Voting behavior in direct democratic votes

The European literature on voting behavior in direct democratic votes has flourished since the 1990s, as a result of the growing number of referendums on European integration (e.g. Christin and Hug, 2002; Franklin et al., 1994a; 1995; Hobolt, 2005, 2006, 2009; Hug, 2002, 2005; Hug and Sciarini, 2000; Mendez et al., 2014). ¹ In other contexts, direct democratic institutions have been an integral part of government for a long time. Switzerland is the country where direct legislation is most developed (Kobach, 1994; Kriesi and Trechsel, 2008; Linder, 2010; Sciarini and Tresch, 2014). During the twentieth century, half of direct democratic votes held on the national level worldwide took place in Switzerland (Altman, 2011; Gallagher and Uleri, 1996). In other words, there were as many national initiative and referendum elections in Switzerland as in all other countries taken together. Ironically enough, there were also more popular votes on European integration in Switzerland than in any EU member states (Sciarini, 2016). It should thus come as no surprise that Swiss direct democracy is often referred to as a “laboratory”, and has given rise to an extensive literature on voting behavior at referendums. The availability of a unique set of survey data, the so-called VOX-surveys, now covering about 200 ballots, also accounts for this. ²