ABSTRACT
EvERY so often in Anglo-American history, the question of "who decides" has been resoundingly answered by citizens who say "we do!" During the 1960s this cry was heard again in the United States. Reacting against bureaucratic indifference, corporate arrogance, and legislative irresponsibility, citizen groups were formed to stop freeways, dams, subdivisions, and unsafe toys. In California, citizens used a ballot initiative to force upon their reluctant legislature a coastal zoning measure designed to protect the coast, from border to border, from unrestricted private development. In Oregon the referendum was used to enact, over frantic industry lobbying, a ban on nonreturnable bottles. In New Hampshire the citizens of one town voted in special referendum to refuse an oil refinery a site within their town. A few miles away, another set of citizens voted 2 to 1 to allow an oil refinery site in their town.
