THE CONSEQUENCES OF INVALIDATING THE CONSTITUTIONAL REFERENDUM IN THE CURRENT ROMANIAN LAW
THE CONSEQUENCES OF INVALIDATING THE CONSTITUTIONAL REFERENDUM IN THE CURRENT ROMANIAN LAW

Summary/Abstract: The Romanian Constitution adopted participatory democracy as a form of society organization which would associate some elements of direct democracy to the rules of representative democracy. To this end, it was stated that the people’s sovereignty is exercised not only through elected representatives, but also through referendum. The situations in which a referendum can be called are limited to three instances (revision of the Constitution, dismissal of the President of the Republic and expression of the popular will around issues of national interest), while the imperative mandate is void and certain fields (fiscality, foreign affairs, amnesty and pardon) are excluded from the exercise of the legislative initiative right. Accordingly, the referendum can be consultative or decisional, facultative or mandatory. Romanian law also distinguishes between the content of the referendum answer and its legitimacy, establishing, in the light of the latter, certain referendum validity criteria. In the situation in which the referendum is not valid, or when a valid answer to the question could not be offered by citizens, no effects can be attached to either answer alternatives offered, because if the whole is not valid the parts are also not valid. When the reason of invalidation is absenteeism, the votes which were not expressed cannot be added to the negative answer, as the people who do not participate to the vote do that because they know they are a minority and try to block the decision of the majority, or because they choose to delegate their voting right to those participating to the ballot, a priori accepting the decision of the majority, regardless of what it is. As the law does not offer a special protection, nor a preference, to the blocking minority, the only solution in such conditions is a repetition of the referendum.

• Details
• Contents