Presidents, Parties, and Prime Ministers: How the Separation of Powers Affects Party Organization and Behavior

by David J. Samuels , Matthew S. Shugart

• ISBN13: 9780521689687
• ISBN10: 0521689686
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2010-05-24
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

This book provides a framework for analyzing the impact of the separation of powers on party politics. Conventional political science wisdom assumes that democracy is impossible without political parties, because parties fulfill all the key functions of democratic governance. They nominate candidates, coordinate campaigns, aggregate interests, formulate and implement policy, and manage government power. When scholars first asserted the essential connection between parties and democracy, most of the world's democracies were parliamentary. Yet by the dawn of the twenty-first century, most democracies had directly elected presidents. Given this, if parties are truly critical to democracy, then a systematic understanding of how the separation of powers shapes parties is long overdue. David J. Samuels and Matthew S. Shugart provide a theoretical framework for analyzing variation in the relationships among presidents, parties, and prime ministers across the world's democracies, revealing the important ways that the separation of powers alters party organization and behavior - thereby changing the nature of democratic representation and accountability.

Author Biography

David J. Samuels is the Benjamin E. Lippincott Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Minnesota.
Matthew S. Shugart is Professor in the Department of Political Science and the School of International Relations and Pacific Studies, University of California, San Diego.

Table of Contents

Preface and Acknowledgments	p. ix
Introduction	p. 1
Democracies with Elected Presidents Are Now in the Majority	p. 4
The Comparative Study of Political Parties and the Missing Variable of Regime-Type	p. 7
Clues from Existing Research	p. 12
"Presidentialized" versus "Parliamentarized" Parties	p. 14
Outline of the Book	p. 18
Political Parties in the Neo-Madisonian Theoretical Framework	p. 22
Democratic Regimes and the Neo-Madisonian Framework	p. 25
Parties in the Neo-Madisonian Framework	p. 34
Situating Parties within the Separation of Powers	p. 36
President-Party Relationships under Semi-Presidentialism	p. 39
Party Dilemmas under the Separation of Powers	p. 46
Conclusion	p. 53
Cohabitation in Semi-Presidential Systems - Cases and Data	p. 55
Insiders and Outsiders: Madison's Dilemma and Leadership Selection	p. 62
Defining Insiders and Outsiders	p. 65
Insiders versus Outsiders: Hypotheses	p. 68
Career Paths of Insiders and Outsiders	p. 72
Limits of Presidentialization in Hybrid Regimes	p. 83
Conclusion	p. 90
Constructing the Database on Leaders' Career Paths	p. 91
Constitutional Design and Intraparty Leadership Accountability	p. 94
Firing Party Agents under Parliamentarism	p. 95
Firing Prime Ministers under Semi-Presidentialism	p. 98
Firing a Directly Elected President	p. 108
Conclusion	p. 120
Electoral Separation of Purpose within Political Parties	p. 123
Electoral Separation of Purpose: The Physical Separation of Votes	p. 126
Sources of Variation in Electoral Separation of Purpose	p. 128
Measuring Electoral Separation of Purpose	p. 130
Illustrative Examples of Electoral Separation of Purpose	p. 132
The Global Extent of Electoral Separation of Purpose	p. 142
Conclusion	p. 150
Sources for District-Level Electoral Data	p. 152
Countries and Elections Included	p. 159
The Impact of Constitutional Change on Party Organization and Behavior	p. 162
Constitutional Reforms and Expectations for Party Adaptation	p. 164
Presidentialized Parties in France	p. 170
Presidentialized Parties in Israel	p. 179
Conclusion	p. 190
Parties' "Presidential Dilemmas" in Brazil and Mexico	p. 193
Presidential Dilemmas in Brazilian Parties	p. 194
Presidential Dilemmas in Mexican Parties	p. 204
Conclusion	p. 215
Presidents, Prime Ministers, and Mandate Representation	p. 218
Parties, Presidents, and Political Representation	p. 222
Policy-Switching or Mandate Representation: A Global Exploration	p. 231
Conclusion	p. 247
Conclusion	p. 249
Semi-Presidentialism Is More Presidential Than Parliamentary	p. 255
Pure Types and Hybrids: Implications of Trends in Constitutional Design	p. 257
The Research Agenda	p. 262
References	p. 265
Index	p. 289
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