Chapter Seven - Parliamentary Inclusiveness: The Social Profile

Summary

A closer look at the legislators as individual actors in parliament opens further insights into the inclusiveness of legislatures. The following chapter therefore examines the social profile of parliaments. Although we do not subscribe to the mechanistic belief that there is a more or less complete congruence between the social background of parliamentarians and the policies they pursue, we cannot dismiss the fact that their values and attitudes are informed by their social background. The fact, for instance, that nearly 55 per cent of German lawmakers are civil servants and government employees undoubtedly contributes to their propensity for over-regulation and legalism. On the other hand, it should be borne in mind that not all political decisions are class-related. Yet, in what way and to what extent the social background of parliamentarians impacts on their political behaviour depends on many additional factors, for example social and ethnic stratification, a society's resource base, distributional conflicts, political polarization, practices of dispute settlement, and other aspects of the political culture. However, as the causal relationships between these factors are extremely complex, they cannot be treated here in greater depth.

While we accept that a legislature cannot and must not mirror precisely the social fabric of a polity, we nevertheless firmly believe that it must represent all major societal interests and groups or that, as a minimum requirement, major groups not represented in parliament must at least have genuine advocates inside the legislature. This ensures “policy responsiveness” — “government for the people” — which is a major prerequisite of an inclusive legislature (Liebert 1990, p. 18; von Beyme 2002, p. 285). Yet, as already noted by Blondel, it is almost inevitable that the social profile of parliaments deviates considerably from society at large (Blondel 1973, p. 77). One obvious reason is the increasingly complex nature of lawmaking which, besides political acumen, demands specialization, professionalism, and technical know-how. It is thus no accident that most parliaments display a bias in favour of legislators with higher education, professional training, and increasingly a tendency towards political professionalization.