A Democracy Or Just Another Ballotocracy?
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NATIONAL OBSERVER (Council for the National Interest, Melbourne), No. 76, Autumn 2008, pages 7-32. Web site: www.nationalobserver.net Australia — a democracy or just another ballotocracy? Joseph Poprzeczny Try to imagine Australia if its 1890s Clearly, it would have placed a huge colonial founding fathers had incor- brake upon the growth of central or porated into the federal constitution Canberra power since a third of all the following clause:1 federal members of parliament — not simply a prime minister and/or cabi- No Bill passed by both Houses of the net — could have triggered a nation- Federal Parliament shall be assented wide referendum on any bill enacted to by the Governor-General until after by a majority party in Parliament. a referendum, if a referendum shall be A referendum could also have been duly demanded before assent declared. triggered if any two state parliaments A referendum may be demanded in re- so resolved. And, last but not least, spect of any Bill passed by both Houses 20,000 voters could have brought on of the Federal Parliament at any time a referendum. within three calendar months after the passing thereof. And if any of these triggers were acti- vated, it would stop a bill from becom- A referendum may be demanded by — ing law until the referendum was held and the Australian people made the I. One-third of the total number of final decision democratically. members of either House of the Federal Parliament: or The existence of such a clause would have prevented politicians, or more II. Resolution of both Houses of any two correctly the handful constituting a local [State] Legislatures: or Cabinet, from having monopoly con- trol of the legislative process. That III. Twenty thousand persons entitled control would have been shared with to vote at the election of members to the states and with electors. serve in the National Assembly [Senate and House of Representatives]. Of course, the Australian Constitution 1. John M. Williams, The Australian Constitution: A Documentary History (Melbourne University Press, 2004), pp.126-7. 8 National Observer Autumn does not include such a clause, and democracy, referred to here as a bal- Cabinet does control the legislative lotocracy — rule by the few, with the process in Canberra, from the draft- many only permitted one vote over ing of bills and arranging debates on the life of any parliament — and a true them, to the final vote that turns bills democracy. into laws which all Australians must This article turns the spotlight back obey. But the Constitution may well onto those two periods in Australia’s have included such a clause because history when the country came so the clause is not a figment of the close to making “the electors them- imagination. It was in an 1891 draft selves … masters of the situation”. It constitution, and a variation was part discusses what happened and why, of Labor’s policy platform almost con- and, in so doing, casts new light on tinuously from 1900 up until 1963. how Australia has ended up with the Both the draft and the policy plank appearance of a democratic system of have effectively disappeared from his- government, but one that has fallen tory: they rarely if ever get any men- well short of the reality. tion in the history books; and most Australians, including academics, teachers and even politicians, honestly True democracy versus believe that the system of representa- ballotocracy tive democracy that we have here is the Both Australia and Switzerland are only form of democracy that exists. bicameral federations, so each has a The Swiss would disagree. Unlike lower and an upper legislative cham- Australians, they are constitutionally ber. In both countries, bills may be empowered to initiate referendums initiated in either chamber. In Aus- at every level of government — mu- tralia, however, once a bill has been nicipal, cantonal and national — and passed by both houses, it goes to the this is in addition to their right to Governor-General for royal assent, elect representatives every five years. after which it becomes law. In Swit- Put otherwise, the Swiss have not be- zerland, a bill that has been passed stowed monopoly power upon their by both houses lies dormant for 100 elected representatives to make laws. days during which time 50,000 voters Unlike Australians, they, the people, can trigger a referendum by signing a are the final arbiters of what shall or petition. shall not be the law of their land. Voters in both countries periodically If, in Australia, the 1891 draft clause elect representatives to parliament, had made it through the convention but the Swiss electorate’s right to process, or if Labor had honoured its call referendums means they have policy plank on those occasions when far more power than Australian vot- it held power, Australian voters might ers. They can continuously exercise a understand the very real difference power of veto over the legislative proc- between the representative form of ess through this rejective or faculta- 2008 Australia — a democracy or just another ballotocracy? 9 tive referendum process. Put another they work on will not be challenged at way, Swiss voters have at least double referendum. During the long consulta- the power of voters enfranchised in tion periods, those who are likely to be polities that are without citizen-initi- affected are brought into the process of ated referendums. Swiss voters can preparing the relevant bill. Being fully determine what will or will not be the informed means there is less likeli- law. Australian voters must accept hood of a bill being challenged. Even what their politicians decide will be so, 6 per cent must face the ultimate the law. test, that is, the people. But Swiss voters can also initiate By comparison, the Australian repre- changes to their national constitution, sentative, or indirect form of, democ- although this requires a petition with racy constitutionally excludes the peo- 100,000 signatures gathered over a ple from being the final adjudicators of period of not more than 18 months. bills, with one limited exception. And, In ballotocracies such as Australia interestingly, Switzerland was the the politicians’ monopoly power over inspiration for that exception, which the lawmaking process, including the applies to bills that seek to amend the power to trigger amendments to the national constitution. But the Austral- Constitution, operates unfettered by ian version gives politicians the power the people, the demos. to initiate all referendums to amend The Swiss form of democracy has been the constitution and limits the people’s variously described as direct democra- power to merely voting on the politi- cy, true democracy, or simply democ- cians’ proposals, that is the power of racy, since it is the people, the demos, veto, but not the power to initiate, who are the ultimate arbiters of what which the Swiss have. This legislative laws they will live under. Moreover, dominance of elected representatives such direct or true democracy applies over voters is what most people here not only at the national level, but also call democracy but it is more correctly in Switzerland’s 2,740 municipalities described as ballotocracy since voters and 26 cantons (states). — the demos — are excluded entirely from the legislative process. Under In practice, 94 per cent of all bills ballotocracy the people’s power is lim- passed by the Swiss national parlia- ited to only electing representatives. ment end up as laws without under- going the referendum process. Of the Voters in 24 American states also have remaining 6 per cent, about half are the right to initiate referendums. In rejected by the people. A key reason some cases, this includes the right to for those 94 per cent not being chal- initiate changes to the state constitu- lenged — that is, not having to go to tion. The impetus for initiative and referendum — is the fact that Swiss referendum (I&R) in America initially politicians feel compelled to consult came from the predominantly rural voters extensively and over long or farmer-based Populist movement periods so as to ensure that the bills of the early 1890s and its successor, 10 National Observer Autumn the urban-based Progressive Move- Kingston’s 1891 draft ment of the late 1890s to late-1910s. clause Most of the western American states had adopted I&R by 1918. A smaller The draft clause referred to above was number did not for a variety of local the work of South Australian-born reasons, including ongoing resistance Charles Cameron Kingston (1850- by politicians. 1908) who included it as part of a draft constitution for Australia that was In stark contrast, no Australian state printed in February 1891 by South Aus- succeeded in incorporating I&R into tralia’s government printer. Kingston, a its constitution despite several deter- lawyer and colonial politician who was mined efforts in the early 1900s by once described as “a radical democrat state Labor governments. and a man committed to the federation The main reason for the failures was of the colonies”3 , then took it to the first the opposition of virtually all con- constitutional convention in Sydney, servative-oriented Australian national held in March and April 1891, where and state politicians who preferred a he represented South Australia. representative or limited form of de- The Sydney convention’s official record mocracy, something with which the shows that Switzerland was referred Labor Party now concurs. to about a dozen times by various By the early 1920s, the impetus went delegates, as was the question of in- out of this debate as more and more cluding referendums, but there was Labor politicians lost interest in trans- no reference to I&R, and the draft forming their states from ballotocra- constitution that emerged contained cies into direct or true democracies.