Lunds Universitet			
Statsvetenskapliga institutionen
STV403; HT1994
Supervisor: Harry Petersson
(passed as scientific work on the "C-level" at the Institute of 
Political Science at Lund University on Feb 9 1995) 

"Wir sind das Volk"
   - Direct Democratic Trends in the New Germany

Author: Malte Lewan 

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Till minnet av Mormor
under vars sista dagar uppsatsen skrevs

Foer hjaelp med oeversaettningar, stort tack till Pappa

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Abstract

There seems to be trends of direct democracy in all of Germany, but 
especially the eastern German Laender have introduced constitutions that 
are much based on popular lawmaking. This essay analyses to which degree 
the German Laender and communes have moved in that direction and the 
reason behind the moves. At the same time, it aims at giving a somewhat 
better understanding of the processes of direct democracy. The main 
reason of the trends appears to be the peaceful revolution in East 
Germany where the people, it is suggested, have the feeling of holding 
on to the power they had during the revolution days. A contributing 
fact, may have been the new constitution of Schleswig-Holstein in 1990, 
that was very progressive in terms of direct democratic elements. In 
itself, it was probably inspired by the developments in the East. At the 
foundation, the old German participatory traditions play their part in 
explaining today's interest in direct democracy. The trends are in 
western Germany mostly visible on the Land level, more than on the 
commune level. In eastern Germany, it's the other way around with the 
local participatory democracy considered very important. This essay also
asks the question how much the founders of the German constitutions,
when developing the popular institutions, have taken notice of theories
that predicts much better economic performance in a direct democracy
than in a strictly representative one.

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Contents

1. Introduction                                    1
1.1 Backround                                      1
1.2 Purpose and Aim                                1
1.3 Material                                       2
1.4 Theory                                         2
1.5 Disposition                                    2

2. What is Direct Democracy?                       3

3. Theories and Studies                            5
3.1 A Social Contract                              5
3.2 Public Choice Critisism                        6
3.3 New Politic-Economic Thinking                 11
3.4 Arrangements of Political Institutions        12

4. Participatory Traditions                       15

5. The Laender                                     16
5.1 History and Development                       16
5.2 Direct Democracy in West Today                17
5.3 The New Eastern Laender                        19
5.4 Some Examples of German Development           20
5.4.1 Schleswig-Holstein and Niedersachsen        20
5.4.2 Brandenburg and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern      21

6. Local Government                               23
6.1 Size and Organisation                         23
6.2 Direct Democracy in the Communes              24
6.3 Comparisons & Party Impact                    25
6.4 Communal Reform                               27
6.5 The New Eastern Communes                      28

7. Conclusions and Summary                        31
7.1 Limiting Direct Democracy                     31
7.2 Some Final Analysis                           31
7.3 Summary and Concluding Remarks                32

Notes                                             35

References                                        36

Appendix                                          38

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1. Introduction

1.1 Backround

"Direkte Demokratie liegt im Trend", Degenhart starts off his essay 
(1992, p 77). He describes the experiences and developments of direct 
democracy in Germany. He is one of several authors investigating the 
interesting phenomena of direct democracy. To some, there will always be 
an attraction of the people making the laws themselves instead of 
representatives. There is a very non-elitistic appeal, especially in 
periods when trust in politicians is low. It is also sometimes an almost 
nationalistic fascination with the "people" on the same day going to the 
polls to decide how something is going to be for themselves. "Wir sind 
das Volk" was the East German legend during the revolutionary days in 
the fall of 1989.

We see more and more examples in the world of important decisions that 
concern us all taken by referendum, among these the latest referenda in 
several countries concerning their relationship with the European Union. 
The author of this essay feels, just from observing world politics of 
today that, with the breakdown of communism in eastern Europe, interest 
partly appears to have shifted from sensitive top relations between 
countries towards lower level of politics and concepts like legitimacy 
and democratic participation. If somebody picks up a surveying 
politological book on Germany from the post-war period and compares it 
with one from today, he may see that in the old one, much of the text 
were devoted to the relations towards East Germany, but in the new one, 
that space has been filled with many other politic aspects. In this 
essay, I've studied one of these traits: direct democracy in Germany.

Finding the best governmental system is an aim for almost any political 
culture. Few people are perfectly happy with the system they live in at 
any particular time or place. In a country like Germany, there is of 
course in some form, always a discussion of how to improve the system. 
The federal construction of the country makes comparison even more 
natural. One important characteristic that is searched for, is a system 
which creates favorable economic outcomes. There are also other ones. A 
system of popular participation in public decisions is one alternative 
for reformation that deserves to be studied.

1.2 Purpose and Aim

The purpose of this essay is to examine the recent trends of direct 
democracy in the Land and commune levels in Germany. In the process, 
it's going to try create a somewhat more general understanding of the 
practise of direct democracy.

Has there been a recent development towards the use of more direct 
democratic institutions in Germany? In that case, why? And what is its 
characteristics? Has there been a way of limiting it when makers of 
constitutions seen fit? Are the communal and Land trends following each 
other hand in hand or are there deviations? Are there any signs that 
notice has been taken of the extensive scientific discussions on the 
economic advantages of direct democracy? These are the questions I will 
try to answer.

1.3 Material

The material I've been using is mostly literature on the subjects. It 
has been describing the history, the current rules and the processes. It 
has been legal works and economic works and of course politological 
works. I've used economic theories and normative political theories. 
Some primary sources have also been used, like  for example 
constitutions and proposals for constitutions.

I found the literature on German direct democratic trends limited, but 
in some ways maybe sufficient. It was necessary for it to be of late 
date and it was already a problem when it was from as early as 1992. I 
have very little information on what has happened in the last one or two 
years. One of the literary sources deserves commenting. It was Harding 
et al's "Legislatures and Regional Administrative Reform in the New 
German Laender" which was sent to me through internet. The authors are 
considering it for publication, but it isn't published yet.

1.4 Theory

I have used much literature on the critical public choice view of the 
system of political competition. There are other views. For example, the 
neo-pluralist view could maybe have been worth examining, but the main 
purpose of this essay was not to examine the theories, it was to use 
particular points they have. I chose the public choice school. Also, in 
some areas, certain of the ideas I refer to, I've never seen challenged 
in a serious way. The authors meet no resistence yet, and don't even 
appear to have any opposing theories to attack. They don't seem to have 
any frame work or fixed points to gain help from. I'm then mostly 
thinking about the new politic-economic essays presented in ch 3.3. 
Theory and empiri are working together all to well. But furthermore, 
important for me is that the public choice writers often have a specific 
interest in direct democracy that is easy to apply.

1.5 Disposition

I start by explaining the basic terms used in the language around direct 
democracy in chapter 2 and follow up by a presentation of the theories 
that are of interest and which constitute the first part in which the 
first terms are needed (ch 3). I then explain some of the pre-war 
history in chapter 4 and with the help of these first chapters start 
looking at the Laender and local governments' situation in chapter 5 and 
6. There is a concluding chapter 7 in the end.

2. What is Direct Democracy?

In this essay I will start by explaining some of the basic expressions 
used in connections to direct democratic institutions. These expressions 
will be used all the way through. They are mostly tools for explaining 
functions and trends we meet as we go along, but have a certain interest 
by themselves, and need to have, since they are so basic for the 
discussions.

Direct democracy is many times defined as constituted by three parts: 
referendum, initiative and recall.1 That could in part be said to be the 
American perspective that has been exported, where it's very much 
possible that a German or Swiss disposition would look a bit different. 
I use the American one when I go through and define the institutions 
mentioned in this essay since I find it _most_ logic (though not 
entirely logic). It is also the most recognised arrangement.

1. "Referendum" is of course the actual process in which all citizens 
with rights to vote in general elections are able to express their view 
on an issue by going to the polls and cast their votes. In this sense of 
the word, the initiator is not of any importance. The referendum can be 
decisive or just consultative which then marks what attention is paid to 
the outcome. In countries with serious elements of direct democracy like 
Germany and Switzerland, the meaning of decisive referenda is generally 
used. That is the case for this essay too when not specified.

But referendum is also many times used short for "facultative 
referendum", a term expressing the institution where a certain 
percentage of the electorate or absolute number of citizens (usually by 
written signatures in both cases) can request an already by parliament 
decided question, to go for approval in a referendum (in the first 
meaning). This sometimes lead to a confusion in the literature on direct 
democracy. For clarity, the maybe more illustrative expression "popular 
veto" is also used. Popular veto obligatorily leads to referendum, 
otherwise the idea wouldn't be much worth since the parliament already 
marked its support of the law it is questioning.

One differs between "obligatory" and "facultative" referenda. The 
"obligatory referendum" is one that must be held because mechanically 
triggered, for example before the constitution can be changed. This is 
the case in Bayern as well as nationally in Switzerland and Denmark 
(Blackwell, 1987, p 525).

2. "Initiative" or "popular initiative" is the institution where a 
certain percentage of the electorate or absolute number of citizens can 
ask to bring their own proposal to referendum. The proposal can either 
be a word-by-word text of law (or constitutional law) or a more general 
text where the exact wording is decided by parliament.

The initiative can forcingly lead to referendum. It can also lead to 
other stipulated acts by governmental institutions instead. The latter 
is common in Germany. That can range from no more than a discussion in 
parliament to a full investigation and formulated proposition (but which 
can be turned down by parliament) depending on the rules. 

The initiative can sometimes be allowed to act as a popular veto, 
revoking already taken legislative action. So constitutionally, the 
distinction between popular veto and popular initiative differs between 
political cultures and while the two institutions are regulated by very 
different sets of rules in some countries, for example Switzerland, in 
Germany they are not (Lewan, 1993, pp 10-12). There, they are both are 
often referred to as "Buergerbegehren".

