Demokratische Optionen, demokratische Herausforderungen

In many countries, the loss of trust combined with increased expectations has more recently motivated the reform of representative institutions and the introduction of elements of direct and associative democracy. This book plays on the long-established democratic varieties in the 26 Swiss constituent states and, for the first time, examines the classical theses on the crisis of democracy at the subnational level. First of all, the innovative measurement instrument developed for assessing the quality of democracy discloses a dilemma between the radical democratic values of direct participation and a broad inclusion of the population. With regard to performance the author cannot confirm systematic differences between representative and more participatory democracies. More representatively arranged democracies, however, are faced with lower institutional trust and weaker attachment to the political community.