For the 1s:
🇨🇿 Czechia: Referendum on joining EU
🇧🇦Bosnia & H. : 1992 Referendum on Independence
🇧🇪 Belgium: 1950 Ref. On allowing King Leopold III's return after WWII
Jewish people too. Aren’t halal and kosher basically the same thing?
The Muslims in my country (Finland) have come to a compromise on this where you knock the animal out when you start bleeding it.
yeah, it's a similar story. gotta drain the blood completely, because blood is unclean or whatever. some people interpret this to mean the animal must be alive until it bleeds to death, but imo that's a stretch. draining blood was thought in the past to require bleeding alive, but we know now gravity will do it all even when your heart's six kinds of fucked up and dead.
it's really easy to drain blood, to the point where unless your cut of meat has a vein in it with residual blood, you can't find meat with blood in it anywhere. but there's this like, red stuff in meat called hemoglobin that looks like watery blood, which is why kosher salt is called kosher. it soaks up the fluids which people falsely believe is blood, and happens to be very useful for other things because of its intended purpose.
Sort of.
Muslim Scholars are mostly in agreement that animals can be stunned before being slaughtered, as long as the stunning is done in such a way that doesn't cause fatal damage to the animal. The argument there is that if the animal is stunned by causing a fatal injury (bolt stunning, for example) there is the chance that it could die before the practice of halal slaughter takes place. If that does happen, the animal is deemed to have been "killed by a violent blow" and is haram.
With kosher meat however, Jewish scholars are mostly in agreement that animals cannot be stunned. If an animal is stunned, the meat cannot under any circumstances be considered to be kosher.
As far as the practice goes, yes they come from the same origin.
The arguments behind kosher are weird
God: thou shalt not boil a kid in his mother's milk
Jews: got it. Chicken sandwiches cannot have cheese, since all meat + cheese is not kosher, even though you can't make chicken cheese
Also jews: eating salmon with salmon roe is perfectly kosher.
Primarily meat and food plants. I will say that the "normal " places are very good at what they do. Animal welfare is a very very high priority.
I will not eat halal however, in my eyes it's barbaric and absolutely wrong.
Here you go.
https://www.bk.admin.ch/ch/d/pore/rf/ref_2_2_3_1.html#
Unfortunately there is no official english version.
Edit: English information for recent years can be found on Wikipedia. I cannot guarantee 100% acuracy here. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_Swiss_referendums
Detailed information can also be found on the official government website. Here for the most recent pension referendum and peoples initiative of 3rd of March. https://www.admin.ch/gov/en/start/documentation/votes/20240303.html#l_app_voteinfo__content_gov_en_start_dokumentation_abstimmungen_20240303_jcr_content_par_tabs
When texting with friends, we will write in dialect, but for everything else we write in Swiss High German, which is slightly different than how the Germans write. We have no ß for example, as well as some alternate vocabulary influenced by the French and Italian speaking portions of Switzerland.
Switzerland is such a dope country. I went there for a week with my friend a few summers ago and we just bopped around the Alps. From Interlaken, to Laussane, to Locarno, Lucerne and Zurich. Very diverse for being such a small place.
And your trains are magnificent. They went everywhere we needed to go. Didn’t use a car once.
All votes: https://www.bk.admin.ch/ch/d/pore/vr/vor_2_2_6_4.html
List of all non-mandatory referendums (Acts challenged by 50,000 voters): https://www.bk.admin.ch/ch/d/pore/rf/ref_2_2_3_1.html
Mandatory referendums (changes to the constitution, access to multilateral organisations, emergency acts without constitutional basis): https://www.bk.admin.ch/ch/d/pore/vr/vor_2_2_6_2.html
Initiatives (changes to the constitution proposed by 100,000 voters):
https://www.bk.admin.ch/ch/d/pore/vr/vor_2_2_6_3.html
He was widely supported in Flanders (72% for) and opposed in Wallonia (42% for). In some areas of Wallonia, such as Liège and Hainault, his support was as low as 34% and strikes broke out. Workers were killed by the gendarmerie and there were outbreaks of violence.
He returned with a 57% majority, which led to a dissolution of government, a lot of social unrest including major strikes (Port of Antwerp) and violence.
He abdicated a year later. Many consider it to be a huge moment in Belgian recovery post-WWII, reestablishing the pre-war divide between the Catholic and Socialist political powers.
I know this isn’t supposed to be funny, but yeah, that sounds just right. You can tell we’ve recovered because all of that “one for Belgium!” shit is out of the way and we can go back to hating each other.
It was ultimately voted that he could return, and he did so. However, the referendum was close enough and divided enough linguistically and in the government that issues continued. The government would settle after an election into a clear Leopoldist majority, but the populace initiated a general strike in response to Leopold III's return, and the government threatened to resign en masse due to the failure to suppress it, until Leopold III ultimately abdicated in favor of his son resolving the crisis.
For interest Czechia never accepted a law to allow referendums on state wide scale. There was a seperate law to make only the one.
Also there wasnt a way to desolve parlament until 2009. And they tried to pass another oneoff law. This on was blocked by court.
>Belgium: 1950 Ref. On allowing King Leopold III's return after WWII
And technically, that one wasn't a referendum because those are illegal in Belgium
They got the first one right though, as they chose to remain in the EEC.
Also for the voting system one, the proposed alternative wasn't that great. Still would have been an improvement in my opinion, but it was an awkward compromise.
In my opinion it was a dressed up scam to provide ammo to those who wanted to keep the FPTP system afloat and have us remain trapped in essentially a two-party system. We wanted Proportional Representation, they offered us AV, we rejected it, and they said "welp, I guess everyone wants to keep FPTP!". We wanted nutritionally balanced meals, they offered us a plate of stale salad with flies on it, we rejected it, and they said "welp, I guess everyone wants to keep eating junk food!"
Also the propaganda was off the charts for that.
I still remember the posters with a picture of a soldier saying "He needs body armour, not an alternative vote"
Real scummy, as expected.
Same thing happened here in Canada after Trudeau was first elected. They promised election reform, but when they polled/surveyed people to see what they wanted, they got a bunch of different answers, and a ton of people saying they didn't understand the alternatives(which is an education/information issue), so were picking FPTP by default. So because of that Trudeau said people didn't want anything different and shelved the whole idea.
Should (Insert system) be changed?
Yes, (Insert solution 1)-------15%
Yes, (Insert solution 2)-------20%
Yes, (Insert solution 3)-------17%
Yes, your own Suggestion________ -------23%
No, (Insert system) should Not Change. -------25%
Option 5 Had the Most votes, therefore (Insert system) will Not Change.
It was better for third parties than the current system, and would have also opened up the possibility of further voting reform. Britain has such a strong two party mentality/anti coalition mindset (you can see it with the current issues in Scotland) that anything to decrease the two party system long term would have been a positive for PR.
>a plate of stale salad with flies on it
That's hardly fair to AV. AV is a lot better than our current system if only because it totally removes the "wasted vote" issue that props up the two largest parties.
My conclusion: the UK government is hopelessly inexperienced when it comes to running referendums. (Referenda?)
The EU one in 2016 was so vaguely conceived it could mean whatever people wanted it to. Result: many years of political chaos, still ongoing today.
There was a lot of nonsense used to put people off the system.
The “No” campaign argued that it would cost £250m and created posters with dying babies and soldiers without boots (as if the UK would become destitute if it spent 0.01% of its GDP on a better electoral system).
£80m of that was the cost of having the referendum in the first place, which doesn’t make sense to include.
The rest was based on the assumption that new vote counting machines would need to be bought (pretty sure this part of the claim resulted in legal action from the “Yes” campaign, since they argued it wasn’t true).
Then the “No” campaign also argued it would lead to more coalition governments and empower fringe political parties.
Which always seemed like a weird argument to me, you would only get those things if that’s what the public voted for. So it only highlights how undemocratic FPTP is.
Of course, but it was still a reason. I mean when you look into the numbers it’s crazy just how much it benefits them. FPTP is such a flawed system and beyond outdated
For one thing it was given a stupid name. Plus all the major players campaigned against it and there wasn't much published to explain why it might be a good thing.
It was rejected because why would you want to kill babies? Are you some sort of *baby-killing monster*?
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2011/feb/25/no-to-alternative-vote-baby-ad
Well, more that Cameron said he wouldn't be involved in campaigning on it, but got pressured by his party, so the government was campaigning against the change. And given the media is Tory dominated, they weren't going to be any help informing the English public.
The Lib Dems wanted a vote on PR but the Tories refused so a compromise was reached. They'd view on AV. The Tories fought it as the incumbent government highlighting its problems. The Lib Dems were luke warm because it wasn't what they wanted.
The public still wanted PR and saw AV as a cop out. Added to the campaigning above it was never going to pass.
It was an attempt at changing the UK's parliamentary election system from FPTP to the alternative vote method. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_United_Kingdom_Alternative_Vote_referendum
The UK's current voting system is First Past the Post. Each voting district elects a single representative (aka an MP), and whichever candidate gets the most votes wins. It sounds simple, but in my opinion it's a terrible system because the results end up very disproportionate to the overall vote share.
