It is increasingly common for citizens to take initiatives to improve their immediate living environment. While setting up and implementing these initiatives initiators come into contact with the... Show moreIt is increasingly common for citizens to take initiatives to improve their immediate living environment. While setting up and implementing these initiatives initiators come into contact with the government. Governments are often enthusiastic about these plans, but yet it proves far from easy to get get the initiative off the ground. 'The law' is seen as the main bottleneck. In this dissertation several (legal) bottlenecks are researched and recommendations to facilitate initiators are formulated. Show less
Lately, the municipal level of government has seen much experimentation with new forms of democracy and democratic decision-making. These experiments aim to revitalize local democracy by engaging... Show moreLately, the municipal level of government has seen much experimentation with new forms of democracy and democratic decision-making. These experiments aim to revitalize local democracy by engaging citizens more directly in the preparation, decision-making and execution of municipal policy.These experiments raise certain legal questions because local democracy is not just a matter of political culture, but of rules and regulations too. There are laws which stipulate which powers local authorities may exercise, how they may exercise these and how they ought to relate to each other. The question is what room this legal framework offers for all sorts of local democratic innovations that aim to enhance the institutionalized local democracy.This question is answered in this thesis with the help of four case studies. The cases and their design are tested for their compatibility with relevant laws and regulations and with the principles that form the foundation of the institutionalized local democracy. Show less
The referendum is one of the most studied and practiced institutions of semi-direct democracy around the world, in several latitudes and historical times, in different systems and political regimes... Show moreThe referendum is one of the most studied and practiced institutions of semi-direct democracy around the world, in several latitudes and historical times, in different systems and political regimes, at international, national, regional or local levels, with different legal frameworks and with various political consequences. However, Portugal, whose constitutional experience begins in 1820 with the liberal revolution, had its first democratic referendum only in 1998. This study try to conceptually characterize the referendum, in order to establish its fundamental typologies regarding the most relevant experiences in this field and to situate the case for and against the referendum as an expression of semi-direct democracy in the political and philosophical debate of different historical moments. In the next chapters, entirely dedicated to the Portuguese case, we shall present the historical evolution of the nation al and local referendum in the constitutional and political life in Portugal since 1820. An added emphasis will be given to the referendum experience of the Portuguese democracy born in 1974, particular attention being payed to the political debate about the formal introduction of the referendum in the 1976 Constitution and to the concrete experience of referendums proposed and held since then. Show less