In Germany, one makes a difference between "Buergerbegehren" and 
"Buergerinitiative". In this essay, I will call them "popular petition" 
and "(popular) initative". They are both usually related to as 
"initiative" internationally in the sense used in the definition above 
(which I BTW won't be using in this essay to avoid additional 
confusion), but the "Buergerinitiative" has fewer preconditions attached 
to it than "Buergerbegehren" and is so easier to attain.2 On the other 
hand, it has no coercive result while "Buergerbegeheren" does.

3. "Recall" is the power where a certain percentage of the electorate or 
absolute number of citizens can force a referendum on whether to hold 
re-elections. So the petition does _not_ lead directly to new elections. 
It is not used on the national level in any country today, but in many 
American states, Swiss cantons and some of the German Laender.3

3. Theories and Studies

In this chapter, I present the theories I will use in this essay. I 
start with the normative thinking of Rousseau which dates long back in 
history, but who takes up ideas that are repeated in one or the other 
form in many political reasonings. These thoughts are indirectly basic 
for this essay and I've chosen to make them explicit. There is then a 
200 year jump to the post-war public-choice theory in 3.2 and my 
collection of relevant critisism of the system of political competition. 
I end with just a few months old politic-economic interesting essays and 
a little older literature on the importance of institutional 
arrangement.

3.1 A Social Contract

Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-78) is the father of the normative political 
philosophy of sovereignty of the people where all representation is 
meaningless, abolishing the freedom of the people. To him, society is a 
social contract, where the people have renounced their ultimate freedom 
to live together under laws. But their explicit approval is demanded at 
every point, when every law is made. It is not a law by society if not 
the people have voted for it. It is "null and void". Sovereignty cannot 
be represented. Only during the short moment when a people elect members 
of parliament it is free. After that, it's once more in slavery 
(Rousseau, 1762, p 78). Further, if the people vote for what they 
believe is the public interest instead of their own private interest, 
then they vote in accordance of the general will. At best, every citizen 
will see the general will and we'll have unanimous decisions.

To Rousseau, the small scale of the democracy is also important, one 
reason being, of course, that in the time he lived, direct democracy was 
hardly possible in larger societies. As well, not least the value of 
discussion between citizens knowing each other, is a reason for him for 
stressing small scale. He was a great admirer of the classic Athen 
democracy and was himself born in Geneve in Switzerland and made no 
secret of that he felt like a free citizen in his home city state and 
direct democracy. Today, a few Swiss cantons actually still demand a 
referendum on each alteration of the law (Lewan, 1993, p 13)!

Through the years, Rousseau's ideas has come back again and again and 
while some philosophies are based on for example technical arrangements 
in politics, like separation of governmental powers or elites fighting 
for power, Rousseau simply gives the power back to where it came from. 
It is maybe not so strange that those ideas seem attractive and won't 
die. I would say that hardly any discussion on direct or representative 
democracy can disregard Rousseau's fundamental principle of power 
emanating from the people. That is true for the recent movements in 
Germany as well.

3.2 Public Choice Critisism

Many public choice authors have long been suspicious of the workings of 
government. They have explained how democratic political systems can 
generate unfavorable results. What a lot of times has been the target is 
pluralism. Dunleavy and O'Leary (1987, p 100) say that the new right 
argues that the fundamental defect of pluralist political arrangements 
is the "basic lack of a determinate relation between the 'realities' of 
the economy and input politics." Public choice writers are interested in 
the relationship between the inputs in politics often in form of 
elections, and the management of the economy. There are a number of ways 
in which they criticise this relationship the way it's mostly done 
today. Many times it is because it's too indirect. There are a lot of 
disturbances on the way, and these disturbances can be very harmful to 
the economic performance of a country. The public choice authors believe 
that "political input processes have only a limited and badly flawed 
ability to communicate citizen's views" (op cit, p 114). So public 
choice thinking about input politics is sceptical and pessimistic. The 
political marketplace is often characterised by gross imperfections. 
Three issues have particularily engaged the writers (op cit, p 95):

1. Search of the best democratic constitution. Here, many of the 
features of the liberal democratic systems are examined and questioned. 
Why are the expressing of preferences from the people accumulated to one 
single moment, the election, with little possibility to give a 
sophisticated picture of the citizens' views? Also, there are many 
different decision rules that could be tried, but we see the same ones 
return, over and over again. There is actually no reason for this 
(Dunleavy & O'Leary 1987, pp 95-96).
2. Limitations of party competition in producing 'realistic' government, 
that is, a government truthfully reflecting the preferences of the 
people.
3. The problems and defects stemming from interest group action.

Of these, problems 2 and 3 are relevant for this essay and analysed in 
the following:

So, what especially may interest us here in the public choice critique 
is the trouble that is seen on the input side and state organisation in 
the _system of political competition_. Sloman (1991, pp 414-415) helps 
us organise by putting the failings of democratic systems in three 
points:4

A. Unequal distribution of power. Certain groups or individuals can have 
a greater influence on politicians than they "deserve" based on who they 
represent.
B. Short-termism. Since politicians face re-elections continuously, they 
tend to be short sighted.
C. Imperfect information. This prevents both voters and politicians from 
making perfect decisions. Voters are for example not as informed about 
issues as politicians.

The most serious and historically recurrent critisism of the system of 
political competition seems to be the big influence of interest groups 
and different types of pressure groups, by the categorising above called 
A. In the following text, five types of the _related_ problems public 
choice authors bring up are grouped together. Of the others, the short-
termism (B) is generally more empirically confirmed than the imperfect 
information (C) (Mueller, 1989, p 277).

In total, I have found nine concrete public choice problems in the 
literature on public choice and I will in the coming present them. Some 
of the problems are border cases and do not clearly fit in any of the 
main categories. For example, A4, could go with category B and C1 could 
be part of category A. Though this uncertainty, I've chosen to group 
them together to hopefully make the points somewhat easier to survey:

A1. Collective action
 2. Logrolling
 3. Pork barrel politics
 4. Politicians' activism.
 5. Agency - politician links

B1. The political business cycle
 2. Bidding up voters' expectations

C1. Invisible costs
 2. Fiscal Illusion

A1. Collective action

In a western pluralistic society, there are interest groups with a lot 
of influence on the government. They can be of very different 
importance. McLean (1987, p 63) supplies Mancur Olson's division of them 
into privileged, intermidiate and latent. They are usually in size 
according to that order with latent groups being the biggest (they need 
not necessarily constitute a factual group at all - the unemployed is 
the classic example). In the privileged group, there is at least one 
member who would pay enough by himself in order to see the goal be 
realised, if he could. In the intermediate group, all members are aware 
of the others' actions.

Olson also classify interest groups into producer groups, consumer 
groups and altruistic groups. It is the producer group that has the most 
power. Production owners and labor unions are both producer groups. 
Consumer groups have no definite sanctions to back their points with and 
the altruistic groups are the weakest since they aren't even motivated 
by self-interest.

The problem here is that some interest groups have gained powers, but on 
criteria not necessarily (and maybe indeed unlikely) good for the 
economy and the people in a country. The powers certainly don't need to 
be according to the number of citizens they represent. The fact that the 
unemployed for sociological reasons may have a hard time organising 
themselves doesn't mean that they should have less to say in society.

McLean (1987, p 70-71) talks about the vote and lobby power of interest 
groups. The vote power is the interest organisation's power of influence 
over how its own members, or others who has any interest in the groups 
public opinions vote in elections. The lobby power is the more direct 
help and promises of cooperation an organisation can offer. MacLean says 
none of the powers is definitely stronger that the other. There are 
examples of victories in issues for both sides over the other one.

Though the interest organisations in Switzerland are strong ("a very 
differentiated, pluralist structure of interest organisations", Mueller 
(1989, p 316) quotes Lehner), the country had the lowest tariff 
protection of 18 OECD countries listed by Olson in a research (ibid) and 
a high growth rate. Mueller thinks that this is explained by the fact 
that the interest organisations have much less use of striking bargains 
with politicians since the real power lies with the people, exercised 
through referenda. The lobby power is almost non-existent and only vote 
power remains. The redistributional struggles that are so saliant in so 
many other countries, definitely including Germany, are not very 
prominent in Switzerland though a fractionalised interest group 
structure.

A2. Logrolling.

Logrolling or vote-trading is when one group agrees to help another 
group by voting for a policy package that is including both groups' 
alternatives reflecting preferences. The package only contains policies 
that none of the groups are opposed to very much. Logrolling is a common 
phenomena in liberal democracies and it's most common in multi-member 
institutions such as legislatures, cabinets or party conventions. The 
problem is that it has considerable potential for loading costs of 
proposals onto a minority. Two groups with a majority in an assembly can 
exploit the minority pushing, what used to be private goods, onto the 
public sector. This works best when there is a _stable_ coalition and 
that is many times found in parliaments (Dunleavy & O'Leary 1987, pp 
103-106).

A3. Pork barrel politics.

Pork barrel politics may occur when a politician or possibly a small 
group of politicians are very exposed to interest group pressures or 
pressures from the group of voters that elected him/them. The expression 
is based on an American situation with a Congressman elected by his 
constituency, but could equally well be, for example, a minister of 
argicultural affairs whose party is very much depending on the votes of 
farmers. The trouble is that the support of the group the politician is 
depending on, is so crucial that the public interest and the big 
perspective comes second. The politician's political survival is most 
important (Dunleavy & O'Leary 1987, p 106)

Pork barrel politics is in one way an application of logrolling since 
that's one way a coalition government can tend to drive up public 
expenditure. 