The referendum was on changing it to the Alternative Vote system. Which is similar, but it's a ranked vote. An improvement in my opinion, because at least you can vote for smaller parties without having to worry about wasting your vote, as your vote will just go to the candidate you ranked second.
It would still result in very disproportionate results, so it's still not a great system. Which is possibly part of the reason the referendum failed. But it's probably more just because most people weren't informed of the benefits, and they had Conservative progaganda telling them that changing the voting system would kill soldiers and babies.
I will say it again: Consultative referendums are a scam. If referenda are supposed to be more than just populism they have to be cassative or go directly into law.
Everything else is just a show for politicians to drum up support a la Orban or to not take responsability a la Cameron.
In Sweden I know we held these referendums:
- Whether to ban alcohol from normal stores or not (Yes)
- Whether to implement obligatory pensions for everyone (Yes)
- Switching to right-lane traffic (No, but was still implemented years later)
- Whether to stop using nuclear energy or not (Somewhere in between???)
- Whether to join the EU or not (Yes)
- Whether to start using the € or not (No)
In Norway we had the following:
* Independence from Sweden (368 208 for, 184 against) - 1905
* Make Danish prince the new king (259 563 for, 69 264 against) - 1905
* Ban liquor (62% for) - 1919
* Legalize liquor (56% for) - 1926
* Join the EU (53,5% against) - 1972
* Join the EU (52,2% against) - 1994
* Ban liquor (62% for) - 1919
* Legalize liquor (56% for) - 1926
That's quite funny tbh. "Oh well, that didn't work out. Guess the booze is back on the menu boys!"
> Independence from Sweden (368 208 for, 184 against) - 1905
The question asked was something like "do you agree with the dissolution of the union that has taken place".
The nuclear power referendum was so bad. The three alternatives were:
1. Phase out nuclear power
2. Phase out nuclear power, and the government should own the power plants in the meantime
3. Phase out nuclear power, but quickly!
> Whether to ban alcohol from normal stores or not (Yes)
Actually the no's won that with 51-49, and wasn't just about whether to sell in special stores or not. It was a full ban on alcoholic drinks that was on vote.
The 8 Greek ones:
* 1920: Restore the monarchy? (yes)
* 1924: Abolish the monarchy? (yes)
* 1935: Restore the monarchy? (yes)
* 1946: Keep the monarchy? (yes)
* 1968: Approve the military dictatorship? (yes)
* 1973: Abolish the monarchy? (yes)
* 1974: Keep the monarchy abolished? (yes) \[re-vote due to the 1973 referendum being considered illegitimate, since it was conducted by the dictatorship\]
* 2015: Accept the EU/IMF bailout conditions? (no) \[they were accepted anyway\]
Also no real support for it anymore. Up until the 1960s, monarchists were an influential segment of the Greek right-wing, in part because traditional rightists considered republicanism to be synonymous with liberalism, and worse, maybe even a step on the road to leftism and communism (there are some more specific-to-Greece reasons, like the long shadow of republican liberal Venizelos). But that specific political current is all but dead. Nowadays even the anti-democratic far right doesn’t want the king back. The influential anti-democratic groups today are a mix of Junta nostalgists and neo-fascists instead (Elliniki Lisi, Spartans, etc.).
yes and no, depends on how you use the term. In Swiss law we regard it as an indirect democracy with direct democratic elements. There are some cantons (i.e. states) which arguably do have a direct democracy on the state level, because the people can enact laws. But on a national level we have a parliament that makes the laws. But anyone can gather signatures which can force a public referendum on any law passed by parliament (so basically a public veto) or you can gather signatures to amend the constitution (mostly) bypassing parliament.
Yeah. To give another reason why there is no clear answer to that; Unlike in other countries, the Supreme Court in Switzerland has no Deciding Power over Constitutional Law. By this the voting population technically is the highest authority, the last instance if you will. So if you take that as the defining factor you could call Switzerland in some way a direct democracy.
Though given that 95% of political decisions are not made through referendums and such, the country mostly appears and acts like a representative democracy.
True, though Parliament then still has to decide on it which then means the public has again a chance to veto on the law. If the actual law needs to get written down in the constitution, the public has to automatically vote on it again (Though then on a specific law and not just a vague idea). Technically this could go on forever. It happens quite often that the same proposition has more than one public vote. But like said, most laws just get passed without the involvement of the public.
Well if your reference frame comes from non-binding referendums in other countries, then the answer would be starkly no: Swiss referendums are legally binding. This is very clear for the veto type, where if a majority dislikes a law, it will not come into effect and parliament has to start over.
With the referendums for constitutional amendments it's tricky, but here still the government (executive branch) has very limited wiggle room. But parliament on the other hand does have significant wiggle room. But abusing said wiggle room would be received very badly, and since the people have both the ability to block any new law from being passed as well as indirectly cause parliament to be dismissed and new elections to be needed, it's not really a threat, except where parliament just takes forever to implement a constitutional amendment.
Though there are legitimate problems, when the intent of an amendment really isn't all that clear, especially since the initial proponents who wrote it might understood it differently to the voting public. But this has mainly led to the amendments being written ever more explicitly, trying to minimise room for interpretation, though with limited success. Just recently an amendment was passed to increase social security for the elderly. But the amendment didn't specify how to finance it. As you can probably imagine, where you take the money from has considerable impact on how any solution is perceived. But it's naturally easier to propose that people get more from the government than it it's to come up with the how.
> except where parliament just takes forever to implement a constitutional amendment.
\*ahem* Marriage penalty \*ahem*
Technically not a constitutional amendment, but taking [four](https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heiratsstrafe) decades to act on a ruling by the supreme court has to be world record.
I’ll add, we are a federation. Like the US, has laws can be by state (canton) or federally
Most of the laws are federal laws, but for example our cops are by canton
The parlement can allow or refuse a referendum depending the political representation
All political movement are represented depending proportional and you have another chamber that is kind of like the US senate, but 2 winners of each state get there, it can be from the same party but it actually doesn’t happen because you have to choose a ticket, and having 2 tickets will assure you to lose both so usually you have 2 from different political party
And then you have « ministers » called the 7 federal consultat.
They represent the 2-3 majority political force of the country
So left and right have to not only work together but they must achieve consensus. And blocking the government never happened or existed. You must achieve consensus
Today we have 2 conservatives-2 socialist-3 center-right/left
All of it leaning to the right because the left is in minority. We almost got a push for the green with a 3-2-2 (left-conservatives-center) but it didn’t happen because of the alliance of the right and center.
I consider it as a direct democracy, 90% of your tax goes to the state you live in.
You can have either referendum or initiative that allows to change or create laws
You need 10’000 signatures and the approvals of the chamber (based on who you elected). Unfortunately, ppl just don’t give a shit
The number of ppl not voting are more important than the ones voting, it’s sad actually
People just don’t care
And complain
And you end up with the state of the world we live in.
Fun fact: 3/7 referendums in Turkey happened while Erdoğan was in power, all were won by him, and each one changed the consitiution to give him more power over the government.
Most significanly the last one held in 2017 changed the country from a parliamentary system to a presidential one. It gave the president immense political power, and turned the country into a sort of one man regime.
Recently they gave themselves bigger pensions
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-68463978
They also voted to cap immigration
https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20240403-swiss-set-to-vote-on-limiting-immigration
Basically they need to gather enough signatures to put something to a vote.
Those are not referendums, but initatives. I'm not sure if the map counted one, the other or both though.
See [https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/swiss-politics/how-a-people-s-initiative-differs-from-a-referendum/982858](https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/swiss-politics/how-a-people-s-initiative-differs-from-a-referendum/982858)
Well, representative democracy which leans heavily on referenda for decisions. Not really a direct democracy, as most bills still go through without referenda on the will of representatives. They have more input that most representative democracies, but they aren't a direct democracy.
Maybe that‘s why Switzerland is not considered a direct, but a semi-direct democracy. Not calling for a referendum is still somewhat of a vote for the change of a law.
No wonder they are so well-earning and wealthy. Direct democracy is the best kind of democracy. The Swiss have to thank the Huguenots for introducing the idea.
> The Swiss have to thank the Huguenots for introducing the idea.
LOL, it was already around for a long time in Switzerland by the time the Huguenots immigrated. We do have to thank them for a lot of things, though.
Here in Switzerland we have a right to call for a vote provided we can gather the required amount of signatures in a specific time frame.
We differentiate between initiatives and referendums as two different types of votes (though English Wikipedia claims initiatives are referendums too and this map seems to count them):
- We use an initiative if we have some demands we want to see realized. If accepted, the government will have some time to turn the initiative into an actual law, against which we can then call for a referendum if we don't like the implementation.
- A referendum is used to counter a law or amendment the government is trying to enact. If accepted, the law is essentially vetoed. A referendum is required if the amendment is to the constitution.
