Local referendum in the Czech Republic

The diploma paper represents a contribution to the research of direct democracy in the Czech Republic, specifically it deals with the most used form of direct citizen participation in governance, local referendum. The paper is mainly empirical - it shows an experience of ten European countries with local referendum as well as the legislative framework and the definition of this instrument in the Czech Republic. The centre point of the whole thesis lies in the real practice and the experience of Czech municipalities with local direct democracy. The data used in this paper come up from research which aimed to collect information on all local referendums in the Czech Republic since 1990. Although this aim has not been fully accomplished, the data allow to study the practice of Czech local referendums. Local referendums are divided into several groups (categories of territorial changes, the environment, issues of internal governance of the municipality and others) within which are further analysed. The aim of the paper is to verify the hypothesis that seeks a relationship among the size of the municipality, subject of voting, quorum and voter turnout. The paper also focuses on the factors that have got fundamental impact on the final result of referendum