ABSTRACT
Populists say the people's views on policy, as expressed in polls or at the polls, should be implemented into public policy. This position is predicated on a very simple notion, the populist theory of voting: the results of a plebiscite or an election represent or reflect the will of the people. The traditional answer to the question of how best to identify the popular will was to hold an election according to the responsible party model. The American system of separated powers is designed—deliberately so in some ways—not to achieve the populist ideal. Instead, the system is based on the liberal democratic model. One of the many intuitively appealing aspects of populism is its straightforward simplicity. In the real world, voters and legislators frequently do not vote according to their true preferences in a strategic calculation. Plebiscites involving the kill clause as well as those involving nonconflicting measures on the same general topic present new problems in aggregating voters' preferences.