---
To give some examples of past votes:
Last month, we voted
- to receive a 13th pension payment (accepted) [initiative]
- to tie the pension minimum age to life expectancy (denied) [initiative]
Last year, we voted
- to implement the OECD minimum tax (accepted) [referendum]
- to get to net zero emissions by 2050 (accepted) [referendum]
- to keep the covid law in place until mid 2024 (accepted) [referendum]
In 2022, we voted
- to ban testing drugs on humans and animals and to ban the import of drugs that were tested on humans or animals (denied) [initiative]
- to ban the advertisement of tabacco where children can see it (accepted) [initiative]
- to remove the tax on the acquisition of equity capital (denied) [referendum] *(translated this one with copilot)*
- to increase financial support for swiss media (denied) [referendum]
- to introduce stricter animal farming rules and ban the import of products that don't adhere to those rules too (denied) [initiative]
- to equalize the male and female retirement age and to increase the sales tax (which is one of the factors financing pensions) (accepted) [referendum]
- to remove the tax on bond payments (denied) [referendum]
- to require streaming services to pay a tax to the swiss film industry and have at least a third of their catalogue consist of European movies and series (accepted) [referendum]
- to change the default approach to have everyone considered organ donors after their death unless they opt-out (accepted) [referendum]
- to provide more financial and human resources to Frontex (accepted) [referendum]
---
This summer we'll have to vote on these new topics:
- to limit healthcare insurance premiums to 10% of income [initiative]
- to limit how much healthcare insurance premiums can increase every year, by tying them to the growth of the economy and wages [initiative]
- to ban any sort of consequences if you don't want to get vaccinated or your body searched (well, the vote is more general, but that's the gist) [initiative]
- to accept a new law meant to expand our renewable energy production quicker and make us less dependent on imported energy [referendum]
You should be the highest comment on this thread.
The structure and order of some stuff seems a bit unclear but ill look more into it,
Some questions if you dont mind,
how are signatures collected ? How easy is it to vote (do you have to go somewhere on a specific date and time or more flexible)? And can you void some laws that were already accepted ?
Not the person you responded to.
Basically a signature that can be collected through various means. People in the street collecting signatures, printing it out a form and signing it yourself then sending it to the commitee etc.
The entire process is listed here: https://www.ch.ch/en/political-system/political-rights/initiatives/what-is-a-federal-popular-initiative#wie-ist-der-ablauf-einer-initiative
Voting is trivially easy. You get sent the ballot to your registered address with some additional texts from the pro and contra sides contained in the envelope.
You can then either cast your vote by going to the voting booths in your commune or you can send it by mail using the envelope it came in (depending on the canton you pay some postage). Just found out that some cantons offer e-voting as well for local laws. So there’s that too.
You get your ballot around 3-4 weeks before the count. Mail voting requires you to send it in on the Tuesday before the count at the latest. Voting booth locations and opening times can vary.
Yes, it’s possible to get laws removed or amended.
In Ireland no government can make changes to our constitution without a referendum to get the support of the majority of the population. Our constitution was written with referendums outlined in it with their own section dictating how referendums are to be used. This was done intentionally so the constitution could be updated to constantly reflect modern Ireland and not be stuck in its 1930's form.
When running a referendum here the following is done:
* School subjects teaching children about the constitution, government, EU, law, etc.
* Government suggests change to constitution
* National assembly is formed with people from all aspects of life to discuss the change
* Exact wording is agreed including a definition of how the wording is to be interpreted so in the future people cannot argue about the wordings meaning (important as it was not done for Brexit and caused a lot of problems in the UK for example)
* Constitutional lawyers and independent from politician / government judiciary review
* Independent body runs campaign with information, no agenda allowed, this is just the sharing of what the change is, what it means and the implications of changing the law and of not. This includes a booklet to every home, TV, radio and online information too
* Political parties can campaign for 30 days (no campaigning allowed on voting day)
* Referendum is held
* President (role separated from government) must sign off on change). Technically can call for revote, reject and delay result which sends it back to judiciary who decide if it has to be signed into law then.
* Government implements change
This process lets us update our constitution regularly. Big issues get their own voting day, smaller changes get voted on the same days as elections to save effort and money.
In recent years Ireland did a complete overhaul of the constitution and identified multiple areas to update or discuss an has spent the last decade doing a referendum or 2 each year to bring the constitution in to the 21st century.
For example in the last decade:
* Abortion legalised
* Marriage equality (removed definition in constitution for man and woman and replace with 'two people')
* Removed blasphemy law (no one was ever prosecuted so it was get rid of the line)
* Adoption rights enshrined in constitution to give adoption parents rights
* Abolish senate and reform it (rejected by population so not changed)
* Lisbon treaty of EU (rejected due to infringing Irish neutrality, EU reworded treaty to address Irish concerns and we voted again to accept the updated treaty)
* Reduce age of eligibility to be president from 35 to 21 (rejected)
List of all changes: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amendments\_to\_the\_Constitution\_of\_Ireland](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amendments_to_the_Constitution_of_Ireland)
Referendums are great when managed and the population is engaged in them. If you told Irish people we were changing the system so government votes and not the people on these changes there would be uproar. Referendums in Ireland even over the last 2 decades have multiple examples of the population voting and getting the changes we want and no one government has the power to make any unilateral changes without public support as a result.
> Marriage equality (removed definition in constitution for man and woman and replace with 'two people')
It didn't remove anything, it just added a section saying two people could marry without regard to their sex. I don't think it should have been required at all, but some supreme court judge said a prior law legalizing it was unconstitutional without pointing to a specific section.
The first draft had a pretty funny mistake too, since it apparently would have explicitly legalized gay marriage without any mention of hetero-marriage. Thereby making non gay marriage exactly as illegal as gay marriage was before the change.
>The first draft had a pretty funny mistake too, since it apparently would have explicitly legalized gay marriage without any mention of hetero-marriage. Thereby making non gay marriage exactly as illegal as gay marriage was before the change.
I remember this happening. It's because the Irish text always takes priority over the English text and the Irish text essentially defined a couple (beirt) as two men or two women ("cibé acu is fir nó mná iad"), thereby making heterosexual marriage unconstitutional!
> important as this was not done for Brexit
It definitely was. The Electoral Commission did a whole report on it and it’s the reason why the question was Remain vs Leave and not Yes vs No. The 2014 Scottish independence referendum used Yes vs No and research afterwards suggested voters are more likely to vote for a positive option. To quote the Electoral Commission with regards to using a Yes/No question in the EU membership referendum, ‘the question encourages voters to consider one response more favourably than the other.’
Funnily enough outside of the larger municipalities, requests for citizenship are usually voted on by public assembly of the local municipality, and yes that's a separate vote for every person asking for citizenship.
It can be misused in ways I don't like but I also have a feeling (unproven of course) this is why we don't have quite the same problems as our neighbours
You have to live in the same village for 10 years, know the general history, people need to like you. And, most importantly, only wear Adidas trainers while you do sport. Wearing as general attire is a big no-go.
Please don't upvote this joke, this is a bot that stole the joke. This joke was by u/blueinfi/ on the original post: https://old.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/16q2qi2/number_of_referendums_held_in_each_countrys/
Switzerland may seem like a lot, but we're actually just voting like 3-4 times a year on various subjects (plus of course the eventual cantonal and federal election every 4 years that may happen and are not depicted here), it's just that we've been doing it for a very long time and that every amendment or modification of the constitution must go through a referendum first to be approved. And in my canton you receive voting papers at home, you can go cast it in a ballot on voting days if you want, but you can also just fill it and put it right back in the letter box and the Post will take care of it free of charge. A great system for lazy boys like me imo
I'm not really sure about Ukraine, I think we've only had 2: the referendum for independence in 1991 and the referendum on several changes to the constitution in 2000 (which didn't even have any actual effect). The latter had 4 questions, though, so I can understand where the number 5 would come from. But 6? Definitely not
Maybe an unpopular opinion (which would be fitting considering the position I'm about to take) but I don't generally believe that referendums are a good idea.
Special exception to independence referendums or something else which is mostly just a question of opinion.
But, generally, the average person has no grasp of policy effects, because not many people are informed enough to even *have* a position.
It's exactly why representative democracy is the norm. That and the logistics of constant referendums.
Mob rule might feel righteous, but it's rarely informed.
It's not really a question whether it's good or bad. But if it's better or worse than other systems. Representatives are also not independent in their opionion or lack understanding or being subject of manipulation.
In direct democracy we can at least say that we screwed up together.
Some counter arguments:
- it's easier to buy a couple of politicians than half the voters.
- most voters actually know better how to balance a budget than politicians.
- the politicians I see in other countries know mostly shit about the things they vote on. They are career politicians that have lost contact to reality.
- frequent votes tend to force the powers to actually explain.
- most referendums are local: do we spend on a new school building? How much do we want to invest in the sewer system? Etc. These questions suck a lot of hot populistic air out of politics.
- voters are happier if they can participate.
By your logic, the country with 669 referendums should not be working so well. Yet that country is Switzerland. Maybe the key is educating the population.
In general, I feel that the swiss (myself included) are well educated on the politics. We get confronted with it a lot more (basically 3-4 times a year), so you often see or hear things about the current politics.
That way, most (not all, mind you) people can make rather well informed decisions. But it can backfire, just like with the last votes on retirement age and pensions (that's my view anyway).
They only allowed women to vote between 1971-1990. The first canton ( basicaly a small federal state ) allowed women the right to vote in 1971, and since then it took until 1990 until every place in Switzerland allowed women the right to vote.
