the left party in switzerland submits a popular initiative each year even though chances are small those will actually be implemented. each time they do they shift the overton window to the left and change the whole public discourse on crucial issues

the reason the left is losing to the right here is because the right submits initiatives MUCH more frequently, and they are MUCH more ridiculous/radical, with a far lower chance of succeeding

for instance, the right wing wanted to have a ridiculously low quota of immigrants being accepted into the country. the proposal did not get implemented, BUT the swiss gov agreed on a compromise, which made the immigration process like hell here

obviously the right has much more money, but that doesn't detract from the evidence (corroborated over and over again) that these pushes to the left/right WORK, and they seem to work the less abstract an idea is, and the more radical the change it promises

why? my guess is that these cause the most publicity and more people are agitated into having an opinion on those issues. also, it's just negotiation psychology 101: making a bold proposal sets an anchor ("anchoring effect"), people have less cognitive dissonance to compromise

that's how i and a lot of ppl i know became leftists at a very young age: the left proposed to prohibit companies to pay their executives 12x the wage of the lowest paid employee. a radical proposal, ppl slammed the left for being "utopian". it failed ofc, but we became leftists

there is a lot of research on how these initiatives (esp the ones with lots of publicity) are effective. to establish direct causality between these proposals and subsequent policy success is obv difficult (may be years apart, multivariate), evidence clearly suggests that it does

but guess what? sometimes they SUCCEED because the mere action of fighting for those issues changes stuff, makes some ppl afraid of being exposed as not 'really' staying loyal to constituents, & so on. fighting is not fighting if victory is assured, you fight bc it's right