A4. Politicians' activism.

This is when politicians show a lot of spirit in showing activism after 
interest organisations and media have put the spot light on a subject. 
Not much else is done than to take the first initiative. There is not 
much of a follow-up or critical evaluation so the decision tend to be 
short sighted. The issue is also considered taken care of, instead of 
discussed in face of a clear ruling. The politician as an intermediate 
step between people and decision distorts the relation by starting 
having a life on its own (Dunleavy & O'Leary 1987, pp 106-107).

A5. Agency - politician links.

Governmental agencies often establish links with sectional interests and 
appropriate politicians in order to secure favorable political 
conditions for their own existence. Even agencies which fulfils a 
function that is clearly in decline, do this to maintain budgetary 
fundings and ensure its own survival. It may be very unefficiant to keep 
these agencies, and also creates an unnecessary growth of the state 
(Dunleavy & O'Leary 1987, pp 123-124).

B1. The political business cycle

This is a theory that governments artifically create business cycles by 
adjusting the economy according to term limits to get the best chance to 
stay in power. Since we can say that it seems to be a fact there is a 
negative relation between inflation and unemployment, the idea behind 
the political business cycle theory is that the incumbent government can 
create favorable short time statistics on both counts immidiately before 
an election. In the long run though, such manipulations are hurting the 
economy.

There are more blatant ways of in a manipulating way prepare a 
government for an election. Generous increases in economic aid targetted 
to groups of people, raises in grants to public service institutions, 
lower taxes etc are examples. To finance the expenditures, there may be 
tax increases and an economy in conraction in off-election years. 
Mueller (1989, p 295) refers to Buchanan and Wagner who say that the 
expenditure behavior just before elections is so attractive to the 
politicians that they usually end up having to pay for some of it in the 
form of a deficit. To finance the deficit, the government starts to 
print money with inflation as effect.

The political business cycle has of course been examined empirically 
many times and the results are not clear. There is actually no definite 
evidence for that the political business cycle exist as a rule in 
liberal democracies but only proof that it _has_ had its being in some 
cases in history (Mueller, 1989, p 286).

Mueller says (1989, p 306) that if the Keynesian premise that government 
can determine the macroeconomic performance (and thereby should be given 
the moral right to interfere with economic life) is accepted, then the 
industralized nations' governments are responsible for the worsenings of 
their economies (he has shown this decline statistically in the pages 
before). He says that the decline "must be assumed to be the direct or 
indirect consequence of the competition for votes between political 
parties. The only two countries in the early eighties with budget 
deficits of less than 1 percent of GDP are oil-rich Norway [...] and 
Switzerland. Switzerland is the only country in the table for which 
parties do not compete for the privilege of controlling the central 
government." It also has the best long-term deficit statistics. And 
Switzerland is the world's only direct democracy.

B2. Bidding up voters' expectations

Politicians in opposition often claim that much better policy results 
could have been attained than the ones the incumbent government has 
actually achieved. This would be rational because by doing that, they 
make the ruling government look bad and it will be easier for the them 
to win the election. Since they are not in office, they have no reason 
to hold back. Immidiately before the election, even the current 
government will talk about what a wonderful future that can be projected 
if they are re-elected. The voter's expectations are increased. Of 
course, the then elected politicians may later have trouble explaining 
why they couldn't fulfil their promises, but in the competition to get 
into office, no party can afford to give accurate information. They have 
to play this game to get into power. And, like in the political business 
cycle, it is well possible that the voter's expectations put the 
government under such pressures that issuing bonds or increasing money 
supply is a tempting solution (Dunleavy & O'Leary 1987, p 101).

C1. Invisible costs

Politicians might frequently and carefully target certain groups of 
people and give them specific highly visible benefits, but when 
financing this, spread the cost over the largest number of other 
citizens. That way, the increase of cost will be so small for each 
individual that the government won't be politically hurt to any great 
extent. Few will notice, exept the group that got the benefit (Dunleavy 
& O'Leary 1987, p 105)

C2. Fiscal illusion

This is when the state can fool the citizens into paying for a larger 
state than they want to. It can be assumed that citizens measure the 
size of government by the size of their tax bill. The politicians have 
to increase the people's tax burden in such a way that it's not visible. 
If they succeed, citizens have got the illusion of a smaller government 
than it really is. Mueller (1989, p 342-343) refers to W E Oates who has 
five ways of explaining the mechanics behind fiscal illusion: 

1. The more complex a tax burden, the harder it is to assess its size.
2. For community property taxes, it is harder for people who rent their 
homes to judge their size than for people who own their houses.
3. Built-in tax increases are more difficult to perceive than legislated 
changes.
4. Implicit future tax increases through adding up public dept is more 
difficult to see through than actual raises of the tax.
5. People do not look upon paying taxes as as costly as spending the 
money in other places.

But, the empirical support for the fiscal reasonings above holding true 
are not clear, just likely. Mueller (1989, p 343) says that public 
choice writers are most concerned with _who_ it is within government 
that is most likely to take advantage of the fiscal illusion. Is it 
politicians, bureaucrats or maybe interest groups? Once again, it's the 
"lack of a determinate relation between the 'realities' of the economy 
and input politics" that is the problem. And direct democracy is one way 
to try to make the realtion more simple and straight foreward.

3.3 New Politic-Economic Thinking

Bohnet & Frey (1994), Horstmann & Schneider (1994), Eichenberger (1994) 
in one issue of the politic-economic magazine "Kyklos", all agree about 
one matter, that direct democracy is a necessary element in future 
politics and economics. Bohnet & Frey (1994) stress the benefits of 
discussion and though they mark a clear distance to 'instant referenda' 
and 'electronic votings', they emphasize the educating effect of the 
discussion in connection to referenda (op cit, p 44). They're clearly 
inspired by the new political development in Europe and for example the 
Danish EU referenda. They attack the pressure groups and use other of 
the traditional public choice critisism of the system of politic 
competition. All in all, it's an essay about the advantages of direct 
democracy.

Horstmann & Schneider (1994) analyse the prospect of the European 
Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) and try to find the solution. They 
refer to a study by Pommerehne which analyses public expenditure in 111 
Swiss municipalities and which shows that the communes with direct 
democratic systems have much lower rates of growth in these than the 
others. The reason they give is that it is a direct link between the 
voters and the actual outcome of decision making (1994, p 372). Looking 
at the cantons, we see the same pattern and by comparing the direct 
democratic Switzerland with other countries, we see that Switzerland has 
the lowest growth of public expenditure of the OECD countries. 
Federalism may add to the pattern of low growth. Horstmann & Schneider 
(1994, p 375) say that "There are a number of theories which argue that 
the level and growth or government is a by-product of the competition 
for voters between different political parties and candidates." So this 
is just like we have discussed before, that others have implied.

Eichenberger finally, discusses the virtues of federalism as opposed to 
centralism. In this case, the other side is equipped with modern 
theories that can be examined. In his text, he for example talks about 
the chances that the exit option (the option an actor might have to 
leave an area) may crowd out the voice option (the option an actor might 
have to express his opinion, for example by voting). But in the end, he 
reaches the complete opposite conclusion:Êthat the voice option is 
endorced by an existing exit option (1994, p 410-411, 416). He advocates 
direct democracy as a solution of many of the same problems that he 
claims federalism can cure.

These three essays in "Kyklos" as well as other literature referred to 
in this essay cast serious doubt on the whole western system of 
representative democracy, and most important, they propose a very 
concrete solution that hasn't been tried in many places yet. In Germany, 
things are moving in this direction and that's what this essay is going 
to take a look at.

3.4 Arrangements of Political Institutions

The over-supply thesis, developed by William Niskanen is a central new-
right theory for explaining why governmental agencies grow (Dunleavy & 
O'Leary, 1992, p 117). It is, according to this theory, by their own 
mechanism. For example, in a bureaucracy, the first civil servants can 
be very useful since none at all would mean that the agency couldn't 
perform any work at all (we assume the agency in itself is useful). The 
next ones would still be an improvement for performance, but maybe not 
so crucial and at some point, no more civil servants would be needed. It 
would be a cost on society to employ more. The over-supply thesis now 
say, that the agency is not interested in finding the highest societal 
benefit/cost ratio, but is budget maximizing instead (since an agency by 
being big gives the agents prestige, higher salaries etc). Therefore, 
they continue to expand (with employing more civil servants in this 
case) as long as society still thinks they aren't more harmful than 
useful. They will use up all the credit they got for the useful ones of 
the civil servants to employ twice the number, just until society 
neither benefits nor loses anything as a result of the existence of the 
agency (op cit, pp 117-119)

Romer et al (1992) analyse referenda on school budgets in school 
districts in the state of New York. The laws are that a non-city 
district must hold one referendum each year on the budget. If the 
referendum fails, then the school may continue try holding more ones. In 
the end, it can pass a crises budget that is supposed to be temperate. 
The districts generally don't want this to happen. In the research, 544 
districts voted, 142 district failed to pass the budget on the first 
try. 120 tried a second time, this time only 65 passed. On the third 
time 8 of 24 were rejected. One district tried a fourth time and 
succeded. All in all, 60 district chose the crises budget.

