Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 March 2014
There are good prima facie reasons to believe that directly electing a prime minister may provide the holder of that office with a tremendous power resource. Indeed some countries with weak prime ministers have debated this possible change, and one, Israel, carried it through. Using a theoretical argument based on the number of veto points in a political system, this article proposes that a directly elected prime minister will not increase the power of a prime minister. It studies what actually happened in Israel, and offers alternative explanations for the weakness of and lack of cohesion in its executive. Similarly, other factors are identified as causes of prime ministerial weakness in Italy and Japan.
The author would like to thank Michael Gallagher and two anonymous referees for their useful comments on the paper.
2 Andeweg, Rudy B., ‘Institutional Reform in Dutch Politics: Elected Prime Minister, Personalised PR and Popular Veto in Comparative Perspective’, ACTA Politica, 32 (1997), pp. 227–57.Google ScholarGraham Allen, The Last Prime Minister: Being Honest About the UK Presidency, London, Graham Allen MP, 2001.
3 Junichiro Koizumi, Kanryo Okoku Kaitairon [Dissolve the Bureaucratic Kingdom], Tokyo, Kobunsha, 1996; The Daily Yomiuri Online, 21 August 2001.Google Scholar
4 ‘A Missed Chance’, The Economist, 3 July 1997.Google Scholar
5 Woldendorp, Jaap, Keman, Hans and Budge, Ian, ‘Party Government in 20 Democracies – an Update 1990–1995’, European Journal of Political Research, 33 (1998), pp. 125–64 andCrossRefGoogle Scholar
6 Taylor, Michael and Herman, V. M., ‘Party Systems and Government Stability’, American Political Science Review, 65 (1971), pp.28–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
7 Diermeier, Daniel and Stevenson, Randy T., ‘Cabinet Survival and Competing Risks’, American Journal of Political Science, 43 (1999), pp.1051–68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
8 A. Lawrence Lowell, Governments and Parties in Continental Europe, 2 vols, London, Longmans, Green and Co, 1896, vol. 1, p. 74.Google Scholar
9 John Huber and Cecilia Martínez Gallardo, ‘Cabinet Instability and the Accumulation of Experience in the Cabinet: The French Fourth Republic in Comparative Perspective’, paper presented to CEACS Instituto Juan March, Madrid, 2002.Google Scholar
10 Parker, Richard Barron, ‘A Suggested Amendment to the Constitution of Japan to Strengthen the Office of Prime Minister’, Gonzaga International Law Journal, 1, (1998).Google Scholar
11 ‘A Missed Chance’, The Economist, 3 July 1997.Google Scholar
12 George Tsebelis, Veto Players: How Political Institutions Work, Princeton, NJ, Princeton University Press, 2002.Google Scholar
13 Maurice Duverger, Political Parties, 3rd edn, London, Methuen, 1964, p. 113. Arend Lijphart, Patterns of Democracy: Government Forms and Performance in 36 Countries, New Haven, CT, Yale University Press, 1999, p. 136.Google Scholar
14 Tsebelis, Veto Players, p. 10.Google Scholar
15 Romer, Thomas and Rosenthal, Howard, ‘Political Resource Allocation, Controlled Agendas, and the Status Quo’, Public Choice, 33: 1 (1978), pp.27–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
16 Matthew Soberg Shugart and John M. Carey, Presidents and Assemblies: Constitutional Design and Electoral Dynamics, New York, Cambridge University Press, 1992, p. 19.Google Scholar
17 Vernon Bogdanor, ‘The Electoral System, Government and Democracy’, in Larry Diamond and Ehud Sprinzak (eds), Israeli Democracy under Stress, Boulder, CO, Lynne Rienner, 1993, p. 97.Google Scholar
18 Larry Diamond and Ehud Sprinzak, ‘Directions for Reform’, in Diamond and Springzak, Israeli Democracy under Stress, p. 372.Google Scholar
19 Diskin, Hanna and Diskin, Abraham, ‘The Politics of Electoral Reform in Israel’, International Political Science Review, 16 (1995), pp.31–45; p. 43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
20 Israel Diaspora Institute, ‘Electoral Reform in Israel: A Report of the First Working Session of the IDI International Forum’, in Arend Lijphart (ed.), Presidential Versus Parliamentary Government, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1994, p. 195.Google Scholar
21 Vasant Sathe, ‘For a Directly Elected Prime Minister of India’, in Lijphart, Presidential Versus Parliamentary Government, p. 189.Google Scholar
22 Robert Elgie, Political Leadership in Liberal Democracies, Basingstoke, Macmillan, 1995, p. 117. Jean Blondel, World Leaders: Heads of Government in the Postwar Period, London, Sage, 1980, p. 43. Kenneth F. Janda, ‘Towards the Explication of the Concept of Leadership in Terms of the Concept of Power’, in G. D. Paige (ed.), Political Leadership, New York, Free Press, 1972, p. 48.Google Scholar
23 Cronin, Thomas E. and , ‘A Resurgent Congress and the Imperial Presidency’, Political Science Quarterly, 95 (1980), pp.209–37; pp. 226–7.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
24 Bob Apple, ‘A Shaky Platform on which to Build’, New York Times, 13 December 2000, final edition, p. 1.Google Scholar
25 Israel Diaspora Institute, ‘Electoral Reform in Israel’, pp. 195–6.Google Scholar
26 Parker, ‘A Suggested Amendment’, pp. 1–2.Google Scholar
27 Hazan, Reuven Y. and Rahat, Gideon, ‘Representation, Electoral Reform and Democracy: Theoretical and Empirical Lessons from the 1996 Elections in Israel’, Comparative Political Studies, 33 (2000), p. 1318.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
28 Gary W. Cox, Making Votes Count, New York, Cambridge University Press, 1997, pp. 188–90.Google Scholar
