PRESIDENTIAL SYSTEMS AND ELECTORAL INSTITUTIONS

WEEKLY READING Smith, Democracy, chs. 5-7 Carey, “Presidentialism and Representative Institutions” Coppedge, “Venezuela: Popular Sovereignty versus Liberal Democracy” Cepeda Ulloa, “Colombia: The Governability Crisis”

THE “NEW INSTITUTIONALISM” Individuals seek to maximize gain Institutions (rules) shape incentives And can therefore determine behavior Ergo, institutional design can affect the collective behavior of political actors

PRESIDENTIALISM OR PARLIAMENTARISM? Presidentialism: Head of government (president) is directly elected Fixed term in office Cannot be removed by legislature (except through impeachment) Selects cabinet ministers Head of government is also head of state Separation of legislative-executive powers

Parliamentarism: Voters elect MPs MPs select head of government (PM) MPs approve cabinet appointments PM (and cabinet officers) dependent on continuing confidence of parliament Head of government (PM) is not head of state Fusion of legislative-executive powers

PRO-PARLIAMENTARY ARGUMENTS Avoid “temporal rigidity,” so crises of government would not become crises of regime Avoid polarization from zero-sum game Avoid paralyzing deadlock Thus superior durability of parliamentary regimes

PRO-PRESIDENTIALIST ARGUMENTS Clarity of fixed time horizon Checks and balances Democratic election of head of government Not the cause of immobilism (PR the cause) Empirical findings result from “selection bias”

PROPOSALS FOR REFORM Brazil Argentina Chile

ENGINEERING PRESIDENTIAL SYSTEMS Electing presidents: Plurality vs. MRO Reelection or not? Power domains: Constitutional or partisan? Bureaucracy, judiciary, military Decree authority

THE LEGISLATIVE ARENA Electoral Systems: SMDs and two-party politics PR and multi-party politics Effects of district magnitude Closed-list vs. open-list ballots The problem of term limits Institutional Performance: Essentially “reactive” legislatures Removing presidents?

THE PLIGHT OF POLITICAL PARTIES Diversity of party systems Levels of popular confidence

Counting Political Parties: N = 1 / (Σ p i 2 ) Where p i is the proportion of votes earned by the i-th party (or, alternatively, the proportion of seats in the legislature)

THE POLITICS OF DISENCHANTMENT Weakness of representative institutions Constraints on modern-day democracy Inadequate policy performance Tendency toward “delegative” or “illiberal” democracy Thus 55% would now support authoritarian government if it could improve economic situation