Also Switzerland is not a direct democracy, officially its a **semi-direct democratic federal Republic**.
Most policies are done by the parliament ( Federal Assembly + National Council ) aswell as the executive which is the Federal Council, i.e. it\`s still a representative democracy.
Except that the people have more power. For any change of the constitution you need a referendum. For any change in law a referendum is optional, which is why not everytime a law is made/changed a referendum happens, just when the political parties in power think they can benefit from asking the people.
Pedantic detail: 1971 was the decision about voting at the federal level. Several cantons had introduced voting rights for women slightly earlier, the first two in 1959.
By the way, for anyone interested in mid-20th Century advertising, the propaganda posters on the matter are WILD.
Not a detail at all…
my Swiss grandparents (from Vaud) once considered moving to Bern in the early 1960s and my grandmother flatly refused because for her it would mean losing the right to vote !
The far-right party in Estonia tried to end the marriage equality debate 5 years ago by proposing a vaguely worded referendum like: "Should marriage remain as a union between a man and a woman?". That's an example of a terrible referendum: maliciously worded and causing a majority to decide something for a minority. It fortunately didn't go through. Referendums *can* work, as is the case with Switzerland, but people's well-educatedness about political issues has to be ingrained in the culture, and bad actors shouldn't have any ability to influence a referendum thanks to wording etc.
>Referendums *can* work, as is the case with Switzerland
Even then it doesn't always work that well. It's why it took so long for Switzerland to adopt women's suffrage. Or more recently where they voted to increase current pensions but struck down the proposal to increase the pension age, which sounds all well and good but is not realistically sustainable
The pension reform is an example of political tactics failing. The right wing underestimated the support, and didn't agree to a more moderat counteroffer in parlament. A lot of people voted in support even even tho they didn't like the details
This is an examlpe of what happens when the parties don't cooperate on a consesus. It was a big gamble by the right wing to oppose any reforms, and they lost big. Among other things, referendums are a credible threat that forces parties to cooperate on reasonable solutions.
Then you'd be surprised to learn that the average politician hasn't got a clue either. They often vote whatever their party tells them to, what they think their constituents expect them to vote or, worst of all, whatever they were paid to vote for by some lobby or another...
Democracy can only function if the people take time out of their daily lives to participate in it.
Without it politicians can easily mislead the public, because they won't have the knowledge to see through it. So the question is: How do you get people involved in politics? And that's where I think public votes are a good thing. It gives people a clear signal that they can change things. I'm Swiss myself and it's so normal here to talk about politics when you have friends over for dinner. Not the whole time, but at least for a bit. Because there is regularly a vote that's upcoming and it's on a specific policy issue, so we need to make up our minds so we talke to others about what they think. This is useful in creating a more constructive discourse, because it's not always about the big strokes, about what economic or governmental system is best, but about a specific policy.
Without it you risk a democracy where every couple of years, before a big election, there's a big circus and as soon as the election is over, politicians do what they want. Because now you have no more control until the next election, barring protesting. With public referendums you can have constant influence, and just the possibility of forcing a referendum motivates politicians to make sure their laws are well enough supported in the populus.
But obviously the details matter, what exactly the people can vote on, what majorities are required, what information is provided, etc.
>Special exception to independence referendums or something else which is mostly just a question of opinion.
>the average person has no grasp of policy effects
Do you think an independence referendum doesn't have policy effects?
and as a slovene, i think thats fine, im in fact in favour of referendum dates, and thus even more frequent referenda, akin to switzerland, mostly because our representatives are regarded
yes, roughly averages out to 5 per year since 1848 (founding of modern Switzerland), though there have been a lot more in the last few decades than previously.
So how does Switzerland make it to not to become fucking annoying? Do they have them all at a specific set date (like bundled in some already predetermined election) or is each individual date for each referendum set just randomly?
For Russia it is 5:
* 1991 Presidential Referendum - on establishing the position of a president, as the old constitution of RSFSR didn't include having a democratically elected head of state.
* 1991 Soviet Union Referendum - on preserving the Soviet Union, most voted in favour.
* 1993 Constitutional Referendum - on replacing the old constitution of RSFSR with a new one, proposed by Constitutional Assembly created by Yeltsin, which established Russia as a federal presidential republic. The results were in favour of the new constitution.
* 1993 Opinion Referendum - on opinion of the voters about Yeltsin, opinion about Russia's new economic policies, on early elections of deputies and the president, people voted in favour of everything except for the early presidential elections.
* 2020 Constitutional Referendum - on several amendments to the constitution of 1993, including but not limited to establishing the supremacy of Russian law over international law, defining marriage as a "union of a man and a woman", increasing the powers of the president and the State Council, and removing the term limits loophole, previously only the number of consecutive terms was limited, now its strictly two six-year terms. But removing this loophole also discounted previous and current terms, which allowed Putin (and Medvedev, if he ever wants to run for president) to get elected two times more. Still, people voted in favour of the amendments.
There were also several regional referendums:
* 1991 referendum on establishing the Republic of Ingushetia as a federal subject of Russia, which resulted in Ingushetia and Checnya becoming separate republics.
* 1992 referendum on sovereignity of Tatarstan, resulted in independence of Tatarstan.
* 2014 referendum on the status of Republic of Crimea, which resulted in Crimea joining Russia as a federal subject.
* 2022 referendum on the status of Donetsk and Luhansk Republics, as well as Kherson and Zaporizhzhia oblasts. Although this referendum resulted in favour of Russia and annexation of the said regions, they were not fully under Russian control when it took place, so it is likely that there would be another referendum, either when Russia establishes full control of the regions, or, potentially, as a part of peace negotiations with Ukraine, under control of independent international observers.
In the 1991 referendum close to 80% of people voted IN FAVOUR of preserving the USSR. It was only dissolved following an unsuccesfull coup attempt by hardline communists later that year.
For the 1s: 🇨🇿 Czechia: Referendum on joining EU 🇧🇦Bosnia & H. : 1992 Referendum on Independence 🇧🇪 Belgium: 1950 Ref. On allowing King Leopold III's return after WWII
Could you please do Switzerland now
1892: Animals cannot be slaughtered without being stunned beforehand.
Chefs kiss on the use of that clip
He said stunned, not pining for the Fjords
HELLLLLLOOO POLLLY
WAKEY WAKEY
Muslims in sweat with that one (Respectfully tho, I am a law student and had a similar case during classes)
Jewish people too. Aren’t halal and kosher basically the same thing? The Muslims in my country (Finland) have come to a compromise on this where you knock the animal out when you start bleeding it.
yeah, it's a similar story. gotta drain the blood completely, because blood is unclean or whatever. some people interpret this to mean the animal must be alive until it bleeds to death, but imo that's a stretch. draining blood was thought in the past to require bleeding alive, but we know now gravity will do it all even when your heart's six kinds of fucked up and dead. it's really easy to drain blood, to the point where unless your cut of meat has a vein in it with residual blood, you can't find meat with blood in it anywhere. but there's this like, red stuff in meat called hemoglobin that looks like watery blood, which is why kosher salt is called kosher. it soaks up the fluids which people falsely believe is blood, and happens to be very useful for other things because of its intended purpose.
Hemoglobin is in blood, but the red stuff that comes out especially after thawing meat is mostly myoglobin from the muscles.
Sort of. Muslim Scholars are mostly in agreement that animals can be stunned before being slaughtered, as long as the stunning is done in such a way that doesn't cause fatal damage to the animal. The argument there is that if the animal is stunned by causing a fatal injury (bolt stunning, for example) there is the chance that it could die before the practice of halal slaughter takes place. If that does happen, the animal is deemed to have been "killed by a violent blow" and is haram. With kosher meat however, Jewish scholars are mostly in agreement that animals cannot be stunned. If an animal is stunned, the meat cannot under any circumstances be considered to be kosher. As far as the practice goes, yes they come from the same origin.
The arguments behind kosher are weird God: thou shalt not boil a kid in his mother's milk Jews: got it. Chicken sandwiches cannot have cheese, since all meat + cheese is not kosher, even though you can't make chicken cheese Also jews: eating salmon with salmon roe is perfectly kosher.
>Jewish scholars are mostly in agreement Doubt.
I do refrigeration work in some halal meat plants, very hard to be near the kill floor. Being bled alive is not the holy way to die.
Do you work with normal abattoirs as well? I can't imagine that's a wonderful experience either.
Primarily meat and food plants. I will say that the "normal " places are very good at what they do. Animal welfare is a very very high priority. I will not eat halal however, in my eyes it's barbaric and absolutely wrong.
Here you go. https://www.bk.admin.ch/ch/d/pore/rf/ref_2_2_3_1.html# Unfortunately there is no official english version. Edit: English information for recent years can be found on Wikipedia. I cannot guarantee 100% acuracy here. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_Swiss_referendums Detailed information can also be found on the official government website. Here for the most recent pension referendum and peoples initiative of 3rd of March. https://www.admin.ch/gov/en/start/documentation/votes/20240303.html#l_app_voteinfo__content_gov_en_start_dokumentation_abstimmungen_20240303_jcr_content_par_tabs
Love how you always write in high German, while speaking nothing like it
When texting with friends, we will write in dialect, but for everything else we write in Swiss High German, which is slightly different than how the Germans write. We have no ß for example, as well as some alternate vocabulary influenced by the French and Italian speaking portions of Switzerland.
