Re-conceptualizing Regime Type

CEUeTDCollection

conclusions. In other words, changes in political conditions must also be taken into account.²²⁵

All this suggests that despite its problems the presidential-parliamentary division remains the most fundamental distinction between democracies.²²⁶ While pure types are rare and some intermediate regime types exist between these two, most regimes fall within these two categories.²²⁷ Moreover, the separation of powers is a viable concept to separate one from the other. However, minor modifications in the content of separation of powers are in order and, to be able to take the political dimension into account, the introduction of an additional dimension is necessary. The next section starts with the explication of this distinction so as to provide a starting point to describing the hypotheses about the effect of regime type on risk-taking.

CEUeTDCollection

only identical with Shugart and Carey’s third criterion, but is also related to the first and second aspect of Shugart and Carey’s definition: why presidents can have a high degree of authority over their subordinates is precisely because constitutionally they face no competition for power within this branch of government and they are untouchable from the outside, because they are directly elected.²²⁹ Hence, they are masters of their house. However, this principle is upset by the idea of collective executives in (pure) presidential systems.

Accordingly, it is not by chance that parliamentary democracies usually go by collective executives and, except for abortive attempts in Uruguay, presidential regimes have single-headed executives.²³⁰

As opposed to this, not only prime ministers but their whole cabinet is responsible to the assembly, which even under strong – prime ministerial – parliamentary government makes the game different from presidential ones: unlike presidents, prime ministers cannot survive without maintaining the support of the parliament and their colleagues. As for the cabinet, its support must be maintained, because cabinet members can remove the prime minister without endangering the party’s or coalition’s majority in parliament. All they have to do in order to outfox the prime minister is to build an alliance among themselves in opposition to the premier. The needs to maintain backbench and cabinet support in parliamentary regimes are two manifestations of the same thing, i.e. executive dependence on the legislature. All in all, prime ministers need some measure of consensus within the executive branch and, thus, are required to bargain within that branch the way presidents must bargain with the assembly.²³¹

In this respect, the nature of the political dynamics within unitary and multi-party coalition governments in parliamentary democracies differs only to a negligible extent. One-party governments are generally described as harmonious and united. Exceptions are made for

229 Hybrid/intermediate regime types are, of course, possible, but the notion of collective/collegial executive does not conform to pure presidentalism.

230 Rockman 1997, 48 and 51.

231 Rockman 1997, 48; Peters 1997, 69.

CEUeTDCollection

political systems with a dominant party (e.g. Japan). Dominant parties are described as parties made up of different factions. However, the unity of every other type of one-party governments is fallaciously overestimated.²³² In other words, because one party governs the country, no natural agreement between members of the governing party should automatically be assumed.

Neither are coalition governments necessarily factional: unity of opinion is possible even among coalition partners over, at least, some issues. Regardless of whether the prime minister leads a one-party or a multi-party government, his job is to maintain support of his coalition. The difference is in the nature of the coalitions. In one party governments an intra-party and in coalition governments an inter-intra-party coalition has to be maintained. How much disagreement may manifest itself within a governing party or among governing parties depends on the factionalization of the party in the former case and in the policy differences among coalition partners in the latter.

Moreover, factionalization is a feature that varies across time and is defined by temporary political constellations. In other words, an additional dimension must be introduced to account for variation due to factors beyond those dealing with formal institutional features.

This – additional – dimension takes care of actual political constraints. Although institutions define the general framework for operation, they leave a lot of room for maneuver. The variation within the institutional framework is better understood by also taking the political constraints into account.

The introduction of this aspect would resolve the difficulty of handling coalition governments as part of the concept of the separation of powers as Peters suggests.²³³ The nature and internal dynamics of coalitions belong to the temporary aspect of political life not

232 See for example Rockman 1997, 55; Mettenheim, Kurt von. 1997. “Introduction: Presidential Institutions and Democratic Politics.” In Kurt von Mettenheim, ed.Presidential Institutions and Democratic Politics. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 10.

233 Peters 1997, 69.

CEUeTDCollection

to the less dynamic, formal political structures that are depicted under the term of separation of powers. Consequently, to include coalition governments into the definition of the separation of powers is stretching the concept too far. Coalition governments and their inner dynamics – rivalry and the instability created – become one particular constellation of the temporary aspect of politics, that is, the amount of division present in a government. It is important to note that it is the division created by coalition governments that is of concern here and not the presence or absence of a coalition, which is due to the electoral formula, and which is part of neither of the two dimensions discussed here.

