ABSTRACT
Discourse about citizen action (DaCA) refers to citizens’ talk about classes of political acts in a more general sense, including voting in elections, signing petitions, and joining demonstrations. In some countries more than others discourse about supply and DaCA are framed by the social issues participants discussed as important. Common across many countries in their fuller deliberations is an anti-politics position that considers political parties hard to differentiate from one another and ineffective, and politicians as people who break promises, are distant from citizens and unresponsive. Referenda were positively supported in Switzerland, where citizens get the opportunity to take part in many direct-democratic votes. In Switzerland, immigration was conceived as a meta-issue that linked the participants’ concerns about terrorism, welfare and social policy. Consequently there are more noticeable ruptures in the political landscape there compared to countries like the Netherlands, Switzerland, and Germany where coalitions of parties moderate politics towards a centre ground and change happens slowly.
