The Law on Referendum, which is the first of its kind in Vietnam, was passed in November 2015 and entered into force on July 1^st 2016, also less than two years ago.

The Law aims to promote democracy and the role of the people as masters and diversify forms of practicing direct democracy. It should create a solid legal foundation for the people to be directly involved in state governance.

As Switzerland has a long experience with direct democracy, the Embassy of Vietnam in Bern has mandated the Institute to receive a delegation of the Vietnamese Lawyers Association which makes a study tour in Switzerland in order to get more information about the practical implementation of direct democracy.

At the Institute of Federalism, Nicolas Schmitt gave to the nine members of the delegation a lecture called « Political rights in Switzerland: Federalism and Direct Democracy » which describes in theory, but also in practice, the quite unique but also complicated mechanism of direct democracy in federal Switzerland, which consists of referendum but also Landsgemeinde and initiative, at the federal, cantonal and local level. The Vietnamese lawyers have discovered with a certain surprise that – to take 2017 as an example – Swiss citizens have voted on 7 topics at the federal and 80 topics at the cantonal level.

More information about referendum in Vietnam can be found here.