What now is interesting, is the proportion that repelled the budget 
proposals. _After_ the initial rejections, the proportion was about 50%, 
which is what the Niskanen over-supply thesis predicts. If we see the 
school boards as the governmental agency that budget maximises, they 
would like to present a budget that would be so large that the general 
public just supports it. In the second referendum, the school boards are 
trying to repair their way too big first proposal by getting just barely 
inside what the general public can accept. Many other points are made in 
Romer et al's essay, but the above conclusion is one to have in mind 
when studying financial referenda. They can be heavily manipulated by 
the agenda setter - he will many times keep just within the boundaries - 
but, without the public immidiate check in form of referenda, the 
situation would probably be much even worse.5

Steuenberg gives a more extensive analysis of the arrangements of 
political institutions. He wants to examine those several American 
investigations that have shown that the difference in public expenditure 
between direct and representative democracies are not that big (though 
there are other examinations showing that there indeed are large 
differences). He examines the _arrangement_ between political 
institutions, not just which ones exist. That his point. While Romer et 
al above, studied a situation with an exogene agenda setter, he looks at 
several different arrangements of which the direct initiative is the 
most direct way for making the people's preferences of a limited budget 
into reality. A lot of other arrangements are also analysed. The 
combinations are endless with questions like: who proposes the budget, 
who can amend it and who can veto it? Who can overrule the veto and 
under which circumstances? In this, what are the roles of legislature, 
bureaucracy, executive, the people etc? What he teaches us is that 
institutional _arrangement_ matters.

Outcomes of public decision making seem to be affected by political 
institutions. There have been many studies supporting this hypothesis, 
comparing local governments using town meetings with those with 
representative systems. There are other views though. Some study 
concluded that the influence of the initiative, referendum and recall is 
very modest when it comes to public expenditure (Steuenberg, 1992, 
p 502).

In the essay, Steuenberg (1992, p 502) says that it is often argued that 
representative democracy contains more 'white noise' than direct 
democracy because of the intermediary level of representatives, where 
bureaucracy and interest groups can focus their attacks. That is a good 
summary of this paper's report on public choice writer's theories, which 
we're going to follow up on in the chapters on Laender and local 
government.

4. Participatory Traditions

In the following I'll explain some of the old pre-war history to keep in 
mind when investigating direct democratic elements in Germany. History 
plays a role in many contemporary constitutional discussions either 
implicitly or expressively as arguments, as we'll see in later chapters 
5 and 6.

After Napoleon in 1806 defeated Prussia's army at the battle of Jena, 
there was a reaction in Prussia to create a system of urban government 
in a philosophy contrary to the one of Napoleon. In Prussia, power was 
then supposed to be decentralized all the way to the grass roots. The 
Chief Minister Baron vom Stein expressed it in what is still a very 
well-known text in Germany (Norton, 1994, p 238):

"Entrusting power and responsibility to a man develops his ability: 
continuous tutelage hampers his development. Participation in public 
affairs confers a sense of political significance, and the stronger this 
sense becomes, the greater also grows his interest in the common good 
and the fascination of taking part in public activities, both of which 
contribute to a nation's spirit."

So, the participation of the citizens in government was stressed a lot. 
The Prussian model got a deep influence in eastern Germany, but in the 
West, some states still relied on a more French system.

Germany between the wars, the Weimar republic, became in theory a direct 
democracy. For example, 10% of the electorate could impose a referendum 
on an issue even nationally (Fisk, 1924, pp 162-163). But since a 
condition of 50% of those entitled to vote was demanded for the bill to 
become law, not one single national referendum initiated by the people 
in the Weimar republic actually made it all the way (Hernekamp, 1979, s 
376f).6 At the Land level though, there were a lot of referenda 
succesfully carried through, and a situation that was more chaotic, with 
lots of re-elections forced upon popular demand (recall) (Hernekamp, 
1979, pp 378-383).

5. The Laender

There are 16 states, "Laender" in Germany. Five of these are new since 
the reunification: Brandenburg, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Sachsen, 
Sachsen-Anhalt and Thueringen. Three in total are city states: Berlin, 
Bremen and Hamburg. The rest are: Baden-Wuerttemberg, Bayern, Hesse, 
Niedersachsen, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Rheinland-Pfalz, Saarland and 
Schleswig-Holstein (see appendix).

The powers of the federal level are matters of defense, foreign policy, 
state finances etc and also federal railways, federal air traffic, post 
and telecommunications. The federal powers are in general very limited. 
The Laender have in principle the right to decide about everything else.

5.1 History and Development

All the thirteen Land constitutions that were created in 1946/47, in 
Wuerttemberg-Baden, Bayern, Hessen, Thueringen, Sachsen-Anhalt, 
Mecklenburg, Brandenburg, Sachsen, Rheinland-Pfalz, Wuerttemberg-
Hohenzollern, Baden, Bremen and Saarland included the right of 
referendum. But there was caution when it came to establishing popular 
initiatives. Instead of the old Weimar 10% of the electorate to request 
a referendum, 20% became the rule in most of West Germany. Other 
limitations were also introduced, for example in Saarland, where the 
initiative was stripped of its imperative action.

With the cold war, this trend away from direct democracy was 
intensified. The federal republic was developed strictly into a 
representative democracy. Instead of embracing the idea of "sovereignty 
of the people", the system was a complex pattern of checks and balances 
and a "rule of law". The state was supposed to be based on parties, "Der 
Parteienstaat" (Norton, 1994, p 241-242). There was a historic reason 
behind this. Since the West was afraid of communist attacks, the people 
was not considered enough reliable (it was "unberechenbare"). The 
decision to abandon direct democracy was a "classic cold war decision" 
(Jung, 1992, p 31). Also, the "negative Weimar experiences" mentioned 
before were used as an argument.

The creation of West Germany with its representative character had 
implications at the Land level. The constitutions that were constructed 
after the national constitution was created refrained from using direct 
democratic elements. They were Schleswig-Holstein, Niedersachsen and 
Hamburg. Both Berlin and Nordrhein-Westfalen are illusionary exceptions 
since they were structurally older. Baden-Wuerttemberg was a special 
case (Jung, 1992, p 31).

For four decades, this remained unchanged. The experience of direct 
democracy, mostly from Bayern, was not considered using in other 
Laender. Today though, there is an alteration and Jung (1992, p 31-32) 
gives two reasons why:

1. There was a state crises in Schleswig-Holstein when the head of 
government were pressured into suicide and the change of power created a 
constitutional reform which gave guidance to successive reforms in other 
Laender. And this reform was probably partly inspired by the following:

2. The revolutions in Eastern Europe and the creation of the East German 
Land constitutions was a reason. Because the revolution in East was the 
work of the people, it was natural with continued power to the people in 
the form of direct democracy and this was apparent in the subsequent 
constitutional proposals. 

5.2 Direct Democracy in West Today

The most important form of direct democracy in the Land constitutions is 
the popular petition. All Laender have this institution except for 
Berlin, Niedersachsen and Hamburg, which have marked a general distance 
towards direct democracy. In those Laender that have the popoular 
petition, the only way for the parliaments to avoid referenda is to 
simply adopt the proposal themselves. It has had very different impacts 
in the political life in different Laender. Bayern is the Land where it 
has gained most practical importance.

Most Laender have given the people limited right for popular petition 
for making laws. Also, in most Laender, the petition has to be based on 
"objective ground". "Financial matters" are not included in the right in 
the rights of the people (what Degenhart refers to as the 
"direktdemokratischer Volksrechte")(1992, p 84). From what we've seen by 
the reasonings in the beginning of this essay, this is a huge mistake, 
shutting out the most valuable characteristics of direct democracy! 
There are several examples of political authors only interested in 
referenda on financial questions and nothing else. von Weizaecker is one 
example. He thinks that binding financial decisions to referenda is one 
of the solutions to cure the great German budget deficit (1992, p 60 & 
passim). An exception to the ordinary limitations can be found in the 
new constitution of Schleswig-Holstein where the petition right is 
expanded to all sorts of political questions. One can speculate that 
recent essays on the virtues of direct democracy on economic development 
has played its part.

Concerning the possibilities of popular vetos, they have been used with 
different intensities. In Bayern and Schleswig-Holstein, 10% of the 
electorate has to sign. In Baden-Wuerttemberg it is one sixth and in 
Nordrhein-Westfalen, Hessen, Rheinland-Pfalz, Saarland and Bremen it is 
one fifth. But in these latter Laender, there are also many times a 
requirement of high participation percentage in the referenda which 
gives a discouraging effect from the start of the petition process. 
Degenhart (1992, p 86) thinks that direct democracy in its most 
practical and strongest form cannot stay at half the distance. If it's 
to made effective, constitutional changes must follow. But from looking 
at the fights around the constitutions in Schleswig-Holstein and 
Niedersachsen in 6.4.1, there may indeed be a distinct purpose of 
limiting the impact of the "unberechenbare" people from the point of 
view of one of the major political parties. It can even be said to be a 
good thing that halfway alternatives are possible.

Obligatory constitutional referenda (initiated by the state) are in the 
Laender more exception than the rule both by constitution and by 
practise (the governments don't issue referenda voluntarily). In Bayern 
and Hessen, there are compulsory referenda when the constitution is to 
be changed though. There are not compulsory referenda for any other 
cases in those Laender. In both of them, a simple majority is only what 
is needed for approval. This is considered a problem by Degenhart (op 
cit, p 87) because he feels it's not much use by it since the Land 
parliament mechanically can count on support of the people with a simple 
majority. He wants requirement of a qualified majority instead. Looking 
at the examples of the New York school referenda and Niskanen's theories 
earlier in this essay, we get the impression that he might be right in 
one way, that a qualified majority condition would increase the powers 
of the people, now that they aren't the agenda setter and have to accept 
or refuse the proposals layed for them. In practise, most of these 
referenda have had clear majorities in Germany.