This second, temporary, dimension corresponds closest to Haggard and McCubbins’

concept of the separation of purpose, that is, the idea that “different parts of the government are motivated to seek different goals.”²³⁴ The separation of purpose is related to both parliamentary and presidential democracies. It may manifest itself between branches that are formally separated or it may rise in parliamentary regimes when the governing party or the governing coalition is divided. Similarly, the separation of purpose may be absent when an assembly and a president work in agreement or when parliamentary governments do not suffer from inter-, or intra-party division.²³⁵

Powers

Separated United

United Mexico Great Britian

Taiwan

Purpose

Separated United States Japan Argentina

Poland Chile

Czech Republic

Table 3. Combination of separations of purpose and powers by Haggard and McCubbins²³⁶

234 Haggard and McCubbins 2001, 3.

235 Haggard and McCubbins 2001, 3-4.

236 Haggard and McCubbins 2001, 4.

CEUeTDCollection

Some modifications must, however, be made to Haggard and McCubbins’s use of the concept of the separation of purpose. What is surprising in their conceptualization is that while their description of the separation of purpose is dynamic, in their categorization of different regimes they apply the concept statically. For instance, they describe Great Britain as unified in both respects and the United States as separated in both respects (table 3). As opposed to this, this dissertation sees both of these dimensions as dynamic.

The relationship is visualized in figure 2. On the horizontal axis (separation of powers) each presidential and parliamentary regime occupies one quasi-permanent position, which may change if constitutional/legal/formal elements relevant to the separation of powers (e.g.

nature of veto power) are altered. The particular constellation of factors that make up the separation of powers – the electoral term, executive-legislative relationship, authority over the cabinet – are nothing else than a given accountability structure.

unified

Presidentialism Parliamentarism

Separation of Powers

separated unified

(pure presidentialism) (pure parliamentarism)

separated

Separation of Purpose

Figure 2. Separation of purpose and powers as continuous variables

Thus, the separation of powers/accountability is a matter of degrees in that, depending on the constitutional configuration, regimes may be placed at different points of the scale, i.e.

CEUeTDCollection

they may demonstrate a constellation of features less or more presidential until the point where presidential features are in minority. In such a case the given regime is defined as primarily parliamentary. But to what degree such a regime is parliamentary is determined by how close it comes to the ideal-type definition of a parliamentary democracy, which is represented at the far right of the horizontal axis and where the executive and the legislative are united. Semi-presidential regimes – regimes with dual executive – would fall in the middle of the scale.

Both presidential and parliamentary democracies have been criticized for the concentration of power in the hands of the chief executive. In the United States, the experience of the Vietnam war era raises scholarly concern over what Arthur Schlesinger called the “imperial presidency”. That is, a permanent shift in the balance of power toward the president and out of the hands of Congress in presidential democracies. In Britain, a similar debate has been going on about the transformation of collective cabinet government into prime ministerial government where the prime minister is no longer first among equals but directs the executive branch as a quasi president. The same debate with regard to parliamentary democracies in general appears as a lamentation over the presidentialization of these regimes.²³⁷ It is not the task of this dissertation to decide whether these arguments are substantiated by evidence. I merely wish to point out that such permanent increase in the powers of the executive in both presidential and parliamentary regimes can be integrated into the present conceptualization of regime types. As embodiments of institutional change, presidentialization of parliamentary democracies and the imperial presidency would appear on

237 See for example Jones 1997, 25-26; Peters 1997, 67-83; Schlesinger, Arthur M. Jr. 1973.The Imperial Presidency. Boston: Houghton Mifflin; Hennessy, Peter. 2000.The Prime Minister. The Office and Its Holders Since 1945. London: Penguin Books, 53-102; Poguntke, Thomas and Paul Webb, eds. 2006.The

Presidentialization of Politics. A Comparative Study of Modern Democracies. Oxford: Oxford University Press;

Foley, M. 1993.The Rise of the British Presidency. Manchester: Manchester University Press.

CEUeTDCollection

the horizontal dimension as a change in the separation of powers, making regimes shift to the left on the horizontal axis.²³⁸

As for the separation of purpose, depending on the actual political situation, each presidential and parliamentary regime may move on the vertical axis. This axis represents the temporary aspect of political life.²³⁹ Overall, separating permanent and temporary features of regimes helps, for instance, overcome the dilemma concerning semi-presidential systems such as France, where depending on whether the government is unified – the president and the prime minister come from the same party – or divided, they are often seen as less or more presidential. According to the present conceptualization, the party identification of presidents and prime ministers falls into the temporary domain, not influencing the long-term semi-presidential characteristics of the regime that would place France around the center of the horizontal axis.