Radical Constitutional Change – A Case in Switzerland

The citizen assembly of the Swiss canton Glarus decided to radically reduce the historical number of communes from 25 to three. Studies show that the financial and economic consequences are surprisingly small. This paper analyzes the effects on citizens’ vote participation as an indicator of their political involvement. We empirically show that vote participation significantly dropped, also compared to neighboring cantons and the rest of Switzerland. This suggests that major constitutional changes tend to undermine the relationship between citizens and their state. This is more likely to occur if the changes are imposed from above, by the executive or legislature