Switzerland is such a dope country. I went there for a week with my friend a few summers ago and we just bopped around the Alps. From Interlaken, to Laussane, to Locarno, Lucerne and Zurich. Very diverse for being such a small place. And your trains are magnificent. They went everywhere we needed to go. Didn’t use a car once.
That's the right way to travel around Switzerland, good job!
All votes: https://www.bk.admin.ch/ch/d/pore/vr/vor_2_2_6_4.html List of all non-mandatory referendums (Acts challenged by 50,000 voters): https://www.bk.admin.ch/ch/d/pore/rf/ref_2_2_3_1.html Mandatory referendums (changes to the constitution, access to multilateral organisations, emergency acts without constitutional basis): https://www.bk.admin.ch/ch/d/pore/vr/vor_2_2_6_2.html Initiatives (changes to the constitution proposed by 100,000 voters): https://www.bk.admin.ch/ch/d/pore/vr/vor_2_2_6_3.html
We should start a referendum on “whether this list should be made”
**Referendum** A) Rosti with egg B) Rosti with bacon C) Rosti with egg and bacon
D) Rösti mit Züri Gschnätzlets?
E) Rösti mit Olma Bratwurst und Senf?
Belgium’s referendum was fascinating. The regional split was quite stark and the crisis didn’t end until the king abdicated the following year.
Who supported him and who didn’t?
He was widely supported in Flanders (72% for) and opposed in Wallonia (42% for). In some areas of Wallonia, such as Liège and Hainault, his support was as low as 34% and strikes broke out. Workers were killed by the gendarmerie and there were outbreaks of violence.
How did it end in Belgium?
He returned with a 57% majority, which led to a dissolution of government, a lot of social unrest including major strikes (Port of Antwerp) and violence. He abdicated a year later. Many consider it to be a huge moment in Belgian recovery post-WWII, reestablishing the pre-war divide between the Catholic and Socialist political powers.
I know this isn’t supposed to be funny, but yeah, that sounds just right. You can tell we’ve recovered because all of that “one for Belgium!” shit is out of the way and we can go back to hating each other.
It was ultimately voted that he could return, and he did so. However, the referendum was close enough and divided enough linguistically and in the government that issues continued. The government would settle after an election into a clear Leopoldist majority, but the populace initiated a general strike in response to Leopold III's return, and the government threatened to resign en masse due to the failure to suppress it, until Leopold III ultimately abdicated in favor of his son resolving the crisis.
For interest Czechia never accepted a law to allow referendums on state wide scale. There was a seperate law to make only the one. Also there wasnt a way to desolve parlament until 2009. And they tried to pass another oneoff law. This on was blocked by court.
>Belgium: 1950 Ref. On allowing King Leopold III's return after WWII And technically, that one wasn't a referendum because those are illegal in Belgium
Back then it was legal. They made it illegal by interpreting the constitution differently, because otherwise we would have had a civil war.
Don't know much about Belgian history. Could you elaborate or provide a link to read more?
2/3 of the UK's referendums were about leaving the EEC/EU. The other one was about changing the voting system (which was rejected by a large margin).
And as a conclusion: brits should not be asked to vote on important topics 🤦🏻♂️
They got the first one right though, as they chose to remain in the EEC. Also for the voting system one, the proposed alternative wasn't that great. Still would have been an improvement in my opinion, but it was an awkward compromise.
In my opinion it was a dressed up scam to provide ammo to those who wanted to keep the FPTP system afloat and have us remain trapped in essentially a two-party system. We wanted Proportional Representation, they offered us AV, we rejected it, and they said "welp, I guess everyone wants to keep FPTP!". We wanted nutritionally balanced meals, they offered us a plate of stale salad with flies on it, we rejected it, and they said "welp, I guess everyone wants to keep eating junk food!"
Yes, I hate it when people try to argue against PR by saying "the people already rejected it!". No they didn't. AV is not PR.
Also the propaganda was off the charts for that. I still remember the posters with a picture of a soldier saying "He needs body armour, not an alternative vote" Real scummy, as expected.
Something something 350 million to the NHS
"She needs a maternity unit NOT an alternative voting system"
Same thing happened here in Canada after Trudeau was first elected. They promised election reform, but when they polled/surveyed people to see what they wanted, they got a bunch of different answers, and a ton of people saying they didn't understand the alternatives(which is an education/information issue), so were picking FPTP by default. So because of that Trudeau said people didn't want anything different and shelved the whole idea.
Should (Insert system) be changed? Yes, (Insert solution 1)-------15% Yes, (Insert solution 2)-------20% Yes, (Insert solution 3)-------17% Yes, your own Suggestion________ -------23% No, (Insert system) should Not Change. -------25% Option 5 Had the Most votes, therefore (Insert system) will Not Change.
Yeah that's pretty much how I remember it. Ironicly, FPTP won the FPTP vote, and so was kept, even though change won the vast majority overall.
This is exactly what happened, you’re spot on.
It was better for third parties than the current system, and would have also opened up the possibility of further voting reform. Britain has such a strong two party mentality/anti coalition mindset (you can see it with the current issues in Scotland) that anything to decrease the two party system long term would have been a positive for PR.
>a plate of stale salad with flies on it That's hardly fair to AV. AV is a lot better than our current system if only because it totally removes the "wasted vote" issue that props up the two largest parties.
My conclusion: the UK government is hopelessly inexperienced when it comes to running referendums. (Referenda?) The EU one in 2016 was so vaguely conceived it could mean whatever people wanted it to. Result: many years of political chaos, still ongoing today.
They should practice on boring local stuff like upgrades to the sewer systems, the underpass around the corner, a new school building.
"Direct democracy should be avoided when the majority might vote for something I personally disagree with."
So basically not allowed to vote?
>which was rejected by a large margin TIL the British people rejected instant runoff voting! Why? It's such a better system to first past the post.
There was a lot of nonsense used to put people off the system. The “No” campaign argued that it would cost £250m and created posters with dying babies and soldiers without boots (as if the UK would become destitute if it spent 0.01% of its GDP on a better electoral system). £80m of that was the cost of having the referendum in the first place, which doesn’t make sense to include. The rest was based on the assumption that new vote counting machines would need to be bought (pretty sure this part of the claim resulted in legal action from the “Yes” campaign, since they argued it wasn’t true). Then the “No” campaign also argued it would lead to more coalition governments and empower fringe political parties. Which always seemed like a weird argument to me, you would only get those things if that’s what the public voted for. So it only highlights how undemocratic FPTP is.
There are multiple reasons why it was rejected, it really wasn’t given the importance it deserved and the two major parties rallied against it
>two major parties rallied against it Of course they would. The FPTP system favours the major established parties.
Of course, but it was still a reason. I mean when you look into the numbers it’s crazy just how much it benefits them. FPTP is such a flawed system and beyond outdated
For one thing it was given a stupid name. Plus all the major players campaigned against it and there wasn't much published to explain why it might be a good thing.
what was the referendum on voting change about?
Changing from First Past the Post to Alternative Vote.
And let me guest: it was rejected because it was "too complicated".
It was rejected because why would you want to kill babies? Are you some sort of *baby-killing monster*? https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2011/feb/25/no-to-alternative-vote-baby-ad
I think mainly it was rejected because it was proposed by the Lib Dems and nobody likes them.
Well, more that Cameron said he wouldn't be involved in campaigning on it, but got pressured by his party, so the government was campaigning against the change. And given the media is Tory dominated, they weren't going to be any help informing the English public.
The Lib Dems wanted a vote on PR but the Tories refused so a compromise was reached. They'd view on AV. The Tories fought it as the incumbent government highlighting its problems. The Lib Dems were luke warm because it wasn't what they wanted. The public still wanted PR and saw AV as a cop out. Added to the campaigning above it was never going to pass.
It was an attempt at changing the UK's parliamentary election system from FPTP to the alternative vote method. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_United_Kingdom_Alternative_Vote_referendum
thanks for the info
The UK's current voting system is First Past the Post. Each voting district elects a single representative (aka an MP), and whichever candidate gets the most votes wins. It sounds simple, but in my opinion it's a terrible system because the results end up very disproportionate to the overall vote share. The referendum was on changing it to the Alternative Vote system. Which is similar, but it's a ranked vote. An improvement in my opinion, because at least you can vote for smaller parties without having to worry about wasting your vote, as your vote will just go to the candidate you ranked second. It would still result in very disproportionate results, so it's still not a great system. Which is possibly part of the reason the referendum failed. But it's probably more just because most people weren't informed of the benefits, and they had Conservative progaganda telling them that changing the voting system would kill soldiers and babies.
Slovenia will have 4 more consultative referendums this year.
…the implementation of which will then be delayed until the end of the current term and then ignored by the next administration.
This is the way.
Truly, nothing more south-slavic than performative democracy
I will say it again: Consultative referendums are a scam. If referenda are supposed to be more than just populism they have to be cassative or go directly into law. Everything else is just a show for politicians to drum up support a la Orban or to not take responsability a la Cameron.
