Jyllands Posten, October 26 1993, book review:

Marcus Schmidt: Direct Democracy - About the Introduction of an Electronic Second Chamber of Parliament (in Danish), Nyt Nordisk Forlag Arnold Busck, Copenhagen 1993

Reviewed by Victor Rasmussen


The subtitle of the book: About the Introduction of an Electronic Second Chamber - combined with the title - provide an excellent summary of the message of this book, whose author is an associate professor at the Southern Denmark Business School where he teaches marketing research.

The shortcomings of our representative democracy brought him to consider the introduction of a direct democracy. In a growing number of fields there is a huge gap between the decisions made by a majority of the Folketing (the Danish Parliament) and the policies that a majority of the population want to be pursued. Consequently, people are feeling more and more "fed up with" and tired of the politicians.

Few things are more vehemently opposed by Danish politicians than proposals to held more referendums. According to the author, enhanced direct popular involvement in matters of governance is nevertheless a trend that is not to be prevented.

Today there are no technical impediments to introducing what the author calls an electronic second chamber. Thanks to the development in communication technology, it is possible today to introduce a true government by the people where the population is directly implicated in the decision making process. Technically it can be achieved by means of push button telephones, and this explains why the author calls the successor of the representative democracy - push-button democracy. It deserves notice that the author takes great trouble to explain carefully the technical, political and formal problems involved, so the allegation that direct democracy could easily be introduced if the politicians were willing, is in no way unrealistic and fanciful.

But are the politicians willing? So far there is nothing which points in that direction. There are plenty of examples in history showing that those in power are horrified and struck by panic (in some places they react with brutal countermeasures) at the idea of giving up power. Amongst Danish politicians it is conventional wisdom and an indisputable fact that the population is reactionary and therefore incapable of making sound decisions on complicated and sensitive issues.

The former Minister of Tourism and Communication, Arne   Melchior, is quoted for having stated his mistrust of referendums (in the daily   B.T. on July 11, l992) on the grounds that "politicians are often more progressive than the majority of the population". The author also deals with this belief - shared by many politicians - and he demonstrates that it simply doesn't hold. The author is convinced that the myth about the reactionary population is being kept alive, because the idea of direct democracy "is the nightmare of the political elite".

There are plenty of good reasons for giving the population access to the decision making process, and the author's arguments are so convincing that they ought to make an impact on the present decision-makers, as well as on those voters who find it difficult to realize that the representative democracy is laying itself open to criticism on several fronts.