Turnout and Legitimacy in Referendums in a Deeply-Divided Society

• In Event: Poster Session: Comparative Politics

Abstract

Under what conditions will citizens in deeply divided societies accept the legitimacy of results in popular referendums on important and divisive political issues? We seek to identify how four factors that commonly vary across referendums influence the public’s willingness to have the government implement legislation that is consistent with the outcome of the referendum. The specific factors we study are the percentage of voters who turn out to vote in the referendum, whether or not voters personally agree with the outcome, the size of the majority supporting the winning side in the referendum, and whether or not the outcome within a voter's local constituency matched the overall outcome of the referendum.

Referendums can be the basis for important public policy decisions, from legalizing marijuana to leaving the European Union. In this paper, we look at a hypothetical unification referendum in Northern Ireland. We will present a conjoint experiment, fielded in Northern Ireland in 2023. We utilize a conjoint experimental design in which survey respondents are shown different descriptions about the outcome of a hypothetical referendum. We randomly manipulate the information shown to respondents regarding the overall result of the referendum, the local-level result of the referendum, the size of the overall majority, and the overall level of turnout. We then ask respondents if they believe that the government should implement the results of the referendum.

Authors

• Andrew Kirkpatrick, Christopher Newport University

• Donald Michael Beaudette, Oxford College of Emory University