1,721,016 research outputs found
Cabinet Reshuffles in Parliamentary Democracies: A Typology and Framework for Comparative Analysis
No full textWhile previous research on cabinet reshuffles has offered valuable distinctions in terms of their timing, other defining features of reshuffles have largely escaped comparative inquiry. This article seeks to develop a more complete comparative assessment of cabinet reshuffles in parliamentary systems that reaches beyond the ‘classic’ samples of Westminster democracies. We seek to distinguish different ‘types’ of cabinet reshuffles that account for several key features, namely: the mode, the scope, the key principal and the party dimension of reshuffles. The usefulness and validity of this typology are demonstrated by a comparative assessment of cabinet reshuffles in four major West European parliamentary democracies. The conceptual distinctions and related empirical observations offered in this article should prove valuable, in particular when it comes to gauging the likely political and policy effects of different types of cabinet reshuffles, and should, ultimately, provide the foundations of a theory of comparative cabinet reshuffles
The Comparative Politics of Cabinet Reshuffles
No full textThis special collection is devoted to cabinet reshuffles, which are understood as personnel-related changes within the lifetime of a cabinet. Scholars agree that cabinet reshuffles matter in many respects. To begin, they may shape intra-governmental relations, by either intensifying or helping solve cabinet conflicts. Further, they are important instruments for party leaders to promote or demote party representatives, with far-reaching possible consequences for the party and beyond. Last but not least, reshuffles may be used to increase governmental efficiency and often trigger policy change. The ever-increasing personalization of politics has fuelled the public interest in any ministerial personnel-related issues, and turned cabinet reshuffles into events of undisputed political and scholarly relevance. Despite the apparent importance and ubiquity of reshuffles, the international literature displays at least two major flaws: first, a lack of systematic comparison across countries and regimes and second, a strong notional and empirical bias towards Westminster democracies. This collection seeks to overcome these weaknesses and their limiting effects on the knowledge and understanding of key aspects of executive politics and executive–legislative relations. With that aim, it gathers novel comparative research on the different types, causes and effects of cabinet reshuffles in a variety of democratic and authoritarian systems. The theoretical approaches and empirical findings of the six articles featured mark a major contribution to the scholarship on political executives and executive elites in the contemporary world. This introductory piece offers a succinct historical overview of cabinet reshuffles in different contexts, and the study thereof
Interessengruppen und Interessenvermittlung : Internationale Gemeinsamkeiten und österreichische Besonderheiten
No full textInteressengruppen und Interessenvermittlung: Internationale Gemeinsamkeiten und österreichische Besonderheiten
No full textPolitical Careers of Ministers and Prime Ministers
No full textThe concept of career, while ubiquitous in elite research, has hardly received any comprehensive analytical treatment in the study of political executives. This chapter will summarize and develop the basic theoretical and methodological approaches as well as empirical findings of studies investigating political careers of cabinet members in democratic parliamentary and semi-presidential systems at the national level. It is divided into three sections. The first provides a sketch of the basic research questions that have been raised (and discussed) in the field of executive careers studies over the past decades. The second part offers a systematic survey of the current state of the literature concerned with ministers’ and prime ministers’ political careers. The third section presents some avenues for future research, including the potential for further theoretical and methodological improvement, followed by some concluding remarks
Cabinet Decision-Making in Parliamentary Systems
No full textThis chapter deals with the internal decision-making process of political executives in parliamentary systems, that is, how executives take their own collective decisions. The focus is on the cabinet system as a whole, including both cabinet members and other involved party-political and bureaucratic actors. In particular, the chapter reviews literature’s debates about the nature of cabinet government, the role of prime ministers, and variations of decision-making. A special attention is payed to factors explaining intra-cabinet power distribution and the choice of different decision-making arenas. After introducing the topic, an overview of conceptual issues and main research questions is provided. Subsequently, the work discusses the way in which scholars have addressed these issues and the findings they have reached. The final part stresses existing deficits and seeks to set the agenda for future research
The socio-cultural foundation of opposition strategies in parliament
Full text linkParliamentary opposition plays a central role within a functioning representative democracy. However, research on it seems to lack theoretical progression and outlook. Attempts to develop Dahl’s (1966) initial theoretical work further are scarce; most recent works by Blondel (1997), and Helms (2004) share Dahl’s approach of referring exclusively to constitutional and institutional aspects of opposition, determined by a countries political, party and electoral system. I will argue on the basis of own research that there is need to add another dimension which considers individual parties’ ideology, history, the party group members’ socio-economic background, their informal rules of engagement etc., as well as more recent theories on agenda-setting (Döring 2005) and veto-player rights (Tsebelis 1995). My research on opposition parties in the Bavarian State parliament (Steinack 2006, 2007) shows contrasting behaviour patterns of the different party groups: While the Social Democrats focused on a strategy of matter-of-fact cooperation and in some controversial legislative cases sought to intermediate, the Green party group chose confrontational power politics which had their main effect outside of parliament. Those significant differences raise the question to what extent party identities and policies coincide with the preference of one opposition strategy over another
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