Some Laender issue the possibility of holding a referendum if no 
majority can be found in parliament. And in Baden-Wuerttemberg and 
Nordrhein-Westfalen, a referendum must be held, if only a majority and 
not a qualified majority supports a change of the constitution. But in 
Nordrhein-Westfalen, there are also possibilities for the Land 
government to without support from parliament initiate a referendum on a 
law, if a proposal has failed in parliament. Though this give the people 
only very limited power (waiting for such a situation to occur), it 
still makes a suggestion of the Rousseau notion that the people is the 
ultimate sovereign that one can go back to, if the representative 
institutions fail. That they ordinarily can't be trusted with that 
decision right is another matter. But this function has not gained any 
importance. And in Baden-Wuerttemberg, it has never been used.

So, changes in the constitution in Bayern requires a referendum to be 
held. This has happened several times on school issues and concerning a 
particular article in the constitution on radio broadcasting. Direct 
democracy can come in conflict with the "interest group democracy", for 
example the large churches. But it can be seen as a counterweight, 
Degenhart (1992, p 82) says. As been presented in this essay, this is 
one of the main reasons on the whole of direct democracy. And according 
to Rousseau of course, there exists no excuse for taking away the 
decision right of the people (that was almost too easy <grin>).

There have been quite a few failing petitions in Bayern. One was about 
freedom of choice of school text books and cost of school food and 
failed because of that the proposal wasn't enough well drawn-up and 
well-founded to be accepted according to the law. Another one was about 
founding a national park in a specific area. That time, the proposal was 
judged to break both the federal and Land constitutions. Also, in other 
Laender, proposals have failed. A limitation in the enlargement of an 
airport in Hessen fell on the competence of the petition. As well the 
stationing of intermediate distance missiles in Baden-Wuerttemberg and a 
school question in Nordrhein-Westfahlen were turned down because of lack 
of competence. In school questions in Saarland and Bremen, the petitions 
failed, this time because of the proposals being too vague.

There are popular rights of demanding re-election of the representatives 
in many Laender, recall, the third leg of direct democracy, as presented 
by me in the start of this essay. But recall has been made difficult. 
The use of it has its traditions from the Weimar republic. In 
BadenÐWuerttemberg, one sixth of the electorate have to support the 
holding of a referendum on the issue. In the issue, a majority of the 
those eligible to vote must support bringing the recall to referendum. 
In Bayern, one million people has to support it. It wouldn't be that 
far-fatched to interpret the fact that the recall still exists as a 
reminder of that Hitler was popularly elected. The experiences from the 
Weimar republic were not good however. In general, history seems to play 
a great part in the shaping of direct democratic institutions in 
Germany.

Degenhart is interested in the possibilities of introducing direct 
democratic institutions on the federal level in Germany (Degenhart, 
1992, p 92ff). Degenhart says that there is room for such a move. The 
constitution does not oppose direct democracy though it marks a clear 
distance (op cit, p 78). One should strive for a certain amount of 
congruity between the development on Land and state levels. What has 
happened on the Land level can be a point of aim for the federal level. 
Of course, there are lots of opponents, issuing the classic warnings of 
emotional thinking, lack of distance in thinking and easily 
manipulation. But the experiences from the Laender have shown that 
direct democracy shouldn't be dismissed, Degenhart says (op cit, p 96). 
He wants an obligatory constitutional referendum on the federal level 
and he doesn't think it's self-explanatory that financial questions are 
excluded. Further, it's not realistic with requirements of 50% of the 
electorate voting yes or no. The fears expressed concerning direct 
democracy have not been realised and the experiences that have been made 
should be utilised if revising the German constitution (op cit, p 97).

5.3 The New Eastern Laender

Haeberle (1993) reproduces 27 proposals for constitutions in the new 
eastern Laender 1990-1992 and describes some of the processes around the 
creation of these. The people making them studied other states in 
Germany, Switzerland and Austria. Especially the very inovative 
movements among the Swiss cantons were considered, but also the more 
cautious movements in the Austrian Laender. We now live in an age of 
constitutional making, "Verfassungszeitalter" (Haeberle, 1993, p 71).

There still lacks a lot of material for studying the peaceful revolution 
around the legend "Wir sind das Volk - wir sind ein Volk." (Haeberle, 
1993, p 73). The old DDR constitution from 1974 is still partly in 
place. The Laender created in 1990 constructed temporary constitutions 
just to organise parliament and government. Only the necessary processes 
were covered. Then, many designs were developed, coming both from 
eastern Germany and western. Sachsen was in the lead with many proposals 
but proposals came 1990 in all Laender. The ones from the West were 
closer to the federal constitution. But Haeberle (1993, p 77) thinks 
that the Laender should experiment to the limits of the federal 
constitution and be as autonomous as possible. In this, the cantons in 
Switzerland could be a model. The competition between the two upper 
levels of government can be of vital importance.

Common for all proposals for eastern German constitutions is the serious 
searching for direct democratic elements. Haeberle thinks this is 
historically consistent, considering that the people liberated itself 
(1993, p 80). In some cases, the new Laender really create something of 
their own, in others, they just copy. It is a mix of elements of 
continuity and progress. Brandenburg is the the most forward Land, while 
for example Thueringen and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern are more cautious. 
Looking at this in a time perspective, we can see a tendency of 
increasing rectification and adjustment to the West German standard. 
After the joy in the first months after the revolution, the drafts were 
very bold and tried the federal constitution to its limits. But when the 
western political parties gained importance, the autonomy decreased and 
the federal constitution or the western Land constitutions were copied 
to a greater extent. Western advisors in eastern Germany have probably 
played a great part in this (Haeberle, 1993, p 91).

Still, the eastern German constitutional proposals (and constitutions) 
is an unparallelled step of development for Land constitution law in 
Germany, maybe even comparable to the new Swiss cantonal one. The 
propositions are as many-sided and individual as the West German Land 
constitutions of 1945 and forward. In many ways, the eastern German 
constitutions are now in the lead in Germany in an evolutionary sense. 
Hopefully, influence will flow the other way as well - from East to West 
(Haeberle, 1993, p 91-92).

5.4 Some Examples of German Development

5.4.1 Schleswig-Holstein and Niedersachsen

The first weighty constitutional debates in Schleswig-Holstein started 
in 1990. The models that were studied were the 40 years of experiences 
from the western German Laender, Switzerland, Denmark and also the 
revolution in DDR. In addition, Jung (1992, p 34) mentions the important 
legend "Wir sind das Volk" and the ideas that the people are 
participating in decisions and not just onlookers. There were at first 
many controversies. SDP (the Social Democrats) who newly had been 
achieved governemental power, suggested a constitution with many _very_ 
liberal direct democratic elements (low quora for petitions etc) and 
very few of the traditional checks on initiatives from the people, but 
the opposition party CDU's (the Christian Democrats) counter proposal 
was stripped altogether from elements of direct democracy! In the end, a 
constitution with a little more moderate check on the referendum 
institutions than the SPD originally had proposed, was adopted by 
parliament. That was in May 30 1990. There was not held a referendum on 
the new constitution.

Jung (1992, p 35) explains the political importance of the constitution. 
It was very significant. It was the first time in 40 years that a Land 
parliament instituted a system of popular law making. It was creative in 
many ways though Jung thinks that the fact that it was built on the 
Weimar model gives him bad vibes. :-)

In the same fashion, in 1992 when Jung wrote his essay, plans for a 
constitutional reform in Niedersachsen was on its way. For a long time, 
the Land constitution has been only a temporary one. Now, in the end, 
there was a need for reform in almost all political areas. In the same 
way as in Schleswig-Holstein, SDP pressed on for direct democratic 
institutions while CDU wanted the more traditional federal model. The 
issue wasn't finally decided in 1992.

5.4.2 Brandenburg and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern

Finally, we will describe the most basic popular insitutions of 
Brandenburg, that  has become somewhat of a forerunner in the new 
democratic trends:

If 20 000 people sign an initiative for a change of law, the issue has 
to be heard and considered in parliament, but which can turn it down. If 
150 000 people sign an initiative for a change of constitution or recall 
of parliament, it's the same procedure, the parliament can turn it down. 
But if the initiative now is turned down, the people can issue a 
petition instead:

If 80 000 people sign a petition for a change of law, there has to be 
held a referendum on the matter. If 200 000 people sign a petition for a 
change of constitution or recall of parliament, there has to be held a 
referendum on the matter. In the first case, 50% of those voting has to 
approve the law and 25% of the electorate has to say yes. In the second 
case, two thirds has to approve the action (constitutional law or 
recall) and 50% of the electorate has to say yes.

Looking at the constitutional proposals (Haeberle, 1992, p 105, p 123), 
you can see that in the first proposal the figure 150 000 was 100 000 
and the figure 200 000 was 150 000 in the first proposal but the second 
one became the final text of the constitution. As usual when it comes to 
the new German constitutions and as discussed before, the later drafts 
were more compromising than the first ones.

The Brandenburg constitution begins with "Wir, die Buergerinnen und 
Buerger des Landes Brandenburg, haben uns in freier Entscheidung diese 
Verfassung gegeben" which means that the citizens have made the free 
decision to come together and make a constitution. This is typical of 
the ideas of Rousseau, that goverment is nothing more than a social 
contract with people deciding so, by their own free will. The 
constitution continues (one passage omitted): "gruendend auf den 
friedlichen Veraenderungen im Herbst 1989," which marks the extra-
ordinary importance the events in the fall of 1989 are credited with and 
quite likely that they color the content of the constitution.

