The process of government formation constitutes a crucial phase and arena in democratic governanc... more The process of government formation constitutes a crucial phase and arena in democratic governance: it concerns the translation of electoral and parliamentary power into executive power, and the possibility of implementing policies that have been democratically endorsed and legitimated by the electorate. As an increasing number of Western European governments are based on a coalition of political parties, 1 studying the process of coalition formation has never been as relevant for the understanding of parliamentary democracies. ...
Abstract A standard conclusion of theorists who model bargaining as a non-cooperative game is tha... more Abstract A standard conclusion of theorists who model bargaining as a non-cooperative game is that the party designated to make the first move—the formateur party—will determine the bargaining outcome. Most empirical studies of parliamentary coalition formation have paid surprisingly little attention to the formation process. In this paper we model government formation as a two-stage unordered discrete choice problem that better reflects this process. The first step involves the selection of a formateur party, and the ...
Discussing the Europeanization of national parliaments is an ambiguous and uncertain task given t... more Discussing the Europeanization of national parliaments is an ambiguous and uncertain task given the lack of unified definition of the concept itself, the overall weakness of the involvement of national assemblies in European policy owing to the Treaties themselves (at least up until the Treaty of Lisbon), and the variable executive-legislative relations among the Member States leading to idiosyncratic differences in the scrutiny of governments' management of European issues. In this paper, we nevertheless set out to explore the ...
Page 1. 1 Living off politics across (subnational) borders ? Ministerial resignations and new mul... more Page 1. 1 Living off politics across (subnational) borders ? Ministerial resignations and new multi-level career patterns in Belgium and Italy Dandoy Régis Université Libre de Bruxelles, ULB Patrick Dumont Université du Luxembourg Luca Verzichelli CIRCaP, University of Siena ECPR Joint Sessions of Workshop St Gallen, Switzerland, 12-17 April 2011 Page 2. 2 Introduction Although its empirical scope is limited to a descriptive analysis of the cases ...
Politics, Institutions, and Fiscal Policy: Deficits and Surpluses in Federated States, 2004
The purpose of this chapter is to explain the differences in the budgetary balances of the variou... more The purpose of this chapter is to explain the differences in the budgetary balances of the various federated entities of the Belgian state (regions and communities), from 1990 to 1998. First, we describe the recent process of federalization of Belgium, the autonomy granted to both regions and communities as to their receipts and expenditures, and the institutional systems of budgetary coordination between the diverse public instances in Belgium. Second, we list the results of previous studies on budgetary policies of the regions and ...
During the eighties and nineties of the 20th century, absenteeism increased in Belgium. This evol... more During the eighties and nineties of the 20th century, absenteeism increased in Belgium. This evolution ended for all types of elections at the beginning of the current century. This paper offered a number of potential explanations for this puzzle, but we acknowledge that further examination is necessary to provide a clear answer for this change. We showed that potential absenteeists share specific characteristics. Potential turnout (in case of abolishment of compulsory voting) is linked with socio-demographic variables, with ...
DI-fusion, le Dépôt institutionnel numérique de l'ULB, est l'outil de référencementde l... more DI-fusion, le Dépôt institutionnel numérique de l'ULB, est l'outil de référencementde la production scientifique de l'ULB.L'interface de recherche DI-fusion permet de consulter les publications des chercheurs de l'ULB et les thèses qui y ont été défendues.
Campaigning in Europe: Parties, Campaigns, Mass Media and the European Parliamentary Elections, 2004
... Jean-Claude Juncker, its leader since the mid-1990s, who is both the Prime Minister and Minis... more ... Jean-Claude Juncker, its leader since the mid-1990s, who is both the Prime Minister and Minister of Finance with the ... Luxembourg's members of European Parliament 2004 Party Gender Age Position held before 2004 elections Name Spautz, Jean Hennicot-Schoepges, Lulling ...
The Selection of Ministers in Europe: Hiring and Firing, Dec 24, 2008
The centrepiece of representative democracy is the accountability of the government through the e... more The centrepiece of representative democracy is the accountability of the government through the electoral process. However, if accountability was only composed of a chance to throw the rascals out every three to five years or so, especially if one only has rascals with which to replace them, then representative democracy would not provide much accountability. In reality, there are many other ways in which governments can be, and are, held to account. Constitutions specify the limits of governmental power; courts ensure that ...
This paper proposes a new method to evaluate the number of rel-evant parties in an assembly. The ... more This paper proposes a new method to evaluate the number of rel-evant parties in an assembly. The most widespread indicator of frag-mentation used in comparative politics is the 'Effective Number of Par-ties'(ENP), designed by Laakso and Taagepera (1979). Taking both the number of parties and their relative weights into account, the ENP is arguably a good parsimonious operationalization of the number of 'relevant'parties. This index however produces misleading results in single-party ma jority situations as it still indicates that ...
