments of local direct democracy and given them both a consultative
status.
The representative context does seem to matter for the occurrence of local direct
democratic innovations. The conclusion is in line with the results of Andersson and
Laerhoven (2007) as well as Vatter (2000). The results of this study indicate that the
presence of certain political parties in the local council determines the use of
referendums to some extent. As was expected, the more seats one of the leftist parties
had in the local councils, the more likely referendums were organized. Similarly, the
presence of the Green party seemed to have an impact. However, the proportion of the
seats of another, more extreme leftist party did not seem to be connected with the use
of referendums.
The result, that referendum initiatives did not explain the use of referendums, reflects
the so far very minor political impacts of citizens’ initiatives in Finnish local politics.
Approximately 80 per cent of the referendum results in Finnish municipalities have
been implemented by the municipal councils, and in every fifth referendum the
council’s decision has been against citizens’ opinion. However, referendum initiatives
are very often rejected by the local councils: Less than 15 per cent of the referendum
initiatives have actually led to a referendum. The data are presented in the Appendix,
and the purpose is to broaden this study to include also analyses of the impacts of
local referendums and referendum initiatives.
The occurrence of referendum initiatives seemed to be explained better with
demographic and geographic factors as well as with the level of electoral participation
than with party system determinants. Initiatives were more likely to occur in
municipalities with a large population and low electoral turnout located in the
18
Southern parts of Finland. The impact of election turnout could be explained by
general political passiveness in bigger cities, but it can also indicate that citizens turn
to direct democratic means in political units where other indicators of political
support – such as participation in elections – are low. The share of seats of the Green
party also seemed to predict the occurrence of citizens’ initiatives. This can be
explained by the strong correlation between population size and support for the Green
party, which has elected local politicians mainly in bigger cities. Education level of
the local electorate can also be linked to the result because the Green party
constituents are in general higher educated.
But why did the effective number of parties not explain the use of neither
referendums nor referendum initiatives? Although theories of party system
fragmentation and the motives for government-initiated referendums suggested that
the effective number of parties might explain the use of referendums and citizens’
initiatives, it did not turn out to be the case in Finnish local politics. One possible
explanation could be that in local politics, actual voting power does not necessarily
play as big role as in the decision-making of national parliaments. Especially in terms
on citizens’ initiatives, if they are considered as minority instruments, perhaps it
already makes the political outcomes more responsive if minority groups are present
in the local council, even without real decision-making power. If citizens view it this
way, then there might not be too many initiatives as long as the actual number of
political groups in the council was high. This view is also supported by some
deliberative democrats, who claim that the presence of all discourses in society is
sufficient for a legitimate democratic process, despite of the proportional size of each
group (Dryzek and Niemeyer, 2008).
What other predictors should be studied? As discussed in chapter 4, most of the direct
democratic innovations in Finnish local politics have been linked to municipal
mergers. Especially the referendum has very clearly become an instrument that is only
used to facilitate processes of forming bigger units of local government. In the results
above, the chosen predictors were able to explain more of the variation of the citizens’
initiative use than that of referendum. This could be because of the fact that
referendums are mainly used for municipal mergers, and this factor was not included
in these preliminary analyses. As a next step, a new independent variable should be
included indicating whether the municipality has merged with other municipalities
19
within 2-3 years from the time of the referendum or the initiative. Then it could be
studied, how strong predictor this prospect of a municipal merger is, and second, how
much of the variance if explained by other factors.
Also the independent variable concerning the geographical location of the
municipality could be replaced with other, more suitable predictors. The
unpredictability of voter preferences -hypothesis suggests that in sparsely inhabited
areas the decisions may reflect less the opinions of the citizens. In Finland, Southern
parts of the country are in general more densely populated than the Northern regions.
However, within the regions variations are huge, so the mere population density of the
municipality might be a better predictor. Also the degree of urbanization could be
used as a predictor with the reference point being the 50/50-balance of urban and rural
areas. However, these demographics often correlate with population size, and also
with each other, which can cause multicollinearity in the logistic regressions.
Finally, other methods could also be applied to explain the use of direct democratic
innovations. A qualitative analysis of local council protocols and newspapers could be
conducted to explore the salience and history of referendum and initiative issues in
each municipality. This could reveal more reliably the real motives for government-
initiated referendums as well as the origins of referendum initiatives.
In Finnish local politics, as in many other countries as well, the most popular methods
for consulting citizens have been opinion polls, issue-based permanent councils,
which have both civil servant and citizen members, and different user panels in
service production. During the last few years some municipalities have also
experimented with deliberative citizen forums, and in the on-going reform of the
municipal law it has been debated whether the use of these forums should be
encouraged in the legislation. These consultative-discursive participatory processes
(Newton, 2012) are not usually, however, linked directly to the work of local
councils. They are being used in particular sectors of government and organized by
civil servants responsible for citizen consultations. In the next stage of this research
project, the use of these consultative-discursive procedures will be mapped in 40
representatively selected municipalities and the factors facilitating their use identified.
20
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APPENDIX
Table 7. Categorization of referendum and initiative issues Category Issues Municipal merger Merging with municipality X
Merging in general vs. remaining independent Several different municipal structures as options
Traffic Construction of a road Construction of an underground car park Construction of a bridge
Social and health services Placing of a retirement home Entering a health cooperation treaty Abolishing a public health service enterprise
Education Preserving the existing school network Closing down local school X
Leisure activities Building an indoor swimming pool Waste and energy Placing of a nuclear power plant
Building a waste burning plant Building a water purification plant
Municipal identity Changing province / region Changing the coat of arms Changing the name of the municipality Changing the municipality form into a city
Other Marketization of a municipal energy company Confidence in the city manager Building a new housing area Cooperation treaty in public service production Selling property of the municipality
Table 8. Coding of independent variables Name of the variable Description and coding
Proportion of seats, SDP Percentage of the council seats the party has, continuous variable.
Proportion of seats, Green party Percentage of the council seats the party has, continuous variable.
Proportion of seats, VAS Percentage of the council seats the party has, continuous variable.
Effective number of parties
The number of hypothetical equal-sized parties that would have the same effect on fractionalization of the party system as have the actual parties of varying sizes, continuous variable.
Population
Number of residents in the municipality, coded into 7 categories: 1=0-2000. 2=2001-5000, 3=5001-10000, 4=10001-20000, 5=20001-50000, 6=50001-100000, 7=100001 and more
Region
In which one of the 18 regions the municipality is located. Coded 1-19 starting from the South (capital Helsinki) and ending in the North (Lapland).
Turnout in last elections The percentage of eligible voters that voted in the most recent municipal elections, continuous variable.
24
Table 9. The impacts of referendums
Issue
Was the council’s decision in line with the referendum result?
No Yes Total Municipal merger 11 44 55 Traffic 0 2 2 Social and health services 0 0 0 Education 0 0 0 Leisure activities 0 0 0 Waste and energy 1 0 1 Municipal identity 0 2 2 Other 0 0 0 Total 12 48 60
Table 10. The impacts of referendum initiatives
Issue Did the council decide to organize a referendum?
No Yes Total Municipal merger 20 3 23 Traffic 6 2 9 Social and health services 3 0 3 Education 8 0 8 Leisure activities 3 0 3 Waste and energy 2 1 3 Municipal identity 3 2 5 Other 5 0 5 Total 50 8 58
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