Educated by initiative

In his best-selling book, "Bowling Alone," Robert Putnam warns that Americans' political participation civic engagement and confidence in government are at all-time lows. A hundred years ago, Progressive Era reformers were equally concerned about the failing health of American democracy. One of the many institutional mechanisms advanced by Progressives to better engage the citizenry was the initiative process. They contended that democracy had to be rigorously practiced by citizens in order for it to be sustainable. Beyond any substantive outcomes that ballot initiatives might yield, Progressives claimed that the initiative process itself would have an educative value.

With the dramatic rise in the number of initiatives appearing on state ballots in the 1990s, it seems sensible to evaluate the educative effects of citizen law-making. Has the initiative process altered the broader democratic landscape in the two dozen states permitting the process? Are there measurable civic benefits from people directly practicing the art of democracy?

Leaving aside the undeniable impact ballot measures have on public policy (it is, after all, the 25th anniversary of Proposition 13, the groundbreaking California tax cut measure), it appears that the Progressives may have been on to something. National survey data from the past decade reveal that voting on ballot initiatives has a positive effect on voter turnout, civic engagement and political efficacy. People frequently exposed to ballot initiatives are more motivated to vote, more engaged and better informed about politics, and more likely to express confidence in government than citizens living in non-initiative states.

These findings are not trivial. Turnout in initiative states, after controlling for a range of other influences, is roughly 4 percent higher in general elections and 8 percent higher in midterm elections than in states without citizen law-making.

Because ballot measures provide additional political information to potential voters, they have the greatest impact on turnout in low-information and non-competitive elections when initiatives are less likely to compete with media coverage of candidate races.

Citizen engagement, political knowledge, and political efficacy are similarly affected by the initiative process. These findings not on pertain to people living in Western states with historically high initiative use, but also to those living in states like Florida Massachusetts, Michigan and Ohio, as they have seen their share of controversial measures appear on ballots.

The impact of the initiative process, though, is not limited to people. Interest groups and political parties also are becoming educated by initiative, contrary to the expectations of Progressives. While states with substantial levels of initiative use have more nonprofit and citizen interest groups than non-initiative states, they also have more peak level associations, suggesting that economic interests are using the initiative to their own narrow benefit. Furthermore, people living in states that really utilize initiatives have a greater propensity to contribute money to interest groups, but not to candidates or political parties.

Interest groups are pushing initiatives as a away to enact public policy and as strategic means to drain the resources of their adversaries. In 1996, the Republican Nation Committee (RNC) stuffed the coffers of Grover Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform (ATR) with close to $4.5 million. Over the next few years, Norquist's nonprofit supported an array of ballot committees in several states sponsoring initiatives. In 1998, ATR contributed $441,000 to the backers of Prop. 226, the paycheck protection measure on California's June ballot. Organized labor spent more $23 million to narrowly defeat the initiative, which would have required union members to provide written permission be fore their dues could be used for political causes. Nevertheless, Norquist crowed after the election, "Even when you lose, you force the other team to drain resources for no apparent reason."

Party organizations are becoming inextricably involved in ballot campaigns, as they view initiatives instrumentally as a means of achieving partisan outcomes at the polls. Party officials known that certain propositions can mobilize their base, drive wedges into their opposition's coalition, and even generate campaign contributions.

But they also are aware that becoming involved in ballot measures can have unintended consequences. California Republicans learned this lesson following the passage of Prop. 187, the 1994 anti-immigrant initiative spearheaded by Gov. Pete Wilson (R). In subsequent elections, Latinos became politically energized and increasingly hostile to GOP candidates.

Clearly, the initiative process is no palliative for the country's democratic deficit. Besides the unsavory outcomes of some ballot Measures--which critics rightly note may tyrannize minority groups and undermine the central tenets of republican government by trying the hands of legislators and restricting their budgetary autonomy--the process may empower the very interest groups and parties that Progressives wanted to weaken.

Yet ballot measures also engage people. Voting on propositions allows them to become more involved in the political process, more knowledgeable about issues, and more confident in government, which may help to stem the erosion of virtues that Putnam and other commentators rightly deplore.

Daniel A. Smith is associate professor of political science at the University of Florida, and Caroline J. Tolbert is assistant professor of political science at Kent State University They are the authors of the forthcoming book, "Educated by Initiative: The Effects of Direct Democracy on Citizens and Political Organizations in the American States," published by University of Michigan Press.

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