Influencing politics with signatures? Models and experiences of local citizens’ initiative Pau Alarcón (UPF) Patricia García-Espín (UPO) Yanina Welp (UZH) Joan Font (IESA) Influencing politics with signatures? Models and experiences of local citizens’ initiative Report Octubre de 2018 Index 1. Introduction 3 2. What is the initiative: typology and potential uses 5 2 1 Types of initiative 5 2 2 What are its uses? 8 2 2 1 Political trust 9 2 2 2 Electoral and non-electoral mobilisation 9 2 2 3 Resources and costs 11 2 2 4 Interest groups 12 2 2 5 Direct and representative democratic processes 13 2 2 6 Political debate and deliberation 14 2 2 7 Control and accountability 15 2 2 8 Governability 16 2 2 9 Quality of decisions 17 3. Origins and expansion 19 3 1 Where: mapping the initiatives 20 3 1 1 General overview 24 3 1 2 Legislative initiatives 25 3 1 3 The agenda initiative 28 3 1 4 The abrogative initiative 31 3 1 5 The recall initiative 31 4. Analysis of the initiatives 35 4 1 Based on what: regulation 35 4 2 Who: the initiating subject 36 4 3 What: the object of the initiative 37 4 4 How it is presented: formulation 40 4 5 How initiatives are processed: procedure and signatures 42 4 6 Why: consequences 47 5. Reference sheets: Examples of initiatives 51 5 1 List of information sheets 51 6. Conclusions 105 Annex: List of consulted experts 109 References 110 Index of tables Table 1 Types of initiatives according to their goal and mandatory nature in the mobilisation of the referendum 6 Table 2 Presence of legislation and/or experiences of different types of initiative at the local, regional and national level 21 Table 3 Examples of legislative initiatives at the local level 26 Table 4 Examples of agenda initiatives at the local level 30 Table 5 Examples of local recall initiatives 33 2 1. Introduction1 More than half of Europeans and almost 40% of people living in Spain have recently signed some sort of petition (Quaranta, 2015) In other words, they have attempted to change a certain aspect of reality, using their signature This kind of participation is one of the most common and widespread after voting In the USA, for example, national polls show that signing a petition is 4 to 5 times more frequent than participating in a demonstration (Durso et al , 2018) Despite most of these initiatives corresponding to non-regulated actuations, otherwise referred to as bottom-up participations, many public institutions have tried to enable regulated mechanisms which allow an organised process of collecting signatures, as a way of influencing public decision-making. The subject of this report is to study the participatory tools which enable citizens to initiate a process of collecting signatures in order to influence local institutions. These ini- tiatives have several aims: to promote a debate in the Chamber of local representatives, for example, or to to call a referendum regarding a political proposal, or perhaps the removal of a public officer. Here we have presented two reasons which help explain why they can be regarded as a desirable method of participation Firstly, it could be said that there is not a large amount of effort required from the participants This facilitates not only a high number of participants, but also a reduction in the social bias found in other forms of participation, which involve very specific sections of the population. Secondly, it may generate a process with a strong capacity for political impact With this study we aim to contribute to the knowledge and reflect upon these partic- ipatory tools which have not been fully studied at local level, despite their growing presence in very diverse areas of the world It will assess a combination of institutional tools that, if well designed, can open new channels to social involvement In order to analyse their use and potential difficulties, we are going to examine how these tools of initiative operate in a multitude of geographical and administrative contexts We are going to pay particular attention to issues such as thematic scope, regulation, validity requirements and their relationship with the decision-making process To achieve this, we are using two principal means. The first and most important is the analysis of 21 cases which illustrate different models, and their strengths and weaknesses Using our selection criteria, we have attempted to cover a diverse overview of situations and regulations from all points of view (diversity of objects, of geographical and cultural areas, of more successful and less successful cases) It is worth noting that the availability of accessible information has un- doubtedly favoured the predomination of experiences in English and Spanish speaking areas Experiences at local level have been prioritised, but two particularly illustrative supralocal cases have also been included For each of these cases a reference sheet has been designed, each with a similar format, based on all the primary and secondary information that we have been able to find (the sources are detailed in each reference sheet in section 5) Additionally, we have conducted 20 online interviews with experts (see table A1 in the Annex) regarding the subject (12 men and 8 women, 12 Europeans and 8 from other conti- nents, 15 people from university institutions and 5 from other research centres or founda- tions) They have provided very relevant information, both about the existence of these tools 3 and their most interesting experiences with them They also provide information about the documentation and their specific opinions regarding some of the experiences. We want to thank them greatly for their valuable contribution to this study The report is structured into four parts After the introduction, the second section defines the object of study and details previous debates about its scope and limitations. In other words, primarily we establish the definition and scope of several types of initiatives and then we examine their different potential effects (both positive and negative), according to previous research in the topic In section 3 we look at the origins of citizens’ initiatives and their current presence in different geographical contexts Section 4 analyses our empirical evidence, through a comparative and transversal reading of the 21 studied cases, together with a literary review of citizens’ initiatives In this section, we analyse the main character- istics of each of the initiatives: how they are regulated, who can initiate them, which issues can be addressed (and which cannot), what are the established procedures to allow them to operate, the number of signatures required and, finally, their influence in decision-making. The analysis performed in each of these sections can be consulted in the reference sheets which better illustrate the ideas presented The large section at the end includes the 21 corresponding reference sheets covering the initiatives that have been analysed during the report The study ends with our conclusions and the bibliography where further information about the issue can be found 4 2. What is the initiative: typology and potential uses In this section we define our object of study, the different types of citizens’ initiatives. Following this, we introduce a debate to discuss the expectations and concerns that these tools generate in the context of increasing citizen disaffection with representative institu- tions 2.1. Types of initiative To explain what we mean when addressing the different initiatives of citizen partic- ipation is not an easy task, given the multitude of existing versions and terms, both in the regulatory and academic fields. If we focus more broadly on the mechanisms of direct de- mocracy, these constitute a set of procedures that allow citizens to make direct political decisions through voting, far beyond regular elections This voting can be determined by law, being made compulsory, it can be promoted by public authorities (known as a top-down process) or it can depend on the collection of signatures (bottom-up) (Ruth et al , 2017) In this work we focus on the latter method, where the citizen is the actor who initiates the process, and we include both the mechanisms that lead to voting and those that allow the presentation of collective proposals upon which parliament or deliberative councils decide Therefore, our object of study includes all the mechanisms which allow citizens to initiate a process of collecting signatures in order to influence, either in a binding way or as proposals, the decision-making or public representation processes, paying special attention to local level This collection of signatures may have various objectives: 1 To push forward a regulatory proposal (bylaw, constitutional change or law) that fulfils the procedural requirements and leads to a referendum being held over the issue (legislative initiative) 2 To push forward a public policy proposal to be considered by the correspond- ing representative bodies, who have the power to decide whether to apply it, put it to a vote, or reject it (agenda initiative) 3 To push forward a referendum proposal regarding a matter of public inter- est, where the corresponding authority can decide to carry it out or not (referendum initiative) 4. To respond to a policy or specific legislative proposal from the public author- ities, promoting a referendum for its approval or rejection (abrogative referendum) 5 To push forward a referendum in order to decide if an authority (executive, legislative) or a government body (the council or parliament as