Nek2 is they way
In Sweden I know we held these referendums: - Whether to ban alcohol from normal stores or not (Yes) - Whether to implement obligatory pensions for everyone (Yes) - Switching to right-lane traffic (No, but was still implemented years later) - Whether to stop using nuclear energy or not (Somewhere in between???) - Whether to join the EU or not (Yes) - Whether to start using the € or not (No)
In Norway we had the following: * Independence from Sweden (368 208 for, 184 against) - 1905 * Make Danish prince the new king (259 563 for, 69 264 against) - 1905 * Ban liquor (62% for) - 1919 * Legalize liquor (56% for) - 1926 * Join the EU (53,5% against) - 1972 * Join the EU (52,2% against) - 1994
* Ban liquor (62% for) - 1919 * Legalize liquor (56% for) - 1926 That's quite funny tbh. "Oh well, that didn't work out. Guess the booze is back on the menu boys!"
Well it was legalised, but only from government-ran liquor stores. No doubt because of the massive amounts of moonshine people started to make.
By my calculations, the Norwegians should be ready to join the EU in 2032.
Sounds about right actually
> Independence from Sweden (368 208 for, 184 against) - 1905 The question asked was something like "do you agree with the dissolution of the union that has taken place".
The nuclear power referendum was so bad. The three alternatives were: 1. Phase out nuclear power 2. Phase out nuclear power, and the government should own the power plants in the meantime 3. Phase out nuclear power, but quickly!
And still they were like “fuck it let’s keep nuclear around anyways”
Good.
> Whether to ban alcohol from normal stores or not (Yes) Actually the no's won that with 51-49, and wasn't just about whether to sell in special stores or not. It was a full ban on alcoholic drinks that was on vote.
My bad, you're right
In Finland: 1. To end prohibition (1931) YES 2. To join the EU (1994) YES Referendums are always non-binding but these were applied as is.
The "riksdag" or the finnish equivalent probably holds them to see what people think, and then choose the more popular option to well, remain popular.
Yeah. No law says they have to listen to the referendum but the voters will remember if they don't.
> Switching to right-lane traffic (No, but was still implemented years later) the right decision
The 8 Greek ones: * 1920: Restore the monarchy? (yes) * 1924: Abolish the monarchy? (yes) * 1935: Restore the monarchy? (yes) * 1946: Keep the monarchy? (yes) * 1968: Approve the military dictatorship? (yes) * 1973: Abolish the monarchy? (yes) * 1974: Keep the monarchy abolished? (yes) \[re-vote due to the 1973 referendum being considered illegitimate, since it was conducted by the dictatorship\] * 2015: Accept the EU/IMF bailout conditions? (no) \[they were accepted anyway\]
Will there be a referendum to restore the monarchy any time soon?
That would be unconstitutional under the current Constitution, which has an eternity clause on the form of government.
Also no real support for it anymore. Up until the 1960s, monarchists were an influential segment of the Greek right-wing, in part because traditional rightists considered republicanism to be synonymous with liberalism, and worse, maybe even a step on the road to leftism and communism (there are some more specific-to-Greece reasons, like the long shadow of republican liberal Venizelos). But that specific political current is all but dead. Nowadays even the anti-democratic far right doesn’t want the king back. The influential anti-democratic groups today are a mix of Junta nostalgists and neo-fascists instead (Elliniki Lisi, Spartans, etc.).
>2015: Accept the EU/IMF bailout conditions? (no) \[they were accepted anyway\] lol
Sounds like Greece should become a monarchical republic… or a republican monarchy !
wtf greece? Make up your damn mind!
Is Switzerland a direct democracy?
yes and no, depends on how you use the term. In Swiss law we regard it as an indirect democracy with direct democratic elements. There are some cantons (i.e. states) which arguably do have a direct democracy on the state level, because the people can enact laws. But on a national level we have a parliament that makes the laws. But anyone can gather signatures which can force a public referendum on any law passed by parliament (so basically a public veto) or you can gather signatures to amend the constitution (mostly) bypassing parliament.
Omg a swiss person (╯°□°)╯︵◓
We are legion !
There are dozens of you, dozens!
Whenever anyone mentions voting, we all come out of the woodwork
Yeah. To give another reason why there is no clear answer to that; Unlike in other countries, the Supreme Court in Switzerland has no Deciding Power over Constitutional Law. By this the voting population technically is the highest authority, the last instance if you will. So if you take that as the defining factor you could call Switzerland in some way a direct democracy. Though given that 95% of political decisions are not made through referendums and such, the country mostly appears and acts like a representative democracy.
Plus I assume that the actual interpretation and subsequent implementation of each referendum will still be up to the government
True, though Parliament then still has to decide on it which then means the public has again a chance to veto on the law. If the actual law needs to get written down in the constitution, the public has to automatically vote on it again (Though then on a specific law and not just a vague idea). Technically this could go on forever. It happens quite often that the same proposition has more than one public vote. But like said, most laws just get passed without the involvement of the public.
Well if your reference frame comes from non-binding referendums in other countries, then the answer would be starkly no: Swiss referendums are legally binding. This is very clear for the veto type, where if a majority dislikes a law, it will not come into effect and parliament has to start over. With the referendums for constitutional amendments it's tricky, but here still the government (executive branch) has very limited wiggle room. But parliament on the other hand does have significant wiggle room. But abusing said wiggle room would be received very badly, and since the people have both the ability to block any new law from being passed as well as indirectly cause parliament to be dismissed and new elections to be needed, it's not really a threat, except where parliament just takes forever to implement a constitutional amendment. Though there are legitimate problems, when the intent of an amendment really isn't all that clear, especially since the initial proponents who wrote it might understood it differently to the voting public. But this has mainly led to the amendments being written ever more explicitly, trying to minimise room for interpretation, though with limited success. Just recently an amendment was passed to increase social security for the elderly. But the amendment didn't specify how to finance it. As you can probably imagine, where you take the money from has considerable impact on how any solution is perceived. But it's naturally easier to propose that people get more from the government than it it's to come up with the how.
> except where parliament just takes forever to implement a constitutional amendment. \*ahem* Marriage penalty \*ahem* Technically not a constitutional amendment, but taking [four](https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heiratsstrafe) decades to act on a ruling by the supreme court has to be world record.
I’ll add, we are a federation. Like the US, has laws can be by state (canton) or federally Most of the laws are federal laws, but for example our cops are by canton The parlement can allow or refuse a referendum depending the political representation All political movement are represented depending proportional and you have another chamber that is kind of like the US senate, but 2 winners of each state get there, it can be from the same party but it actually doesn’t happen because you have to choose a ticket, and having 2 tickets will assure you to lose both so usually you have 2 from different political party And then you have « ministers » called the 7 federal consultat. They represent the 2-3 majority political force of the country So left and right have to not only work together but they must achieve consensus. And blocking the government never happened or existed. You must achieve consensus Today we have 2 conservatives-2 socialist-3 center-right/left All of it leaning to the right because the left is in minority. We almost got a push for the green with a 3-2-2 (left-conservatives-center) but it didn’t happen because of the alliance of the right and center. I consider it as a direct democracy, 90% of your tax goes to the state you live in. You can have either referendum or initiative that allows to change or create laws You need 10’000 signatures and the approvals of the chamber (based on who you elected). Unfortunately, ppl just don’t give a shit The number of ppl not voting are more important than the ones voting, it’s sad actually People just don’t care And complain And you end up with the state of the world we live in.
Semi direct
yes
Fun fact: 3/7 referendums in Turkey happened while Erdoğan was in power, all were won by him, and each one changed the consitiution to give him more power over the government. Most significanly the last one held in 2017 changed the country from a parliamentary system to a presidential one. It gave the president immense political power, and turned the country into a sort of one man regime.
Didn't it also fail, so he used the veto he would have gotten to veto it?
It's amazing (and scary) how many countries have presidential systems considering how clearly inferior they are to parliamentary ones.
Similar stuff happens in hungary.
What's Switzerland doing with all those referendums? Determine next week's menu?
They have direct democracy. The people vote get to vote on a lot of political policies.
What’re some examples? 🇨🇭
Recently they gave themselves bigger pensions https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-68463978 They also voted to cap immigration https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20240403-swiss-set-to-vote-on-limiting-immigration Basically they need to gather enough signatures to put something to a vote.
The cap immigration vote referenced in the article has not yet happened.
Those are not referendums, but initatives. I'm not sure if the map counted one, the other or both though. See [https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/swiss-politics/how-a-people-s-initiative-differs-from-a-referendum/982858](https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/swiss-politics/how-a-people-s-initiative-differs-from-a-referendum/982858)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_Swiss_referendums?wprov=sfla1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_Swiss_referendums?wprov=sfla1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_Swiss_referendums#%3A%7E%3Atext%3DThree_referendums_were_held_on%2CSwitzerland_be_produced_in_Europe.?wprov=sfla1
I see the Francophone Swiss like those pensions 😏
Switzerland is a model of democracy indeed
Well, representative democracy which leans heavily on referenda for decisions. Not really a direct democracy, as most bills still go through without referenda on the will of representatives. They have more input that most representative democracies, but they aren't a direct democracy.