29 Ibid.Google Scholar
30 Michael Laver and Kenneth A. Shepsle, Making and Breaking Governments, New York, Cambridge University Press, 1996.Google Scholar
31 Lijphart, Patterns of Democracy, p. 132.Google Scholar
32 Huber, John D. and McCarty, Nolan, ‘Cabinet Decision Rules and Political Uncertainty in Parliamentary Bargaining’, American Political Science Review, 95: 2 (2001), pp.345–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
33 Own calculation based on data from Woldendorp, Keman and Budge, ‘Party Government in 20 Democracies – an Update 1990–1995’ and ‘Political Data 1945–1990 – Party Government in 20 Democracies’.Google Scholar
34 One should disregard the first election (which was used only to elect a government) and the last standing government. It was calculated for the 22 countries from 1945 (or democratization) to 1 January 2000 using Woldendorp, Keman and Budge, ‘Party Government in 20 Democracies – an Update 1990–1995’, and ‘Political Data 1945–1990 – Party Government in 20 Democracies’; EJPR Political Data Yearbooks (1993–2000); Alan Siaroff, Comparative European Party Systems: An Analysis of Parliamentary Elections since 1945, New York, Garland, 2000; and Chris Cook and John Paxton, European Political Facts of the 20th Century, 5th edn, Basingstoke, Palgrave, 2001. There was some disagreement in the literature about the number of governments in Israel (officially there have only been 29). Here a new government is said to be any change in supporting coalition partners, thus the departure of a party from cabinet but their continued support in parliament is not a new government. This is rarely relevant except in Israel. The measurement is otherwise similar to the EJPR Yearbook definition. By these calculations Israel has had 34 governments, Italy had 53 and Japan had 43. For Portugal the first legislature is disregarded because it was heavily presidentialized.Google Scholar
35 Anthony King, ‘Chief Executives in Western Europe’, in Ian Budge and David McKay (eds), Developing Democracy, London, Sage, 1994, pp. 150–64. King only includes some West European countries in his analysis. These are added to by using an index of executive dominance, which correlates almost perfectly with King to add more European countries. Scores are assigned to non-European countries by consulting the literature (as King originally did). This gives high scores to the Commonwealth countries of Australian, Canada and New Zealand, and low to Japan and Israel. On Israel this assessment refers to the current office, not to the historically powerful prime minister referred to earlier. This data is available from the author at [email protected].Google Scholar
36 Asher Arian, Politics in Israel – the Second Generation, Chatham, NJ, Chatham House, 1985, p. 164.Google Scholar
37 Brichta, Avraham, ‘The New Premier-Parliamentary System in Israel’, Annals, AAPSS, 555 (1998), p. 183.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
38 Diamond and Sprinzak. ‘Directions for Reform’.Google Scholar
39 Ibid. p. 362.Google Scholar
40 Peter Medding, ‘From Government by Party to Government Despite Party’, in Reuven Hazan and Moshe Maor (eds), Parties, Elections and Cleavages – Israel in Comparative and Theoretical Perspective, London, Frank Cass, 2000, p. 192.Google Scholar
41 Woldendorp, Keman and Budge, ‘Party Government in 20 Democracies – an Update 1990–1995’, and ‘Political Data 1945–1990 – Party Government in 20 Democracies’. Ariel Sharon's government is not relevant, because, although he was directly elected, the law was repealed the same day as he was sworn in.Google Scholar
42 Source: EJPR Data Yearbooks.Google Scholar
43 Hazan and Rahat, ‘Representation, Electoral Reform and Democracy’, p. 1324.Google Scholar
44 Medding, ‘From Government by Party to Government Despite Party’, p. 197.Google Scholar
45 Gideon Alon, ‘Sharon Sworn in: Direct Election Law Repealed’, Ha’aretz, 8 March 2001.Google Scholar
46 Gallagher, Michael, ‘The Political Impact of Electoral System Change in Japan and New Zealand, 1996’, Party Politics, 4 (1998), p. 204.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
47 Masaru Kohno, ‘Rational Foundations for the Organization of the Liberal Democratic Party in Japan’, World Politics, 44 (April 1992), p. 395.Google Scholar
48 Taketsugu Tsurutani, ‘Japan's Chief Executive’, in Jack B. Gabbert and Taketsugu Tsurutani (eds), Chief Executives, Pullman, Washington State University Press, 1992. p. 222.Google Scholar
49 Ibid., pp. 215–19.Google Scholar
50 Ibid., pp. 235–41.Google Scholar
51 Mulgan, Aurelia, ‘Japan's Political Leadership Deficit’, Australian Journal of Political Science, 35 (2000), p. 187.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
52 King, ‘Chief Executives in Western Europe’, p. 194.Google Scholar
53 Katz, Richard S., ‘Electoral Reform and Transformation of Party Politics in Italy’, Party Politics, 2: 1 (1996), p. 32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
54 Ibid., p. 37.Google Scholar
55 Lijphart, Patterns of Democracy, p. 162.Google Scholar
56 Morlino, Leonardo, ‘Crisis of Parties and Party System Change in Italy’, Party Politics, 2: 1 (1996), p. 6.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
57 Own calculation based on ibid., p. 8.Google Scholar
58 Katz, ‘Electoral Reform and Transformation of Party Politics in Italy’, p. 37.Google Scholar
59 Richard Rose, ‘Prime Ministers in Parliamentary Democracy’, in George W. Jones (ed.), West European Prime Ministers, London, Frank Cass, 1991, p. 9.Google Scholar