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Party-system polarisation, legislative institutions and cabinet survival in 28 parliamentary democracies, 1945–2019

Bergmann, Henning ; Bäck, Hanna LU orcid and Saalfeld, Thomas (2022) In West European Politics 45(3). p.612-637
Abstract

The resurgence of radical and populist parties has stimulated renewed discussions about the resilience of parliamentary democracy in Europe. This work contributes to this debate by analysing the extent to which positive parliamentarism, the prime minister’s parliamentary dissolution powers, the government’s power to table votes of confidence and the majority requirements for votes of no confidence serve as ‘shock absorbers’ moderating the effect of ideological polarisation in European parliaments. Fitting several Cox Proportional Hazards models to data for 752 cabinets from 28 European democracies between 1945 and 2019, the well-established finding that the restrictiveness of the constructive vote of no confidence mitigates the... (More)

The resurgence of radical and populist parties has stimulated renewed discussions about the resilience of parliamentary democracy in Europe. This work contributes to this debate by analysing the extent to which positive parliamentarism, the prime minister’s parliamentary dissolution powers, the government’s power to table votes of confidence and the majority requirements for votes of no confidence serve as ‘shock absorbers’ moderating the effect of ideological polarisation in European parliaments. Fitting several Cox Proportional Hazards models to data for 752 cabinets from 28 European democracies between 1945 and 2019, the well-established finding that the restrictiveness of the constructive vote of no confidence mitigates the destabilising effect of strong extreme parties on non-electoral cabinet replacements is confirmed. More counter-intuitively, the absence of positive parliamentarism reduces the risk of non-electoral cabinet replacements when ideologically extreme parties are strong.

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Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
; and
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
keywords
cabinet survival, coalition government, legislative institutions, Polarisation
in
West European Politics
volume
45
issue
3
pages
612 - 637
publisher
Taylor & Francis
external identifiers
  • scopus:85099951262
ISSN
0140-2382
DOI
10.1080/01402382.2020.1870345
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
e3f09964-52f7-48a6-b790-0b5e6fe2a9ce
date added to LUP
2021-02-08 11:28:49
date last changed
2024-02-17 14:35:13
@article{e3f09964-52f7-48a6-b790-0b5e6fe2a9ce,
  abstract     = {{<p>The resurgence of radical and populist parties has stimulated renewed discussions about the resilience of parliamentary democracy in Europe. This work contributes to this debate by analysing the extent to which positive parliamentarism, the prime minister’s parliamentary dissolution powers, the government’s power to table votes of confidence and the majority requirements for votes of no confidence serve as ‘shock absorbers’ moderating the effect of ideological polarisation in European parliaments. Fitting several Cox Proportional Hazards models to data for 752 cabinets from 28 European democracies between 1945 and 2019, the well-established finding that the restrictiveness of the constructive vote of no confidence mitigates the destabilising effect of strong extreme parties on non-electoral cabinet replacements is confirmed. More counter-intuitively, the absence of positive parliamentarism reduces the risk of non-electoral cabinet replacements when ideologically extreme parties are strong.</p>}},
  author       = {{Bergmann, Henning and Bäck, Hanna and Saalfeld, Thomas}},
  issn         = {{0140-2382}},
  keywords     = {{cabinet survival; coalition government; legislative institutions; Polarisation}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  number       = {{3}},
  pages        = {{612--637}},
  publisher    = {{Taylor & Francis}},
  series       = {{West European Politics}},
  title        = {{Party-system polarisation, legislative institutions and cabinet survival in 28 parliamentary democracies, 1945–2019}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01402382.2020.1870345}},
  doi          = {{10.1080/01402382.2020.1870345}},
  volume       = {{45}},
  year         = {{2022}},
}