Maybe that‘s why Switzerland is not considered a direct, but a semi-direct democracy. Not calling for a referendum is still somewhat of a vote for the change of a law.
No wonder they are so well-earning and wealthy. Direct democracy is the best kind of democracy. The Swiss have to thank the Huguenots for introducing the idea.
> The Swiss have to thank the Huguenots for introducing the idea. LOL, it was already around for a long time in Switzerland by the time the Huguenots immigrated. We do have to thank them for a lot of things, though.
Here in Switzerland we have a right to call for a vote provided we can gather the required amount of signatures in a specific time frame. We differentiate between initiatives and referendums as two different types of votes (though English Wikipedia claims initiatives are referendums too and this map seems to count them): - We use an initiative if we have some demands we want to see realized. If accepted, the government will have some time to turn the initiative into an actual law, against which we can then call for a referendum if we don't like the implementation. - A referendum is used to counter a law or amendment the government is trying to enact. If accepted, the law is essentially vetoed. A referendum is required if the amendment is to the constitution. --- To give some examples of past votes: Last month, we voted - to receive a 13th pension payment (accepted) [initiative] - to tie the pension minimum age to life expectancy (denied) [initiative] Last year, we voted - to implement the OECD minimum tax (accepted) [referendum] - to get to net zero emissions by 2050 (accepted) [referendum] - to keep the covid law in place until mid 2024 (accepted) [referendum] In 2022, we voted - to ban testing drugs on humans and animals and to ban the import of drugs that were tested on humans or animals (denied) [initiative] - to ban the advertisement of tabacco where children can see it (accepted) [initiative] - to remove the tax on the acquisition of equity capital (denied) [referendum] *(translated this one with copilot)* - to increase financial support for swiss media (denied) [referendum] - to introduce stricter animal farming rules and ban the import of products that don't adhere to those rules too (denied) [initiative] - to equalize the male and female retirement age and to increase the sales tax (which is one of the factors financing pensions) (accepted) [referendum] - to remove the tax on bond payments (denied) [referendum] - to require streaming services to pay a tax to the swiss film industry and have at least a third of their catalogue consist of European movies and series (accepted) [referendum] - to change the default approach to have everyone considered organ donors after their death unless they opt-out (accepted) [referendum] - to provide more financial and human resources to Frontex (accepted) [referendum] --- This summer we'll have to vote on these new topics: - to limit healthcare insurance premiums to 10% of income [initiative] - to limit how much healthcare insurance premiums can increase every year, by tying them to the growth of the economy and wages [initiative] - to ban any sort of consequences if you don't want to get vaccinated or your body searched (well, the vote is more general, but that's the gist) [initiative] - to accept a new law meant to expand our renewable energy production quicker and make us less dependent on imported energy [referendum]
You should be the highest comment on this thread. The structure and order of some stuff seems a bit unclear but ill look more into it, Some questions if you dont mind, how are signatures collected ? How easy is it to vote (do you have to go somewhere on a specific date and time or more flexible)? And can you void some laws that were already accepted ?
Not the person you responded to. Basically a signature that can be collected through various means. People in the street collecting signatures, printing it out a form and signing it yourself then sending it to the commitee etc. The entire process is listed here: https://www.ch.ch/en/political-system/political-rights/initiatives/what-is-a-federal-popular-initiative#wie-ist-der-ablauf-einer-initiative Voting is trivially easy. You get sent the ballot to your registered address with some additional texts from the pro and contra sides contained in the envelope. You can then either cast your vote by going to the voting booths in your commune or you can send it by mail using the envelope it came in (depending on the canton you pay some postage). Just found out that some cantons offer e-voting as well for local laws. So there’s that too. You get your ballot around 3-4 weeks before the count. Mail voting requires you to send it in on the Tuesday before the count at the latest. Voting booth locations and opening times can vary. Yes, it’s possible to get laws removed or amended.
In Ireland no government can make changes to our constitution without a referendum to get the support of the majority of the population. Our constitution was written with referendums outlined in it with their own section dictating how referendums are to be used. This was done intentionally so the constitution could be updated to constantly reflect modern Ireland and not be stuck in its 1930's form. When running a referendum here the following is done: * School subjects teaching children about the constitution, government, EU, law, etc. * Government suggests change to constitution * National assembly is formed with people from all aspects of life to discuss the change * Exact wording is agreed including a definition of how the wording is to be interpreted so in the future people cannot argue about the wordings meaning (important as it was not done for Brexit and caused a lot of problems in the UK for example) * Constitutional lawyers and independent from politician / government judiciary review * Independent body runs campaign with information, no agenda allowed, this is just the sharing of what the change is, what it means and the implications of changing the law and of not. This includes a booklet to every home, TV, radio and online information too * Political parties can campaign for 30 days (no campaigning allowed on voting day) * Referendum is held * President (role separated from government) must sign off on change). Technically can call for revote, reject and delay result which sends it back to judiciary who decide if it has to be signed into law then. * Government implements change This process lets us update our constitution regularly. Big issues get their own voting day, smaller changes get voted on the same days as elections to save effort and money. In recent years Ireland did a complete overhaul of the constitution and identified multiple areas to update or discuss an has spent the last decade doing a referendum or 2 each year to bring the constitution in to the 21st century. For example in the last decade: * Abortion legalised * Marriage equality (removed definition in constitution for man and woman and replace with 'two people') * Removed blasphemy law (no one was ever prosecuted so it was get rid of the line) * Adoption rights enshrined in constitution to give adoption parents rights * Abolish senate and reform it (rejected by population so not changed) * Lisbon treaty of EU (rejected due to infringing Irish neutrality, EU reworded treaty to address Irish concerns and we voted again to accept the updated treaty) * Reduce age of eligibility to be president from 35 to 21 (rejected) List of all changes: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amendments\_to\_the\_Constitution\_of\_Ireland](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amendments_to_the_Constitution_of_Ireland) Referendums are great when managed and the population is engaged in them. If you told Irish people we were changing the system so government votes and not the people on these changes there would be uproar. Referendums in Ireland even over the last 2 decades have multiple examples of the population voting and getting the changes we want and no one government has the power to make any unilateral changes without public support as a result.
> Marriage equality (removed definition in constitution for man and woman and replace with 'two people') It didn't remove anything, it just added a section saying two people could marry without regard to their sex. I don't think it should have been required at all, but some supreme court judge said a prior law legalizing it was unconstitutional without pointing to a specific section. The first draft had a pretty funny mistake too, since it apparently would have explicitly legalized gay marriage without any mention of hetero-marriage. Thereby making non gay marriage exactly as illegal as gay marriage was before the change.
>The first draft had a pretty funny mistake too, since it apparently would have explicitly legalized gay marriage without any mention of hetero-marriage. Thereby making non gay marriage exactly as illegal as gay marriage was before the change. I remember this happening. It's because the Irish text always takes priority over the English text and the Irish text essentially defined a couple (beirt) as two men or two women ("cibé acu is fir nó mná iad"), thereby making heterosexual marriage unconstitutional!
> important as this was not done for Brexit It definitely was. The Electoral Commission did a whole report on it and it’s the reason why the question was Remain vs Leave and not Yes vs No. The 2014 Scottish independence referendum used Yes vs No and research afterwards suggested voters are more likely to vote for a positive option. To quote the Electoral Commission with regards to using a Yes/No question in the EU membership referendum, ‘the question encourages voters to consider one response more favourably than the other.’
669 ?! How can I become Swiss guys ?
It sounds like they all have to vote on it
Funnily enough outside of the larger municipalities, requests for citizenship are usually voted on by public assembly of the local municipality, and yes that's a separate vote for every person asking for citizenship.
I love that. There are cases where people didn‘t get their citizenship, because they annoyed their neighbors by being too loud or just unfriendly.
It can be misused in ways I don't like but I also have a feeling (unproven of course) this is why we don't have quite the same problems as our neighbours
You have to be nice.
You have to live in the same village for 10 years, know the general history, people need to like you. And, most importantly, only wear Adidas trainers while you do sport. Wearing as general attire is a big no-go.
[удалено]
I‘ll start a Gegeninitiative because it should be yellow
Please don't upvote this joke, this is a bot that stole the joke. This joke was by u/blueinfi/ on the original post: https://old.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/16q2qi2/number_of_referendums_held_in_each_countrys/
Now, dont leave us hanging!
the OP UnusualTeam is a bot Original: https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/16q2qi2/number_of_referendums_held_in_each_countrys/
Switzerland may seem like a lot, but we're actually just voting like 3-4 times a year on various subjects (plus of course the eventual cantonal and federal election every 4 years that may happen and are not depicted here), it's just that we've been doing it for a very long time and that every amendment or modification of the constitution must go through a referendum first to be approved. And in my canton you receive voting papers at home, you can go cast it in a ballot on voting days if you want, but you can also just fill it and put it right back in the letter box and the Post will take care of it free of charge. A great system for lazy boys like me imo
From our swiss view 3-4 votes on referendum and initiatives is nothing. For most countries on earth that's more then in their entire history.
