The History of Ethno-National Referendums 1791–2011

Abstract

This article presents an overview of the total number of ethno-national referendums since the French Revolution to the present day. After establishing a typology of referendums, the article goes on to present the trends in their use from the beginning of the eighteenth century to the present day. While referendums are said to be about democratic legitimacy and idealistic principles, the history suggest that short- and long-term political calculations have been the main motivations for holding them and that their overall number have grown, especially in times of geopolitical upheaval.

Notes

1. John McGarry and Brendan O’Leary, “Introduction: The Macro-Political Regulation of Ethnic Conflict,” in John McGarry and Brendan O’Leary, eds., The Politics of Ethnic Conflict Regulation: Case Studies of Protracted Ethnic Conflicts (London: Routledge, 1993), 1–40, and updated in Brendan O’Leary, “Introduction,” in Brendan O’Leary, Ian S. Lustick, and Tom Callaghy, eds., Right-Sizing the State: The Politics of Moving Borders (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), 1–14.

2. Eugène Solière, Le Plébiscite dans l’annexion. Étude historique et critique de droit des gens (Paris: L. Boyer, 1901), 10–11.

3. Ibid., 15.

4. Ibid., 26.

5. Ibid., 26.

6. Johannes Mattern, The Employment of the Plebiscite in the Determination of Sovereignty (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1921), 53.

7. Elie Kedourie, Nationalism (Oxford: Blackwell, 1960), 1.

8. In particular Brendan O’ Leary, “In Praise of Empires Past: Myths and Method in Kedourie's Nationalism,” New Left Review 18: 106–30 (2002).

9. A point forcefully made in Antony D. Smith, The Ethnic Origins of Nations (Oxford: Blackwell, 1986).

10. Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism (Oxford: Blackwell, 1983), 97–99.

11. Cited in G. F. von Martens, Recueil de Principaux traits d’alliance de paix (Göttingen: J. C. Dieterich, 1801), 400–401.

12. Jean Laponce, Le Référendum de souveraineté: Comparisons, Critiques et Commentaires (Laval: PUL, 2010), 21.

13. Cardinal Ressonico quoted in Felix Freudenthal, Die Volksabstimmung bei Gebietsabtretungen und Eroberungen. Eine Studie aus dem Völkerrecht (Erlangen: Th. Blaesing, 1891), 3–4.

14. Johannes Mattern, The Employment of the Plebiscite, 77.

15. Laurence Morel, “Towards a Less Controversial Use of the Referendum, in Europe,” in Michael Gallagher and Pier Vincenzo Uleri, eds., The Referendum Experience in Europe (London: Macmillan, 1996), 68.

16. Ibid., 68.

17. Heinrich Heine quoted in L. Gell Aufbruch der Freiheit (Frankfurth: Nikolai, 1998), 13.

18. Nicoló Machiavelli, “Exhortatio ad capessendam Italiam in libertatemque a barbaris vindicandam,” in Alessandro Capata, ed., Machiavelli: Il Principe (Rome: Newton, 2002), 95.

19. John A. Davies, “Italy: 1796–1870: The Risorgimento,” in George Holmes, ed., The Oxford Illustrated History of Italy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997), 181.

20. Philip Goodhart, “Referendums and Separatism,” in Austin Ranney, ed., The Referendum Device (Washington DC: American Enterprise Institute, 1981), 139.

21. Eugene C. Lee, “The American Experience 1778–1978,” in Austin Ranney, ed. The Referendum Device (Washington DC: American Enterprise Institute, 1981), 46.

22. Mattern, The Employment of the Plebiscite, 119.

23. Laponce, Le referendum de souveraineté, 71.

24. Mattern, The Employment of the Plebiscite, 104.

25. Laponce, Le referendum de souveraineté, 71.

26. John Locke, Second Treatise (Cambridge: Cup, 1988) para. 141.

27. Mattern, The Employment of the Plebiscite, 116.

28. Lord Salisbury, House of Lords Debates, vol. 345, Col. 1311–1312, 19 June 1890.

29. Cited in Mattern, The Employment of the Plebiscite, 112.

30. Ellison Kahn, “On the Road to Republic,” Annual Survey of South African Law 1:1 (1960).

31. Laponce, Le Référendum de souveraineté, 50.

32. George Williams and David Hume, People Power: The History and Future of the Referendum in Australia (Sydney, NSW: University of New South Wales Press, 2010), 7.

33. Colonial parliaments failed to approve the first draft of the constitution and the decision to hold a referendum was only reached after the members of a constitutional convention had been elected. See: Stuart MacIntyre, The Concise History of Australia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 136.

34. Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) Federation Fact Sheet 1 - The Referendums 1898–1900, (n.d.), http://www.aec.gov.au/About_AEC/Publications/Fact_Sheets/factsheet1.htm (Accessed 30 June 2011).

35. Alfred Deakin, Commonwealth Parliamentary Debates 4: 4807 (1901).

36. MacIntyre, The Concise History, 138.

37. Karl Nordlund, The Swedish-Norwegian Union Crisis. A History with Documents (Uppsala: Student Literature, 1905), 365.

38. N. Eden, Sweden for Peace (Uppsala: Student Literature, 1905), 23.

39. Per Egil Hegge, “Christian Michelsen: Slagkraft Ja – Dokumentlesning: Nei” [Powerful: Yes Document reading: No], in Gudleiv Forr, Per Egil Hegge and Olav Njolstad, eds., Mellem Plikt og Lyst: Norske Statsministre 1873–2010 (Oslo: Dinamo Forlag, 2010), 97.

40. This quality is, perhaps, best defined by Hannah Arendt. According to her definition, Virtù is “the excellence with which man answers the opportunities the world opens up before him in the guise of fortuna. Its meaning is best rendered by ‘virtuosity’, that is, an excellence we attribute to the performing arts (as distinguished from the creative arts), where accomplishment lies in the performance itself and not in the end product which outlasts the activity that brought it into existence and becomes independent of it. The virtuoso-ship of Machiavelli's Virtù, reminds us, although Machiavelli hardly knew it, that the Greeks always used such metaphors as flute-playing, dancing, healing, and seafaring to distinguish political from other activities, that is, that they drew their analogies from those arts in which virtuosity of performance is decisive”; Hannah Arendt, Between Past and Future: Eight Exercises in Political Thought (London: Penguin, 1977), 153.

41. See the classic study: Sarah Wambaugh, Plebiscites since the World War (Washington, DC: The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1933).

42. J. L. Snell, “Wilson on Germany and the Fourteen Points,” Journal of Modern History 26(4): 364–69 (1954).

43. Woodrow Wilson quoted in Lawrence T. Farley, Plebiscites and Sovereignty: The Crisis of Political Legitimacy (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1986), 3.

44. Vernon Bogdanor, “Referendums and Separatism II,” in Austin Ranney, ed., The Referendum Device (Washington DC: AEI, 1981), 145.

45. Ibid., 140.

46. George Williams and David Hume, People Power: The History and Future of the Referendum in Australia (Sydney, NSW: University of New South Wales Press, 2010), 8.

47. Arnold J. Zurcher, “The Hitler Referenda,” American Political Science Review 29(1): 95 (1935); emphasis added.

48. J. H. Goodlad, “The Faroese Road to Autonomy: An Analysis of the Faroese Political System,” Shetland Life: 1–26 (1987).

49. William B. Ballis, “The Pattern of Sino-Soviet Treaties, 1945–1950,” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 277 (Report on China; Sept.): 167–76 (1951).

50. D. Nohlen, F. Grotz, and C. Hartmann, Elections in Asia: A Data Handbook, vol. II (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), 490.

51. Martin Meredith, The State of Africa: A History of Fifty Years of Independence (London: The Free Press, 2005), 57.

52. “Proclamation des résultats du référendum d’autodétermination du 1er juillet 1962” [Proclamation of the result of the referendum on independence], Journal Officiel de l’État, 6 July 1962.

53. Darsie Gillie, “Vote Relieves Pressure of Ex-Generals,” The Guardian, A1 (1961); see also “Editorial: De Gaulle Well Satisfied with Algeria Votes,” Manchester, The Guardian, 9 Jan., A8 (1961).

54. Gillie, “Vote Relieves Pressure,” A1.

55. “De Gaulle Well Satisfied with Algeria Votes,” A8.

56. Georg W. F. Hegel, Vorlesungen über die Philosophie der Geschichte [Lectures on the history of philosophy] (Frankfurt: Suhrhampf, 2011), 29.

57. Matthew Craven, “Statehood, Self-Determination and Recognition,” in Malcolm D. Evans, ed., International Law, 3rd edition (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), 234.

58. Jonathan Steele, “Nation Building in East Timor,” World Policy Journal 19(2): 76–87 (2002).

59. Edward Hallet Carr, The Conditions of Peace (New York: Macmillan, 1942), 39.

60. U. O. Umozurike, Self-Determination in International Law (Hamden: Archon, 1972), 162.