Presidentialism, parliamentarism, and democracy
By: Jose Antonio Cheibub
Series: Cambridge studies in comparative politics
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 2007
Place of publication: New York, NY
Language: eng
Number of pages: 202
ISBN-13: 9780521834674; 9780521542449
Subjects: Presidents; Cabinet system; Democracy; Coalition governments
Description: "Are newly established presidential democracies doomed to fail? In support of their positive answer to this question, advocates of parliamentarism point out that these regimes tend to last longer than presidential ones. This book takes a contrary view. It argues that most of the reasons offered for the poor survival record of presidential democracies - that they are prone to deadlocks, offer no incentives for coalition formation, make political parties weak, and fragment decision making - have neither sound theoretical foundations nor any empirical support. In fact, what has made presidential democracies more fragile is that they typically emerged in countries where the military was already strong, which placed democracy of any kind at risk. Therefore, the prospects of new democracies that have established a directly elected president as their head of government may be better than usually considered. Instead of attempting to change the form of government, institutional reformers should thus concentrate on designing a better presidential democracy."--Jacket.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. 185-195) and index
Table of contents: title: Introduction; title: Presidential, parliamentary, and mixed democracies; title: Are the incentives for coalition formation different in parliamentary and presidential democracies?; title: Are coalitions rare in presidential democracies?; title: Party discipline and form of government; title: What makes presidential democracies fragile?; title: Conclusion