Prof. Sam Lehman-Wilzig: Reviving Israeli Democracy by Expanding It
Last week (https://israelseen.com/prof-sam-lehman-wilzig-a-one-branch-democracy-is-not-rooted/), I examined the steady “takeover” of the Legislative Branch of government by the Executive Branch in Israel as well as in the U.S. – and the resulting danger facing their respective democratic systems. The question then becomes: how to ameliorate such a dangerous tendency? My answer: fortify democracy from a different direction.
“Democracy” means “power to the people” (demos kratos). Given this term’s generality, there’s a practical question: “how to ensure such people power?” This has become especially relevant in Israel’s recent past given the disconnect (as seen in periodic polls over many months) between a large majority of the country’s citizens and their government, on an array of issues: 1) Returning all the hostages by ending the war in Gaza; 2) Forming an official Commission of Inquiry to examine all the factors leading up to the Oct. 7, 2023 disaster; 3) Legislating a law that mandates ultra-Orthodox men being drafted into the IDF, accompanied by significant financial (or criminal) penalties for any who refuse; 4) Halting the “Judicial Reform/Revolution.” In all four cases, a clear majority (for the first three, closer to 70%!) of the Israeli public are opposed to the government’s policy.
The Israeli government’s public response: “we won the election and maintain a clear majority in the Knesset; if you want change, wait until late 2026 when new elections will be held.” That’s technically correct under Israel’s present system. But there’s nothing sacrosanct about such a system (or any other, for that matter); indeed, democracy has many faces. Almost all have somewhat different ways of enabling “people power” to work, whether in the overall system (parliamentary versus presidential), or in some addition to elections as a safeguard against deeply unpopular governmental policy.
Some examples: Thirteen U.S. states have a provision enabling a ballot measure that gives voters a chance to call for a convention without collecting signatures or seeking legislative approval. Five states (Alaska, Hawaii, Iowa, New Hampshire, and Rhode Island) automatically provide the chance to vote for a convention every 10 years. (If you are wondering whether this can be used by President Trump to run for a third term in 2028 by changing the Constitution’s 25th Amendment two-term restriction, the answer is no: only the state legislatures – 2/3 of them – can decide to ask Congress for such a change, and then 3/4 of the states have to approve it; a very long shot, given that the Democratic Party holds the reins in more than 1/3 of the state legislatures.)
Perhaps more germane to Israel is the Swiss system. The federal government holds up to four elections per annum, with 6-12 referenda measures each year. Its democracy works extremely well, despite the country being divided into dozens of cantons with four different languages – not a monolithic society at all. Another highly diverse country, Italy, also allows any law to be put to a popular referendum; there have been dozens successfully doing so since 1948.
Referenda on specific policies are not the only way to empower the citizenry between elections (details are open to change; the general idea is what’s important). Forcing electoral “recall” is no less important. This is almost impossible in a “presidential” system that almost always sets a strict tenure for elections, as in the U.S. (2 years for the House of Representatives, 4 years for President, 6 years for the Senate). But in a parliamentary system (e.g., Israel’s) where elections can be held at any juncture – and most of the time they are in fact held before the end of the government’s term – empowering the citizenry to force new elections entails no systemic barrier.
How would that work? For new elections to be called (not by the already existing Knesset vote of “constructive no confidence” in the government in which the Knesset majority has to also designate who will be the new prime minister and the governing coalition), a super majority of all voting-eligible citizens (e.g., 60%) would have to sign a petition calling for new elections. The onus of gathering the initial signatures would be taken on by willing citizens or any legally recognized non-profit institution. After it gained the required number of signatures, it would be vetted and approved by Israel’s official Elections Commission to ensure that the requisite number of signatures was reached.
The greatest argument against enabling different forms of in-between-election “people power,” is the fear of populist sentiment overturning important civil rights or other democratic fundamentals. There are two main ways to ensure that it won’t happen. First, the bar for any change – whether calling for early elections, negating recent legislation, or directing future government policy – should be set quite high, as in the required 60% super majority mentioned above. Second, assuming that a country has a written Constitution (almost all do), any changes or additions to it would have to go through even more rigorous procedures or an even higher public majority (e.g., 75%). Israel has several Basic Laws, already comprising 90% of what would be included in any Constitution.
Of course, there’s one major obstacle in the way of any of the above procedures: they have to be legislated into law – precisely by the people (legislators!) who would be losing their present exclusive authority to pass laws and set policy. How can this be overcome? A major party would have to put “people power” on their agenda – a strategy that should be quite popular with the populace. Israel today already has one party called “The Democrats” (ha’demokratim) and another party (officially nameless but being put together by former PM Naftali Bennett who leads in the polls) standing for greater transparency – and playing by the traditional rules of the game.
Israelis are easily among the most politically knowledgeable (and involved) citizens in the entire democratic world. The time has come to enable them to use their political judgement more often than once every four years.