When studying the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern constitution (Landtag 
Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, 1994), one finds that even though this 
constitution is supposed to be less bold and more western influenced 
than the one of Brandenburg, it contains many similarities with this 
constitution and contains low quora for initiative and petition.

While the Laender in this way, for example by taking a look at the 
constitutions, is in some way straight forward to analyse, the situation 
of the local governments is more complex. They are dependent on both 
higher levels of government and there are simply more of them, within 
each system. That is what we're going to take a look at in the next 
chapter.

6. Local Government

6.1 Size and Organisation

The federal constitution gives local authorities the status of third 
level of government along with the federal and Land levels.7 They enjoy 
more respect in Germany than in most other Western democracies (Norton 
1994, p 244). Their existence is guaranteed by the federal constitution. 
They have a general competence which in principle means the right to 
make decisions in all those areas not reserved for the two higher 
levels. In the constitution, some basic elements of their working is 
described. But it is the Land constitutions that in detail regulate how 
communes are supposed to be organised and which assignments they will 
have. The Land constitutions look quite different from each other in 
this field.

There are "Kreise" and "Gemeinde" (the latter here referred to as 
"communes" from a German synonym "Kommune") at the lower level of 
government in Germany. The Kreise is the upper level with a population 
average of in western Germany about 160 000. It has no rights granted to 
it by the federal constitution. The big cities are not a part of the 
Kreis-structure but retain those very functions themselves (as well as 
being communes of course).

The communes in Germany are very small with an average size of 5000 
people. In the 70's, a lot of the communes were amalgamated into bigger 
ones and in eastern Germany, this is a now an ongoing process, more so 
in some Laender (eg Brandenburg) than others (eg Sachsen)(Harding et al, 
1995). It is entirely up to the Laender to decide about the minimum size 
of lower-level governments. In the southern Laender, the stress has been 
on voluntary amalgamation and commune co-operation. In the north, where 
the building of bigger communes has been more common, Norton (1994, 
p 255) says research reports say that management capability has improved 
and the bigger size has opened up more autonomy in the communes' 
decisions. The local level is becoming "an increasingly important part 
of decision-making".8 Less contacts between citizens and councils has 
been one of the disadvantages.

A basic dinstinction between North and South is that in the North, the 
mayor is elected by the council and has assignments separated from the 
administration while in the south (Baden-Wuerttemberg, Bayern) the mayor 
is directly elected by the people (with long term limits) and is head of 
both the administrative and political operation. The new eastern Laender 
have in general taken up the southern model (Grunow, 1992, p 54).

There are usually many possibilities for altering the party lists at 
local elections in Germany. Candidates can be striken out, others added 
and additional votes given to yet others. Also in practise, these 
potentials are taken advantage of. In southern Germany, it is reported 
that only about 20% of the lists are left unchanged! Individual 
councillors are naturally extremely sensitive to voters' feelings 
immidiately before elections (Norton 1994, pp 275-276).

6.2 Direct Democracy in the Communes

The social activism of the 1960's led to more involving the citizens in 
the decision making process at the local level, sometimes as a result 
and compensation of the amalgamations of communes when 276 000 elected 
representatives became 153 000 and thereby contacts between citizens and 
councillors became less frequent.

In many German villages, there is a tradition of discussing matters of 
concern in town meetings. Also here, is the southern German 
participatory tradition the stronger one whereas in Baden-Wuerttemberg 
and in Bayern a stipulated number or proportion of the citizens can 
demand the convening of such meetings.

Most of the Laender give the communes the right to hold decisive local 
referenda. Initiative can be taken from the council or a certain 
percentage of the population. There is a usually provision of a fixed 
number of the electorate participating in the voting. Numbers of course 
differs between the Laender.

Citizens can request an issue to be considered and decided by the local 
council in a popular intitiative. In most cases, it has to be dealt with 
within three months (in Hesse: considered within six months, decided on 
within yet another six months). In some Laender, there is a requirement 
that the initiative is supported by reasons and an estimate of the costs 
of implementation. Because of the sometimes hard criteria for launching 
initiatives and the fact that they can be turned down by the council 
without the people being asked, this a weak control of government. An 
instrument like this is typically used for citizens to be able to 
participate in setting the political agenda without actually give them 
any absolute decision making power (see Hoekstra, 1994).

Baden-Wuerttemberg though, has a unique system with direct activation of 
decisive referendum upon popular demand.9 15% of the voters has to sign 
the petition. A statement of the issue to be decided must be included. 
Also, the backround to the issue and a proposal of how to raise the 
necessary resources must be submitted. The Baden-Wuerttemberg popular 
petition can also be used as a popular veto since it can be directed 
towards a council decision within four weeks of its publication. There 
are a number of matters that are excluded, among those financial 
matters. The council has the power of ruling on admissibility. It can 
anticipate the referendum by themselves adopting the proposal in the 
petition directly. Otherwise, a 30%-quorum of the electorate partipating 
in the voting is needed for the result to be valid.

The Baden-Wuerttemberg system is well-known in local government 
constitution discussions in Germany for its special characteristics. It 
is indeed a model of communal direct democracy by most definitions of 
the name. It features the initiative/petition institution as well as the  
popular veto institution which are the most basic elements of direct 
democracy. At the same time, it is limited and restricted in almost all 
ends.   

6.3 Comparisons & Party Impact

It is important to remember that the typical commune gets two thirds of 
its financial resources from higher levels of government and generates 
only one third itself. Moreover, as in the following paragraphs 
explained more thoroughly, Laender can intervene in communal budgets. 
This means that many other factors than the political system determine 
the economy and in the end maybe even the possibilities to balance the 
budget. It is therefore difficult to make any definite evaluations of 
the economic performance of different communal systems. 

Since 1969, federal aid to communes is undoubtedly within the 
constitution if channeled through the Laender in form of block grants. 
The consensus needed and the indirect grants have been critisised, for 
example for its slowness of decision-making.

The Laender are responsible for providing sufficient financial resources 
to the local authorities. If the budget of a lower-level government is 
failing, the Land is accountable to intervene. It can for example 
directly order taxes or charges to be increased or even appoint a 
commissioner to take over. In the end of the 80's, it was much discussed 
whether the Laender should be allowed to limit local authority 
expenditures but it was politically unacceptable to introduce this 
reform given the notion of the local government's constitutional rights 
(Norton, 1994, p 274).

Still, while we're keeping in mind the reservations made in this 
chapter's first paragraph, the constitutions for local government in 
southern Germany are argued to create more well-balanced budgets. 
Deficit budgets are most common in the north. Norton thinks this 
difference is because of the clear accountability of the mayor in the 
south. The theories we have presented suggest that it is because of the 
direct democracy in Baden-Wuerttemberg (especially) and Bayern. That 
would be in line with for example the studies Horstmann & Schneider 
(1994) refers to. Norton does agree to that it can be because of 
logrolling in government (1994, p 274). This A2 in my survey of public 
choice critisism of pluralistic government (ch 3.2) indicates that 
logrolling is increasing public expenditures.

Attempts to rate different commune models according to performance have 
not been altogether convincing, Norton (1994, p 277) says.10 Yet, later, 
he says that the northern German model has been the most criticised. 
Some reports have recommended its abolition. Many citizens approach the 
mayor directly like he was the executive, despite his lack of formal 
powers. He, in his turn, might have a hard time to do the responsible 
thing and say no and refer them to the chief administrative officer. 
Whether the northern model is more democratic than the southern strong 
mayor system is forcefully contested (op cit, pp 279-280). In Hesse, a 
recent consultative referendum showed a large majority in favor of the 
latter. It is now expected there will be a change towards this system in 
Hesse.

Fried 1976 makes a study on party impact on communal policies in German 
cities. German cities are much varied in their actions when it for 
example comes to taxation, welfare, incurring debts and the employing of 
people. He analyses 53 of the biggest cities - those with 100 000 people 
or more (the three city states are not included). Studies of the 
relation between party and policy have traditionally shown mixed 
results. In many cases, there has been a weak or even (to what was 
expected) contradictory relation (Fried 1976, p 12). Previous studies in 
Germany have shown impact of party either weak or nonexistent. Political 
variables has emerged as weaker than social economic or cultural, in 
explaining differences in policy outcomes (op cit, p 16). Based on 
statements by West German local political leaders, there would on the 
contrary be a very direct impact (ibid).

Fried lists a number of possible explanations for low impact after 
presenting the results of a new study he has made. Some examples of 
these explanations are: much power held by administration or weak 
communal autonomy. He also mentions an "anti-party affect" which would 
be a hostility in German political culture towards strong partisanship 
at the local level, a feeling that it was out of place at that level. 
Maybe the old Weimar time still plays a role (op cit, p 23). And maybe 
it's the Prussian participatory school that rejects too much emphasis on 
party politics. His conclusion though, is that party control indeed 
_does_ play _some_ role over extended periods of power. Of course, a 
later follow-up on this study would tell us more today.

"Germany possess a powerful system of interest group organisation, 
recognized in law and closely linked with political parties.", Norton 
(1994, p 243) writes. It is a corporate pluralism. The interest 
organisations are a recognised part of the institutional system in the 
Laender and large communes and receive support from public revenues. The 
intertwining of interest groups and agencies in government is "an 
outstanding aspect of German political life" (ibid). All this is of 
course a horror for the public choice critics and their ideas as they 
were presented in chapter 3. 