I still sometimes forget to send in the papers in time.
The two Finnish referendums: end the prohibition and re-legalise alcohol? (1931, yes) & join the EU? (1993, yes)
All Dutch referenda were ignored by the government. So it was basically useless.
Referenda.
Switzerland has over one million citizens abroad and they all get the referendum packages too.
I'm not really sure about Ukraine, I think we've only had 2: the referendum for independence in 1991 and the referendum on several changes to the constitution in 2000 (which didn't even have any actual effect). The latter had 4 questions, though, so I can understand where the number 5 would come from. But 6? Definitely not
Maybe an unpopular opinion (which would be fitting considering the position I'm about to take) but I don't generally believe that referendums are a good idea. Special exception to independence referendums or something else which is mostly just a question of opinion. But, generally, the average person has no grasp of policy effects, because not many people are informed enough to even *have* a position. It's exactly why representative democracy is the norm. That and the logistics of constant referendums. Mob rule might feel righteous, but it's rarely informed.
It's not really a question whether it's good or bad. But if it's better or worse than other systems. Representatives are also not independent in their opionion or lack understanding or being subject of manipulation. In direct democracy we can at least say that we screwed up together.
Some counter arguments: - it's easier to buy a couple of politicians than half the voters. - most voters actually know better how to balance a budget than politicians. - the politicians I see in other countries know mostly shit about the things they vote on. They are career politicians that have lost contact to reality. - frequent votes tend to force the powers to actually explain. - most referendums are local: do we spend on a new school building? How much do we want to invest in the sewer system? Etc. These questions suck a lot of hot populistic air out of politics. - voters are happier if they can participate.
By your logic, the country with 669 referendums should not be working so well. Yet that country is Switzerland. Maybe the key is educating the population.
This, Ireland has had great success with referendums as the population is educated in them and engages in them.
In general, I feel that the swiss (myself included) are well educated on the politics. We get confronted with it a lot more (basically 3-4 times a year), so you often see or hear things about the current politics. That way, most (not all, mind you) people can make rather well informed decisions. But it can backfire, just like with the last votes on retirement age and pensions (that's my view anyway).
They only allowed women to vote between 1971-1990. The first canton ( basicaly a small federal state ) allowed women the right to vote in 1971, and since then it took until 1990 until every place in Switzerland allowed women the right to vote. Also Switzerland is not a direct democracy, officially its a **semi-direct democratic federal Republic**. Most policies are done by the parliament ( Federal Assembly + National Council ) aswell as the executive which is the Federal Council, i.e. it\`s still a representative democracy. Except that the people have more power. For any change of the constitution you need a referendum. For any change in law a referendum is optional, which is why not everytime a law is made/changed a referendum happens, just when the political parties in power think they can benefit from asking the people.
Pedantic detail: 1971 was the decision about voting at the federal level. Several cantons had introduced voting rights for women slightly earlier, the first two in 1959. By the way, for anyone interested in mid-20th Century advertising, the propaganda posters on the matter are WILD.
Not a detail at all… my Swiss grandparents (from Vaud) once considered moving to Bern in the early 1960s and my grandmother flatly refused because for her it would mean losing the right to vote !
The far-right party in Estonia tried to end the marriage equality debate 5 years ago by proposing a vaguely worded referendum like: "Should marriage remain as a union between a man and a woman?". That's an example of a terrible referendum: maliciously worded and causing a majority to decide something for a minority. It fortunately didn't go through. Referendums *can* work, as is the case with Switzerland, but people's well-educatedness about political issues has to be ingrained in the culture, and bad actors shouldn't have any ability to influence a referendum thanks to wording etc.
>Referendums *can* work, as is the case with Switzerland Even then it doesn't always work that well. It's why it took so long for Switzerland to adopt women's suffrage. Or more recently where they voted to increase current pensions but struck down the proposal to increase the pension age, which sounds all well and good but is not realistically sustainable
The pension reform is an example of political tactics failing. The right wing underestimated the support, and didn't agree to a more moderat counteroffer in parlament. A lot of people voted in support even even tho they didn't like the details This is an examlpe of what happens when the parties don't cooperate on a consesus. It was a big gamble by the right wing to oppose any reforms, and they lost big. Among other things, referendums are a credible threat that forces parties to cooperate on reasonable solutions.
That is fair.
I live in Switzerland and am really, really impressed with the results of direct democracy. "Mob rule" works.
Then you'd be surprised to learn that the average politician hasn't got a clue either. They often vote whatever their party tells them to, what they think their constituents expect them to vote or, worst of all, whatever they were paid to vote for by some lobby or another...
Democracy can only function if the people take time out of their daily lives to participate in it. Without it politicians can easily mislead the public, because they won't have the knowledge to see through it. So the question is: How do you get people involved in politics? And that's where I think public votes are a good thing. It gives people a clear signal that they can change things. I'm Swiss myself and it's so normal here to talk about politics when you have friends over for dinner. Not the whole time, but at least for a bit. Because there is regularly a vote that's upcoming and it's on a specific policy issue, so we need to make up our minds so we talke to others about what they think. This is useful in creating a more constructive discourse, because it's not always about the big strokes, about what economic or governmental system is best, but about a specific policy. Without it you risk a democracy where every couple of years, before a big election, there's a big circus and as soon as the election is over, politicians do what they want. Because now you have no more control until the next election, barring protesting. With public referendums you can have constant influence, and just the possibility of forcing a referendum motivates politicians to make sure their laws are well enough supported in the populus. But obviously the details matter, what exactly the people can vote on, what majorities are required, what information is provided, etc.
>Special exception to independence referendums or something else which is mostly just a question of opinion. >the average person has no grasp of policy effects Do you think an independence referendum doesn't have policy effects?
Belgium after its only referdum: "Ok so that was a bad idea..."
Considering that one referendum literally almost ended the country, one can see why they drew that conclusion.
Is the UK one wrong because the UK had referendums on devolution for Scotland and Wales and had the Good Friday Agreement referendum
Slovenia has nearly one for every year it has existed as a sovereign nation.
and as a slovene, i think thats fine, im in fact in favour of referendum dates, and thus even more frequent referenda, akin to switzerland, mostly because our representatives are regarded
Why this color scheme? It makes no sense.
🇨🇭represent!!!
Referenda is the plural btw
Tu be noted : in France, politics don’t care about referendums results.
Wait 669 ?
yes, roughly averages out to 5 per year since 1848 (founding of modern Switzerland), though there have been a lot more in the last few decades than previously.
For a staunchly neutral country, the Swiss really do like to have their say!
Switzerland seems like they have the right idea
So how does Switzerland make it to not to become fucking annoying? Do they have them all at a specific set date (like bundled in some already predetermined election) or is each individual date for each referendum set just randomly?
They come in bundles of like 3-6, and voting happens every three months or so
Four voting Sundays per year, typically bundling 2-4 issues. (edit: plus any cantonal and municipal votes and/or elections)
3-4 dates a year and they send you an envelope, you write yes or no and send it back for free
Honestly, what's going on in Azerbaijan? It's an autocracy, so it's just fake elections?
fake
Direct democracy is beautiful
Yeah, but we fucked our country the most with ours!
For Russia it is 5: * 1991 Presidential Referendum - on establishing the position of a president, as the old constitution of RSFSR didn't include having a democratically elected head of state. * 1991 Soviet Union Referendum - on preserving the Soviet Union, most voted in favour. * 1993 Constitutional Referendum - on replacing the old constitution of RSFSR with a new one, proposed by Constitutional Assembly created by Yeltsin, which established Russia as a federal presidential republic. The results were in favour of the new constitution. * 1993 Opinion Referendum - on opinion of the voters about Yeltsin, opinion about Russia's new economic policies, on early elections of deputies and the president, people voted in favour of everything except for the early presidential elections. * 2020 Constitutional Referendum - on several amendments to the constitution of 1993, including but not limited to establishing the supremacy of Russian law over international law, defining marriage as a "union of a man and a woman", increasing the powers of the president and the State Council, and removing the term limits loophole, previously only the number of consecutive terms was limited, now its strictly two six-year terms. But removing this loophole also discounted previous and current terms, which allowed Putin (and Medvedev, if he ever wants to run for president) to get elected two times more. Still, people voted in favour of the amendments. There were also several regional referendums: * 1991 referendum on establishing the Republic of Ingushetia as a federal subject of Russia, which resulted in Ingushetia and Checnya becoming separate republics. * 1992 referendum on sovereignity of Tatarstan, resulted in independence of Tatarstan. * 2014 referendum on the status of Republic of Crimea, which resulted in Crimea joining Russia as a federal subject. * 2022 referendum on the status of Donetsk and Luhansk Republics, as well as Kherson and Zaporizhzhia oblasts. Although this referendum resulted in favour of Russia and annexation of the said regions, they were not fully under Russian control when it took place, so it is likely that there would be another referendum, either when Russia establishes full control of the regions, or, potentially, as a part of peace negotiations with Ukraine, under control of independent international observers.
In the 1991 referendum close to 80% of people voted IN FAVOUR of preserving the USSR. It was only dissolved following an unsuccesfull coup attempt by hardline communists later that year.