ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with the conflicting views on direct democracy. It focuses specifically on referendums, and not on all institutions of direct democracy. The purpose is to explore who supports referendums and why and, more specifically, whether patterns and regularities can be identified in the support for and rejection of this form of direct democracy. The views on referendums are analyzed at two levels: first at the theoretical level, and then at the practical level where a distinction is made between the political elite and the people. The relationship between democracy and referendums has quite a different nature from these two theories of representative democracy. The theoretical views on referendums are a mirror for the theoretical views on representative democracy, which can roughly be divided into two main types that have been labeled radical and liberal democratic theory. A large number of arguments have been formulated for and against referendums on the basis of political experiences.