There is a united labor movement in Germany that is quite effective in 
wage negotiations linked with a willingness of businesses to co-operate 
(Norton, 1994, p 247). It is the strong Olson producer groups that co-
operate and definitely get themselves a "greater influence (...) than 
they 'deserve'"as Sloman's category A is expressed in this essay.

There is no clear distinction between policy advice/making between 
ministers and public officials. Party membership has been a condition 
for many civil servant appointments which has brought these officials 
into the parties. There has been an interweaving of the both interests 
and one which can be "impenetrable to outsiders, and sometimes corrupt." 
(Norton, 1994, p 249). This phenomena can be tied to the A5 "agency-
politician links"which might help unefficient governmental agencies 
survive after they have fulfilled their function, as well as of course 
with the A1 general "collective action" problem. Also, this has meant 
that the advisors coming from western Germany to eastern Germany have 
expected to continue the tradition and come to dominate local councils.

A federal law of 1967 has provided exercise of Keynesian counter-cyclic 
policies at the national level and forced Laender and lower level 
governments to conform (Norton, 1994, p 259). This should have increased 
the possibility for political business cycles (B1) and at the same time 
decreased the powers for the Laender to counteract this.

6.4 Communal Reform

Grunow (1992) describes a constitutional reform for local government in 
Nordrhein-Westfalen that at the time of his writing was being prepared. 
The constitution has undergone reform in this respect before. Grunow 
counts eight times between 1948 and 1984, but the basic structure has 
never really been changed. It has been argued that  too many interests 
in social groups or parties would be affected. There could never be a 
consensus or mayby not even a majority for a big change. In some ways, 
this is was still the case in 1992 but yet reform came on the agenda. 
The models from Baden-Wuerttemberg and Bayern are now taken into 
consideration. Until today, Nordrhein-Westfalen has been heavily 
ideologically influenced by the reforms around the amalgamations in the 
70's. The questions of communal size and administrative efficiency have 
been dominant.

In the reform debate, formal interventions of citizens in the decision-
making process is a topic. What also is discussed is a merging of the 
functions of mayor and head of administration, also here from 
inspiration of the southern German model. It is nearly impossible to 
evaluate the overall performance of local government as a consequence of 
constitution, Grunow extends Norton's point (1992, p 50). Many 
intiatives of change stem from the experience of a single case or very 
few ones and many times an experience not even shared by others 
analysts. In almost all instances, there is a contradictory case. Also, 
in processes of change, there is almost always someone winning and 
someone losing. There are therefore different evaluations within a 
specific case.

What is often starting a reform are comparisons and competition between 
comparable models. In Germany, the situation is in some ways good for 
these comparisons with a federal system in which whole sets of communes 
are existing. (As explained above, there are definite problems too.) 
What is of central concern in Nordrhein-Westfalen is a comparison with 
the models in Bayern and especially Baden-Wuerttemberg.

The interesting trait of these systems that Grunow mentions, is the idea 
of the mayor being elected as well as him having strong administrative 
powers (op cit, p 52). One cannot, in this content, look away from the 
direct democracy which was established as a countervailing mechanism 
against the powerful mayor (ibid). But this is not the major reason for 
the Nordrhein-Westfalen interest in Baden-Wuerttemberg. It may be a bit 
strange, looking at the conclusions of writers presented in ch 3.3 of 
this essay, who see clear economic advantages of local direct democratic 
elements, supported by both theory and empiri from other places. The 
fact that the German South balances its budgets better than the North 
adds to the pattern.

Grunow has read Banner who is a proponent of the Baden-Wuerttemberg 
model and is using three criteria for comparison: budgeting, personnel 
policy and citizen policy and thinks the Baden-Wuerttemberg model 
performs better on all counts. Without any more extensive argumenting, 
Grunow says he dosen't buy them, except for the one of balancing the 
budget. He even finds another author that in a comparative empirical 
analysis questions even giving the credit to the Baden-Wuerttemberg 
constitution for this. Once again, it is brought up that the communes in 
Germany are so different in size, location, economic structure and long-
term majorities, that contrasting them to each other gets very hard. Yet 
another author says that the Baden-Wuerttemberg participatory elements 
has allowed development of a specific political culture that can't be 
transported elsewhere. Looking at the continued Land 
comparison/competition trends in Germany, this seems a unspecified 
reason not to try it elsewhere.

6.5 The New Eastern Communes

Grunow (1992, p 46) says that "there are strong interests in East 
Germany to include more participation and decision rights for the 
citizens in the commune constitution." This, he ascribes, like Jung 
(1993) and Haeberle (1993) before in this essay, the experiences of the 
'peaceful revolution' as well as a long binding 1990 DDR law about local 
government. And it is useful to point out that the protest against the 
communist party started with the illusory communal elections in 1989. It 
is only reasonable that any resemblance of those elections is a 
sensitive issue for the eastern Germans who might want something more 
obviously democratic. In general, it has been very obvious that both 
political participation and administrative efficiency are the main 
points for the modelling of local government. Grunow thinks the goals 
are only partially compatible (1992, p 46).

The situation in the eastern German states is quite different from the 
one in Nordrhein-Westfalen because there are completely new constituions 
that must be established. The conserving forces are much weaker. The 
choices have to be thoughtful and weighted selections of specific models 
in western Europe. It can be a new mixture of different elements _or_ 
even a completely new model (within the limits of the federal 
constitution, that is). Grunow (1992, p 53) thinks "this situation can 
lead to a more open impartial review and evaluation of the existing 
alternatives."

One restriction is the 1990 (May 17) DDR law on self-administration. It 
puts a lot of stress on citizen's rights of participation. It is a 
combination of western models with the melding of the tasks of mayor and 
head of administration but the mayor is not directly elected and he's 
forcefully controlled by the council. And "the notion of grassroots 
democracy is much more anchored here than in all models in West 
Germany.", Grunow says (1992, p 54) concerning the content of the DDR 
law.

The Laender have since, been given the right by the federal constitution 
to create their own commune constitutions but the impact of the DDR law 
still appears important. It seems to Grunow (op cit, p 54) that the 
eastern Germans are _not_ willing to accept pressure from western German 
colleagues. And because so much is new, popular support when creating 
new structures and institutions gets important for reasons of legitimacy 
especially. It is difficult to imagine that the power given to the 
people today can be taken away later when eastern Germany has been built 
up. Especially, since a transcendance to the (north) western system now 
would need the explicit approval of the people in many places. Harding 
et al (1995) think that eastern Germans are fast learners in the 
building of institutions and realise that citizens must be made to feel 
part of the process if reforms are to be effective.

So, as touched upon before, there are at least influences, if not 
pressures, from many advisers from the West. It has been desribed as 
'colonisation' of eastern German administration. The "consultants" 
(Harding et al, 1995) have been especially busy coming with suggestions 
for the Land level since the commune level had a few still workable 
elements but have certainly tried to move things here too. It is not so 
strange that the westerners from a certain Land try to sell their model 
since it is the model they know best and probably the one they can give 
best evaluations of.

A partnership has been established between Nordrhein-Westfalen and 
Brandenburg and one of the thoughts of arrangements like these is that 
West will be able to help East. In the case of Sachsen, Bayern and 
Baden-Wuerttemberg are partners. This has been a trend of establishing 
new political frameworks and spreading political experience. It is 
interesting to see if Nordrhein-Westphalen now will transport its model 
to Brandenburg. It basically doesn't seems so, but the big-size commune 
system of Nordrhein-Westphalen has actually already been implemented. 
But keep in mind, as seen by the text about commune amalgamations 
earlier, the bigger size can even be seen as incentives for direct 
democracy, for not losing the popular participation in politics.

Sachsen has chosen the southern German small communes and so not 
reformed the previous standard size very much. Harding et al do an 
interview with the secretary of the "Sachsen city and commune 
association" which is "proud" of the southern German administrative 
strucure and he thereby associates himself with the southern West. My 
analysis is that the southern German commune system is following more 
consistently the ideas of the Rousseau small participatory society, than 
the one of northern Germany (including Brandenburg). And this is also 
persistent with the old Prussian aims where Sachsen is a notable 
example. 

Harding et al (1995) compares Sachsen and Brandenburg when it comes to 
debates in the Land parliament. They see that attention to the wishes of 
the people and other local-level considerations is much more likely to 
be mentioned in Sachsen. In Brandenburg, by contrast, the emphasis is on 
efficiency and technical considerations.

But it would be surprising if the incorporation of East Germany meant a 
one way street in the spreading of policies. The Brandenburg 
participatory solution is an example of a more independent thinking 
(there are other examples, as well) if we disregard the minimum size of 
communes, and is something that is bound to have an impact when 
Nordrhein Westphalen reforms its constitution given the close co-
operation between the two. Also, the events of 1990-1992 have shaken the 
idea of permanence of liberal democratic images of government. 
Supporters of participatory democracy in the West are naturally endorsed 
by the eastern German trends. It is a trend _away_ from the classic 
German emphasis on efficient adminstration. And what is efficient and 
what is not, is not so self-explanatory this essay has shown.

There can be seen a pattern in which efficient city management has 
become the tasks of communes in western Germany while democratic values 
are represented on the Land level. In eastern Germany, this trend is 
quite the opposite, with the small units seen as the basis of democratic 
participation and legitimacy and effiency lays on higher levels (Grunow, 
1992, p 57). As we saw in the section about the Laender, it is clear 
that in the case of western Germany, the Land level is the most 
interesting to study concerning direct democratic institutions. But, 
examining Grunow's statement, we saw that we generally had to go to 
eastern Germany also in the case of most democratic experimenting on the 
German Land level. Especially Brandenburg is an example of a Land 
emphasising participation on the Land level, a little more western 
stylish.