The process of government formation constitutes a crucial phase and arena in democratic governanc... more The process of government formation constitutes a crucial phase and arena in democratic governance: it concerns the translation of electoral and parliamentary power into executive power, and the possibility of implementing policies that have been democratically endorsed and legitimated by the electorate. As an increasing number of Western European governments are based on a coalition of political parties, 1 studying the process of coalition formation has never been as relevant for the understanding of parliamentary democracies. ...
Abstract A standard conclusion of theorists who model bargaining as a non-cooperative game is tha... more Abstract A standard conclusion of theorists who model bargaining as a non-cooperative game is that the party designated to make the first move—the formateur party—will determine the bargaining outcome. Most empirical studies of parliamentary coalition formation have paid surprisingly little attention to the formation process. In this paper we model government formation as a two-stage unordered discrete choice problem that better reflects this process. The first step involves the selection of a formateur party, and the ...
Discussing the Europeanization of national parliaments is an ambiguous and uncertain task given t... more Discussing the Europeanization of national parliaments is an ambiguous and uncertain task given the lack of unified definition of the concept itself, the overall weakness of the involvement of national assemblies in European policy owing to the Treaties themselves (at least up until the Treaty of Lisbon), and the variable executive-legislative relations among the Member States leading to idiosyncratic differences in the scrutiny of governments' management of European issues. In this paper, we nevertheless set out to explore the ...
Page 1. 1 Living off politics across (subnational) borders ? Ministerial resignations and new mul... more Page 1. 1 Living off politics across (subnational) borders ? Ministerial resignations and new multi-level career patterns in Belgium and Italy Dandoy Régis Université Libre de Bruxelles, ULB Patrick Dumont Université du Luxembourg Luca Verzichelli CIRCaP, University of Siena ECPR Joint Sessions of Workshop St Gallen, Switzerland, 12-17 April 2011 Page 2. 2 Introduction Although its empirical scope is limited to a descriptive analysis of the cases ...
Politics, Institutions, and Fiscal Policy: Deficits and Surpluses in Federated States, 2004
The purpose of this chapter is to explain the differences in the budgetary balances of the variou... more The purpose of this chapter is to explain the differences in the budgetary balances of the various federated entities of the Belgian state (regions and communities), from 1990 to 1998. First, we describe the recent process of federalization of Belgium, the autonomy granted to both regions and communities as to their receipts and expenditures, and the institutional systems of budgetary coordination between the diverse public instances in Belgium. Second, we list the results of previous studies on budgetary policies of the regions and ...
During the eighties and nineties of the 20th century, absenteeism increased in Belgium. This evol... more During the eighties and nineties of the 20th century, absenteeism increased in Belgium. This evolution ended for all types of elections at the beginning of the current century. This paper offered a number of potential explanations for this puzzle, but we acknowledge that further examination is necessary to provide a clear answer for this change. We showed that potential absenteeists share specific characteristics. Potential turnout (in case of abolishment of compulsory voting) is linked with socio-demographic variables, with ...
DI-fusion, le Dépôt institutionnel numérique de l'ULB, est l'outil de référencementde l... more DI-fusion, le Dépôt institutionnel numérique de l'ULB, est l'outil de référencementde la production scientifique de l'ULB.L'interface de recherche DI-fusion permet de consulter les publications des chercheurs de l'ULB et les thèses qui y ont été défendues.
Campaigning in Europe: Parties, Campaigns, Mass Media and the European Parliamentary Elections, 2004
... Jean-Claude Juncker, its leader since the mid-1990s, who is both the Prime Minister and Minis... more ... Jean-Claude Juncker, its leader since the mid-1990s, who is both the Prime Minister and Minister of Finance with the ... Luxembourg's members of European Parliament 2004 Party Gender Age Position held before 2004 elections Name Spautz, Jean Hennicot-Schoepges, Lulling ...
The Selection of Ministers in Europe: Hiring and Firing, Dec 24, 2008
The centrepiece of representative democracy is the accountability of the government through the e... more The centrepiece of representative democracy is the accountability of the government through the electoral process. However, if accountability was only composed of a chance to throw the rascals out every three to five years or so, especially if one only has rascals with which to replace them, then representative democracy would not provide much accountability. In reality, there are many other ways in which governments can be, and are, held to account. Constitutions specify the limits of governmental power; courts ensure that ...
This paper proposes a new method to evaluate the number of rel-evant parties in an assembly. The ... more This paper proposes a new method to evaluate the number of rel-evant parties in an assembly. The most widespread indicator of frag-mentation used in comparative politics is the 'Effective Number of Par-ties'(ENP), designed by Laakso and Taagepera (1979). Taking both the number of parties and their relative weights into account, the ENP is arguably a good parsimonious operationalization of the number of 'relevant'parties. This index however produces misleading results in single-party ma jority situations as it still indicates that ...
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