LOCAL REFERENDUMS: AN ALTERNATIVE TO THE ALIENATED-VOTER MODEL.

As Marvin E. Olsen points out in the preceding article, a number of studies of political alienation have shown it to be related to "negativism toward issues that are strongly supported by the majority of the community." In this paper the author attempts to test empirically the proposition that the proportion of protest votes in elections, especially referendum elections, varies directly with turnout. Because his findings do not support this proposition, based to a large extent on the alienated voter concept, he presents a revised statement of the concept. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]