A New Year’s Resolution for Political Scientists: Stop Saying That Parliamentarism “Fuses” The Executive and Legislature

Posted on 2017/12/31 by J.W.J. Bowden

Introduction: A Lazy and Stupid Metaphor 

Political scientists like taking shortcuts and writing in shorthand. But sometimes, these cause them to get hopelessly lost rather than shortening their journey toward fact and truth.

For instance, too many political scientists of the 20th and 21st centuries — especially those dealing in comparative politics — try to explain parliamentary systems of government not in and of themselves but, instead, implicitly in opposition to presidential systems of government. [1] Consequently, they have committed a categorical error by claiming that parliamentarism “fuses” the executive and legislature together. They use this metaphor of fusion, presumably taken from physics, in order to explain the confidence convention in particular, and to contrast parliamentary government in general to the strong and strict separation of powers which characterizes presidential-congressional systems of government.

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Posted in Reaffirmation of, Responsible Government, Separation of Powers | 4 Comments

How Early General Federal Elections Can Be Held in Germany

Posted on 2017/11/26 by J.W.J. Bowden

The Grand Coalition of the Social Democrats and Christian Democrats straddles the center-left and center-right like the Colossus of Rhodes and leaves no credible opposition as an alternative government in its wake.

Introduction

Germans elected a new parliament on 24 September 2017. The main center-right and center-left parties, the Christian Democrats and Social Democrats, both lost ground to the far-right Alternative for Germany and the far-left, aptly named The Left. The Free Democrats, a pro-business liberal party, won back the presence and representation that they lost in 2013, and the Greens also made gains.

From 2005 to 2009 and from 2013 to 2017, Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats governed in Grand Coalition with the Social Democrats. From 2009 to 2013, the Christian Democrats entered into a more ideologically compatible coalition with the Free Democrats. In 2017, the Christian Democrats won a plurality of seats and sought to form another coalition, but the Social Democrats refused to continue their previous arrangement and instead sought to become the official opposition. The Christian Democrats entered into negotiations with the Free Democrats and Greens — since all three would need to coalesce in order to form a parliamentary majority.

On 20 November 2017, coalition talks between these three parties broke down after the Free Democrats withdrew. The German media then discussed the possibility that Germans would have to go to polls in an early election in 2018.[1] Incumbent Chancellor Angela Merkel herself reportedly favours this possibility.[2] Most of these media articles did not comment on precisely how the Basic Law allows for early elections under limited circumstances or delve into discussions of constructive non-confidence and confirmation voting. Essentially, there are two possibilities for how an early election can occur in Germany, and I’ve outlined them below.

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Posted in Comparative, Confirmation Voting, Constructive Non-Confidence, Fixed-Date Elections, Government Formation in Germany & Austria | 1 Comment

Premier Gallant and the Early Dissolution That Wasn’t

Posted on 2017/10/28 by J.W.J. Bowden

Introduction

 On Friday, 20 October 2017, CBC journalist Jacques Poitras reported on a strange, ambiguous press release  from the Liberal Premier of New Brunswick, Brian Gallant, and speculated what it might mean. The original press release said that the Premier would meet with the Lieutenant Governor on Monday.[1] This coy phrasing kicked off speculation that the Premier might intend to advise an early dissolution. However, Poitras correctly surmised that the cryptic wording alluded to an upcoming prorogation, short intersession, and new Speech from the Throne.[2]

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Posted in Dissolution, Fixed-Date Elections | 2 Comments

New Brunswick’s Legislative Assembly Needs to Do Better

Posted on 2017/10/27 by J.W.J. Bowden

Public Records Must Be Freely Available 

I discovered by attempting to research New Brunswick’s fixed-date election law that the Legislative Assembly of New Brunswick has not uploaded its Debates, Journals, or committee transcripts online. All the other provincial and territorial legislative assemblies make these records freely and publicly available online. Worse still, the Legislative Library of New Brunswick has failed even to send hard copies of its Journals to university libraries since 2005, and it hasn’t sent copies of the Debates since long before then. In other words, New Brunswickers cannot access basic information that would allow them to hold their government and legislative assembly to account. I e-mailed the Speaker of the Legislative Assembly of New Brunswick and requested all records pertaining to the province’s fixed-date election law, which entered into force in 2007. The library did indeed send me all this information promptly. Consequently, Speaker Chris Collins took to Twitter in a vain attempt to shame me publicly for my earlier jokes about the inadequacies of New Brunswick’s record-keeping. He said:

I replied:

https://twitter.com/JWJBowden/status/923311216646377472

The issue is not whether the Legislative Library responds quickly to requests; the issue is that the library has failed to publish these records so that all New Brunswickers and Canada, or anyone, can access them freely. I should have been able to access all those records myself at 12:07 am or any other time of day that I damn well please. I would go as far as to argue that legislative bodies have a fiduciary duty to publish all records of all proceedings not conducted in camera or in secret sittings. All the other provinces and territories have done their duty; only New Brunswick has not. And the fact that the legislative library sent me these records so quickly — in the form of clean, searchable PDFs, by the way — means that they exist in-house and that the Legislative Library has properly indexed them. It should now simply publish them online. Publishing these records online promotes accountability and neutrality, and it would also unburden the staff at the Legislative Library from carrying out these requests themselves. Furthermore, journalists in New Brunswick ought to care more about this issue and should champion the freedom of information, since their trade depends on it.

Only an informed citizenry can sustain a liberal democracy.

 

Posted in Parliament | 3 Comments

Being a Bad Apple in the Middle Class

Posted on 2017/09/27 by J.W.J. Bowden

What Is the Significance of Being a Bad Apple?

Over the last three years or so, I’ve noticed a strange quirk in the debates over police brutality in the United States. Proponents of the police often couch their support in an analogy, which they intend to mean, “Some police officers do bad things, but in general, they are good and do good and shouldn’t all be dismissed as bad simply because some of them are bad.” They mention something about “a few bad apples,” normally without completing the sentence, which makes evaluating the origin of the analogy more difficult.

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Posted in Random Thoughts | Leave a comment