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  • 37 - Presidentialism, Parliamentarism, and Their Hybrids

  • from Part III. B - The Executive
  • Edited by Richard Bellamy, University College London, Jeff King, University College London
  • Book:
    The Cambridge Handbook of Constitutional Theory
    Published online:
    27 March 2025
    Print publication:
    24 April 2025, pp 640-655

  • Summary

    The chapter discusses the comparative constitutional theory of parliamentary and presidential government as well as various hybrids. It suggests that the much-discussed perils of presidentialism, to the extent that they exist, may largely be due to the kind of personalism that results from directly electing a fixed-term president. When the comparative study of executive formats goes beyond the standard trichotomy of parliamentary, presidential, and semi-presidential systems, we can see that the branch-based separation of powers can be analytically and practically separated from executive personalism. Hybrid systems such as “assembly-independent” government in Switzerland or “semi-parliamentary” government in Australia can be understood as efforts to reap the benefits of powers separation while avoiding the perils of executive personalism. Cogent arguments for the direct election of a fixed-term president are hard to find, despite the widespread belief that it is inherently more democratic.