7. Conclusions and Summary

7.1 Limiting Direct Democracy

We have in this essay found many ways direct democratic institutions can 
be limited in their functions. If we leave out the very basic 
differences between what the Germans (and we in this essay) call 
initiative and petition ("begehren"), that are so fundamental that the 
Germans even have separate names for, the limitations can be summarised 
as follows (with the adding of some new information):

1. The popular petition can be requested to include supplements 
explaining reasons behind the petition, estimates of costs and how to 
raise the money needed.
2. In Hessen, two similar petitions cannot be put forward within the 
period of two years on the Land level.
3. The collection of signatures must be approved. First of course, 
necessary quorum has to be fulfilled and names accepted, then the way in 
which they have been collected can be put in question. Lists for 
signatures can't be put in public in whatever way (Degenhart, 1992, p 
84).
4. There may be a whole catolog of issues that are not permitted for 
petition, for example financial matters or changes in constitution (this 
is for example true for Hessen). Especially common is the condition that 
the referendum can't be on anything outside the powers of the 
representative body on the level in question. The proposal is not 
allowed to break neither the Land nor the federal constitution.
5. In the case of the popular veto, the time to collect necessary 
signatures can be more or less short.
6. There may be quite a long time during parliament/council can delay a 
referendum.
7. Parliament or council can also be given a chance to adopt the 
proposal without the other citizens (other than those signing it) are 
given a chance to prevent it (no obligatory referendum). This is very 
common in Germany. One exception is the constitutional petition in 
Bayern.
8. Finally, all sorts of quorum with very harsh voter turnout conditions 
or yes/no-vote percentages or even combinations of the two can be used. 
In Germany, partipation requirements is the rule as opposed to for 
example in Switzerland.

The above could be said to be institutional traps before giving free 
rein to an at first sight very liberal institution to mean much in 
reality. While the tradition in Germany usually has been an approval of 
direct democratic institutions on both Land and commune levels, the 
battle has many times been fought around what the rules regulating them 
would be. Generally in Germany, direct democracy is often circumscribed 
by statutes.

7.2 Some Final Analysis

Germany in general isn't exactly the public choice writers' paradise 
among democratic systems, for example because of the strongholds of 
interest producer groups and firm agency-politician links. But this fact 
should make the reforms even more welcome in tying up the "mess". To the 
extent that the Laender and communes actually have enough discretion to 
have a real impact on German eonomic life, the country (or certain parts 
of it) could be considered a giant experiment testing out some of the 
theories mentioned in this essay. Comparisons between traditionally 
"more representative" Laender like Nordrhein-Westfalen and Niedersachsen 
(conditioned they don't change!) and Brandenburg and Sachsen will be 
increasingly interesting as the new systems stabilise. A thorough 
economic investigation on Laender basis will then be welcome. But, as 
mentioned before, comparing economic performance between different 
systems in the Laender is very difficult since so many divergences of 
all kinds exist and it's not easy to make heads or tails of them. Grunow 
says that it is nearly impossible to evaluate the overall performance of 
local government as a consequence of constitution (1992, p 50).

In this essay, I have obviously put on a pair of glasses with a filter 
emphasising comparison of direct versus traditional representative 
democracy , when reading texts on German politics. Since Germany is such 
a mix of the both, this is maybe something that should be done more 
often than appears to be done in the literature. It seems to be a 
sometimes overlooked aspect, while I in this essay have magnified it 
greatly. If the purpose would have been to study German politics in a 
more general aspect, it would had been too much, but this wasn't the 
aim. The specific purpose was to study the recent direct democratic 
trends. I think my outlook helped me find some patterns not usually 
found, one or them being that the reason the balancing of the communal 
budgets are more successful in southern Germany than in northern might 
be the direct popular control of the people rather than the functions of 
the major. Romer et al (1992), who analysed school budget referenda in 
New York and Steuenberg (1992) studying institutional arrangements 
certainly would agree with the restraining effects of direct democracy, 
which is useful in budget control. This essay has at the same time 
presented several reservations of such a conclusion but the idea is 
still interesting. 

7.3 Summary and Concluding Remarks

There has indeed been a forceful development towards increased use of 
direct democratic institutions in Germany. The sources of literature 
seem to agree and a look at the new constitutions is making it even 
clearer. All eastern German Laender have adopted constitutions with the 
popular petition having a prominent position. In the constitutional 
introductory texts, a true belief of the people being part of government 
is expressed.

The main reason of these developments seem to be the peaceful 
revolutions in East Germany, where a people who once had the power 
cannot let go of it. Actually, the first system of popular law making 
was introduced in a western Land, Schleswig-Holstein, but very much 
possible, inspired by the events in East. There were some extra-ordinary 
circumstances in that Land after the events of a suicide of the leader 
of government followed by the change of power in government. The 
establishment of the Schleswig-Holstein constitution endorced further 
direct democratic developments on the Land level in western and eastern 
Germany.

But the basis for all the direct democratic tendencies can most likely 
be found in the Prussian tradition and from the Weimar republic. Taking 
looks back at different periods of German turbulent history is a 
recurrent theme in the literature. The impact of participatory 
traditions are great, but so are all the warning examples. Much 
discussion appears to be performed in the light of old experiences, even 
ones from long time back. 

The trends were very forceful in the beginning of the 90's with bold 
propositions for Land constitutions, both in Schleswig-Holstein and in 
eastern Germany. The federal constitution was tried to its limits. 
Later, the eastern constitutions conformed more and more to the western 
standards and copied more and more. Yet, the eastern ones are generally 
very forward and now in the lead of constitutional development.

One reason that the East partly has adapted to West is probably the 
partnerships between Laender in the West and ones in the East. Western 
advisors have been sent over and talked about the system _they_ are used 
to. This has been happening both on the commune and Land levels. Also, 
several propositions for new constitutions have come from the West. On 
the commune level, some structures of working arrangements still existed 
that didn't have to be changed, so in some ways, consequences haven't 
been so great at that level.

In comparison to for example the Swiss constitution, all one see in the 
German one is hurdles limiting popular involvement in government. As 
presented in this essay, there are many ways of getting control of too 
excessive popular decision making. Certain kinds of referendum issues 
can be disallowed and difficult requirements of participation can be set 
up, making it even less attractive to even start the procedure to 
collect signatures. This probably explains to a great extent the long 
time almost slumbering direct democracy in most of Germany.

Direct democratic trends are highly visible on the Land level in 
Germany. On the communal level, there are also trends. Baden-
Wuerttemberg is known for its unique model of direct decision making but 
also in the eastern Laender, there are now notable systems, for example 
in Brandenburg and Sachsen. In eastern Germany, the direct democracy is 
leading on the communal level but also important on the Land level. In 
western Germany, direct democratic trends have not moved as far on the 
communal level, but there is some activity.

The message of many new politic-economic authors is very clear.  Many 
of today's economic problems would be smaller if there wasn't an 
indirect link between the citizens and the decisions. On financial 
matters, the direct democracy  is therefore especially valuable. In the 
German constitutions, this has hardly been payed attention to at all, 
though Schleswig-Holstein is an exception. Instead, popular lawmaking on 
financial questions has been disallowed. It appears, history has created 
the foundation for direct democracy in Germany, but it hasn't been of 
any help when it comes to taking into consideration new ideas of 
economic advantages that direct democracy can give. Mixing the old with 
the new looks like a good idea. That is: to mix Rousseau and the new 
politic-economic thinking.

---

Notes

1. DMP (1993, p 411) explains recall as a device existing alongside the 
"two other methods for producing direct democracy, the initiative and 
recall ". Steuenberg (1992, p 502) talks about "three forms of citizen 
influence in representative systems" and then directly refers to Farnham 
who speaks of "initiative, referendum, and recall". There are many other 
examples in the literature.
2. In fact, in Blackwell (1987, p 525), "initiative" is referred to 
_only_ as the coercing form of request of the citizens, quite opposite 
to the ordinary German use of the term.
3. In connection to the total revision of the Swiss constitution, after 
the Swiss citizens by petition have requested so, new elections must 
actually be held (section III, article 120).
4. These points are also similar and correspond individually to 
Mueller's (1989) three chapters 15-17 on pages 277-347.
5. The day before this essay was finished, there was a Swedish opinion 
poll, asking people what they thought about the national budget 
presented by the minister of finance a few days before. This budget was 
generally considered one of the greatest cuts in public expenditure 
since the World War II and many interest organisations like for example 
the national student union were upset. But in the poll of 1000 citizens 
asked (made by Gallup for the news paper "Svenska Dagbladet"), 13%, 
thought the cuts just right, 14% thought them too big and 53% thought 
them too small (Swedish tele-text, Jan 15 1995).
6. Eight initiatives were launched. Two reached referendum. None met the 
condition of 50% electoral participation (Hernekamp, 1979, p 376).
7. "Multi-level federalism" (Harding et al 1995)
8. On the other hand, SOU 1994 (pp 46-47) described the communal power 
as _decreasing_. I interpret this as being in a shorter perspective than 
above.
9. Norton (1994) seems mostly to be talking about western Germany in his 
Handbook, though I never see him expressively confess that the German 
section isn't updated in all the places. I don't have that much 
information about eastern Germany when it comes to the Laender having 
communal systems similar to the one of Baden-Wuerttemberg's, but I see 
frequent suggestions in different sources of literature, this is the 
case.
10. Grunow (1992, p 50) says this is because the situations are so 
different in all aspects, communal size, demography etc.

---

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Appendix

See
http://www.leo.org/info_muc/WWWother/demap-geo.html