Die Europäische Union schickt sich an, wichtige Entscheidungen für ihre Zukunft zu treffen. Der eingesetzte Konvent wird eine europäische Verfassung ausarbeiten, die Entscheidungsmechanismen der Union reformieren soll. Welche ökonomischen Aspekte sollten dabei Berücksichtigung finden? Nach...

This chapter applies a comparative approach to evaluate initiatives and referendums in the context of constitutional change. We analyze differences in the political process if citizens have access to instruments of direct democratic decision-making compared to a purely representative democratic...

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...