"In a democracy, people get the kind of government they deserve"

A bit of counterfactual history: it is 1980, and the Parti Québécois has called a non-binding referendum on Québec's place in or out of the Canadian confederation. Here are the options:

(1) Sovereignty-association (i.e. an independent Québec in a currency union with Canada)

(2) Unencumbered independence (i.e. no currency union)

(3) The status quo

This differs only in one respect from the historical referendum: Option 2 was not on offer. Still, let's imagine that the referendum--which was purely consultative--featured three options, but was conducted under the historical rules. Therefore:

-under the supervision of the chief electoral officer, three committees would have been formed;

-each of the committees would have received equal public funding to conduct its campaign

-total expenditure for each of the committees would have been capped

-equal time for each of the committees would be allotted by broadcaster

-the only other campaign permitted, that of the electoral authorities to explain the purpose and workings of the referendum--that is, the institutional campaign--would have likewise strictly allotted equal space to all three options

The most important outcome of the referendum would have been the same, whatever the number of votes tallied by the three options: the political process was accepted, the vote clean, and the convener--René Lévesque--lost none of the respect he had always received from his political opponents.

This week's Barcelona plebiscite offers none of the guarantees of the 1980 Québec referendum. In response to criticisms that the process was skewed from the outset and money being wasted (it's now clear that €1.3 million was spent on political pantomime, the state disguised as civil society), city hall took out a full page advertisement in Saturday's La Vanguardia, according to which such criticisms are tantamount to "an unacceptable questioning" of the body charged with oversight:

No-one seems to have objected to dissent being labelled "unacceptable". Then again, as Adlai Stevenson is said to have said, "In a democracy, people get the kind of government they deserve."