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Party government in Europe? Parliamentary and semi?presidential democracies compared

Schleiter, Petra, Morgan-Jones, Edward (2009) Party government in Europe? Parliamentary and semi?presidential democracies compared. European Journal of Political Research, 48 (5). pp. 665-693. ISSN 0304-4130. (doi:10.1111/j.1475-6765.2009.00847.x) (The full text of this publication is not currently available from this repository. You may be able to access a copy if URLs are provided) (KAR id:36496)

The full text of this publication is not currently available from this repository. You may be able to access a copy if URLs are provided.
Official URL:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1475-6765.2009.00847.x

Abstract

Control over government portfolios is the key to power over policy and patronage, and it is commonly understood to lie with parties in European democracies. However, since the democratic transitions of the 1990s, Europe has had nearly equal numbers of parliamentary and semi-presidential regimes, and there is evidence that the ability of parties to control government posts in these two regime types differs. As yet, political scientists have a limited understanding of the scale and causes of these differences. In this article a principal-agent theoretical explanation is proposed. Data are examined on 28 parliamentary and semi-presidential democracies in Europe that shows that differences in party control over government portfolios cannot be understood without reference to the underlying principal-agent relationships between voters, elected politicians and governments that characterise Europe's semi-presidential and parliamentary regimes.

Item Type: Article
DOI/Identification number: 10.1111/j.1475-6765.2009.00847.x
Subjects: J Political Science > JA Political science (General)
J Political Science > JF Political institutions and public administration
J Political Science > JN Political institutions and public administration (Europe)
Divisions: Divisions > Division of Human and Social Sciences > School of Politics and International Relations
Depositing User: Edward Morgan-Jones
Date Deposited: 15 Nov 2013 15:08 UTC
Last Modified: 16 Nov 2021 10:13 UTC
Resource URI: https://kar.kent.ac.uk/id/eprint/36496 (The current URI for this page, for reference purposes)

University of Kent Author Information

Morgan-Jones, Edward.

Creator's ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0231-5156
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