Direct democracy and its integrity. The Italian 2020 and the Turkey 2017 constitutional referendums

Abstract

What is the role of referendums in different regimes from authoritarian electoral democracies to democratic systems? In this article we use the Direct Democracy Integrity Index to analyse the Turkish (2017) and Italian (2020) referendums to understand if they can be seen as contributing to majoritarianism or to consensus democracy, depending on rules such as who can call a referendum and on the integrity of the referendum itself and considering the misuse of the instrument by the executive especially in the initial phase of the referendum. Turkey and Italy are used as a most different systems design: a modern autocracy and a consolidated democracy are actually similar in their extensive and frequent use of nationwide constitutional referendums. We conclude that the constitutional referendum in modern autocratic Turkey contributed to majoritarian developments and strengthened the president, while in democratic Italy the referendum also offered incentives for minorities and regions to express dissent. Integrity was more problematic in the pre-referendum phase.