50,000 citizens sign a referendum. If a public initiative attains 100,000 signatures, parliament must discuss certain proposed amendments of the Swiss constitution. Parliament can work out an alternative proposal and the citizens and cantons select one of the alternatives in a plebiscite. There are also facultative referenda concerning international treaties or the entry of Switzerland into international organizations as well as obligatory referenda where the citizens can vote on the retention or abolition of constitutional amendments or emergency laws one year after they have been passed. A plebiscitary system is a political system in which ruling parties or charismatic leaders decide on which issues referenda should be taken and how the questions for such plebiscites are formulated; citizens then vote directly on these issues. The main criticism of this concept is that it is prone to manipulation and that a plebiscitary system can easily turn into totalitarianism. Max Weber favored a plebiscitary system based on charismatic leadership. Carl Schmitt considered, twelve years after the death of Weber, a dictatorship based on plebiscitary legitimation as the best form of government (Schmitt 1932) and conceived plebiscitary leadership as the foundation of the political model of the National Socialists known as the Volksgemeinschaft. Classical thinkers of representative democracy, such as Montesquieu, John Stuart Mill, and John Locke, stressed democratic institutions, that is, power structures such as parliaments, governments, and constitutions. Their concept of democracy is based on an objective concept of power in which power structures represent citizens. For classical thinkers of direct democracy, such as Jean-Jacques Rosseau, who argued that the moment a people allows itself to be represented it is no longer free, democracy is a more subjective process, that is, it is based on the permanent decision making by citizens. It is more desirable, just, and democratic that those affected by decisions are directly involved in decision making than the formation of decisionmaking elites by the election of representatives or the plebiscitary separation of decision preparation and decision taking that results in autocracy. In this context, the notions of participation and participatory democracy arise. Participation means that humans are enabled by technologies, resources, organizations,and skills to design and manage their social systems all by themselves and to develop collective visions of a better future so that the design of social systems can make use of their collective intelligence. Decisions in a social system should be prepared, taken, and enacted by all individuals and groups affected by the operations of the system in bottom-up grassroots processes. Participatory systems are self-organized and self-managed systems. Why is participation important? Participation is a human right. Participatory systems are more democratic and effective than heteronomous systems. Participation contributes to the contentedness and happiness of human beings. Participation is a precondition for consensus. Participation creates respect for one another. Participation can ensure that people take part in social systems more effectively and at a deeper level of commitment. • Participation allows synergies to arise from cooperation and joint knowledge production. • • • • • •
A participatory social system is a system in which power is distributed in a rather symmetrical way, that is, humans are enabled to control and acquire resources such as property, technologies, social relationships, knowledge, and skills that help them in entering communication and cooperation processes in which decisions on questions that are of collective concern are taken. Providing people with resources and capacities that enable responsible and critical activity in decision-making processes is a process of empowerment; 173