Synopses & Reviews
In this book, Robert Elgie examines the relationship between semi-presidentialism and democratic performance. Semi-presidentialism--where a constitution provides for both a directly elected president and a prime minister and cabinet responsible to the legislature--has become the regime type of choice for new democracies. There are now over 50 countries in the world with a semi-presidential constitution and the vast majority of these countries have chosen this form of government since the early 1990s.
Semi-Presidentialism operationalizes Shugart and Carey's distinction between president-parliamentarism--where the prime minister is responsible to both the legislature and to the directly elected president--and premier-presidentialism--where the prime minister is responsible to the legislature alone. The book shows that, all else equal, the president-parliamentary sub-type is more likely to be associated with a poorer democratic performance than its premier-presidential counterpart. The evidence is based on a mixed-method approach, including large-n comparative statistical studies of all semi-presidential democracies since 1919, as well as in-depth case studies.
Comparative Politics is a series for students, teachers, and researchers of political science that deals with contemporary government and politics. Global in scope, books in the series are characterised by a stress on comparative analysis and strong methodological rigour. The series is published in association with the European Consortium for Political Research.
About the Author
Robert Elgie is Paddy Moriarty Professor of Government and International Studies at Dublin City University. He is the co-editor of the journal
French Politics and
Studies in European Political Science series, and has published extensively on comparative politics, semi-presidentialism and French politics.
Table of Contents
List of Tables
1. The Perils of Semi-Presidentialism?
2. Variation within Semi-Presidentialism
3. Varieties of Semi-Presidentialism and Democratic Survival
4. Varieties of Semi-Presidentialism and the Performance of Democracy
5. Semi-Presidentialism and Democratic Survival and Collapse - Country Narratives
6. The Performance of Democracy under Semi-Presidentialism - Country Narratives
7. Premier-Presidentialism, President-Parliamentarism and Democratic Performance: Indicative Case Studies
8. Conclusion