The citizens are stirring on both sides of the Atlantic in defence of democracy. In the US an eminent group, including Michael Rattner, Gore Vidal, Ramsey Clark and many others has just set up the International Endowment for Democracy - an appeal for  international help that "asks the people of the world to contribute towards helping to save (and institute for the first time) democracy in the United States."

It only hurts when you laugh. Meanwhile, in Europe, where electorates appear to be equally turned off by the kind of representative democracy they have to live under, direct democracy is flourishing, according to a new report in Accountancy Business and the Public Interest, a journal that may not, hitherto, have been everybody's favourite beach read. This issue, though, is worth checking out for the substantial report on direct democracy in five countries in Europe, downloadable free here.