Procedural Congruence and the Delegate-Trustee Dilemma

Abstract

There is a well-known tension between the role of representatives as either trustees or delegates. This tension is also present when representatives interpret advisory direct democratic procedures. Should the representatives follow the opinions of their voters, or should they follow their own convictions? Previous research has shown that the legitimacy of a majority-rule procedure, as perceived by the general population, is dependent on the turnout, the size of majority, and the favorability of the outcome. In this article, we investigate whether elected representatives assess referendumresults differently from their voters. To study this form of elite-citizen procedural congruence, we compare a survey experiment sent to all elected representatives in Norway (N= 4231) with aprobability-based survey of the general population (N= 1568).