Publication

This paper examines whether the possibility of referendums leads to policies more closely reflecting the voters' wishes using a comparative analysis at the national level. For several policies in the domain of labor regulation, the authors show that the presence of institutions allowing for referendums reduces the difference between policy outcomes and the voters' wishes as assessed in surveys. Due to the adoption of new constitutions in Eastern and Central Europe containing numerous provisions allowing for referendums, cross-national comparative work on the policy effects of referendums across the European continent have become possible. This allows researchers to close an important gap in the literature on referendums, namely to assess the consequences of these institutions at the national level.