As a Swiss and living within the Swiss political system I firmly believe that laws alone can never be enough to keep people from getting too much power. Instead, implementing and defending a democracy that actually deserves its name, as in a system where the majority of people keep the last say in the law making process, instead of just letting them delegate that right every few year, is what keeps the system stable and everyone in check. Besides the direct effect on the law, this has two positive effects that most people don't quite seem to grasp when arguing about direct vs. indirect democracy:
- People tend to be more content with the laws they need to follow. Even if they lost on a vote its easier to accept in a system where its an actual majority behind it instead of just some removed cabal that you can only elect based on some pamphlet information every few years.
- Politicians in such a system tend to think ahead in terms of what can and cannot be popular with the people. They do so not only for the election years (which don't have that great of an importance here, not only because of direct democracy but also because of the way our federal government is formed by all major parties) but whenever delicate issues are coming up. One example I'd attribute to this effect is our liberal online piracy laws and our seemingly better protected privacy. When we had our own small scale Snowden affair in the 80ies it blew up into a huge scandal leading to the resignation of a federal council member ('Fichenaffäre', http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secret_files_scandal).
- People tend to be more content with the laws they need to follow. Even if they lost on a vote its easier to accept in a system where its an actual majority behind it instead of just some removed cabal that you can only elect based on some pamphlet information every few years.
- Politicians in such a system tend to think ahead in terms of what can and cannot be popular with the people. They do so not only for the election years (which don't have that great of an importance here, not only because of direct democracy but also because of the way our federal government is formed by all major parties) but whenever delicate issues are coming up. One example I'd attribute to this effect is our liberal online piracy laws and our seemingly better protected privacy. When we had our own small scale Snowden affair in the 80ies it blew up into a huge scandal leading to the resignation of a federal council member ('Fichenaffäre', http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secret_files_scandal).