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A directly democratic and Federal Europe

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  • Bruno Frey

Abstract

This paper endeavors to take up the neglected aspects of federalism and direct democracy. It emphasizes the mutual dependence of the two for reaching the goals of efficiency and trust. Direct democracy is seen to preserve federalism, but even more importantly, federalism is taken to enable and to preserve effective direct democracy. Empirical evidence is adduced showing in particular that direct democracy leads to higher efficiency in the sense of lowering transaction costs. A proposal for a novel combination of federalism and direct democracy—which is called FOCJ (the acronym for “Functional Overlapping Competing Jurisdictions”)—is suggested for Europe. Copyright Kluwer Academic Publishers 1996

Suggested Citation

  • Bruno Frey, 1996. "A directly democratic and Federal Europe," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 7(4), pages 267-279, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:copoec:v:7:y:1996:i:4:p:267-279
    DOI: 10.1007/BF00119267
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    8. Frey, Bruno S, 1994. "Direct Democracy: Politico-economic Lessons from Swiss Experience," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(2), pages 338-342, May.
    9. Wilson, James Q., 1993. "The Moral Sense," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 87(1), pages 1-11, March.
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    11. Lüder Gerken (ed.), 1995. "Competition among Institutions," Palgrave Macmillan Books, Palgrave Macmillan, number 978-1-349-24262-7, October.
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    13. Casella, Alessandra & Frey, Bruno, 1992. "Federalism and clubs : Towards an economic theory of overlapping political jurisdictions," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 36(2-3), pages 639-646, April.
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Simon Hug, 2009. "Some thoughts about referendums, representative democracy, and separation of powers," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 20(3), pages 251-266, September.
    2. Kyriacou, Andreas P., 2000. "An Ethnically Based Federal and Bicameral System: The case of Cyprus," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 20(2), pages 251-268, June.
    3. Bruno S. Frey & Armin Steuernagel & Jonas Friedrich, 2018. "Future European Alliance - Europe as a Flexible Democracy," CESifo Working Paper Series 7270, CESifo.
    4. Gemma Mateo González, 2006. "Domestic Politics and Referendums on the Constitutional Treaty," EUI-RSCAS Working Papers 32, European University Institute (EUI), Robert Schuman Centre of Advanced Studies (RSCAS).
    5. Jean-Michel Josselin & Alain Marciano, 2007. "How the court made a federation of the EU," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 2(1), pages 59-75, March.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    D7; H1; H7; PO;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D7 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making
    • H1 - Public Economics - - Structure and Scope of Government
    • H7 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations

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