Trevor Ritchie (author)
Gary Wilson (thesis advisor)
Tina Fraser (chair)
Michael Murphy (committee member)
Greg Halseth (committee member)
Gregory Poelzer (committee member)
University of Northern British Columbia Political Science (Degree granting institution)

2020

Master of Arts (MA)

Political Science

1 online resource (v, 116 pages)

Democracy serves as a governing philosophy where decisions are made by a vote of the population. Due to the large numbers of citizens who live in modern democracies, this is mainly done through elections to legislative assemblies as a form of representative democracy. But representative democracy does not always ensure policy alignment between citizens and elected representatives. Citizen initiatives serve as a means of promoting greater policy alignment by allowing citizens to propose their own legislation, to be voted on by the electorate. This thesis investigates why British Columbia chose to enact citizen initiative alone among Canadian provinces, and also why British Columbia’s policy was written with the provisions and constraints that elected representatives chose to include. The research shows that key individuals in power used their influence to advocate for citizen initiative in the province, and that British Columbia’s citizen initiative process was written to accommodate constitutional requirements and public opinion on what citizen initiative should look like.

Political participation.
British Columbia.
Political participation--British Columbia--Case studies.
Democracy.
Political activists--British Columbia.

10.24124/2020/59130

thesis