TY - JOUR A1 - Ganghof, Steffen T1 - The Regime-Trilemma: On the Relationship between the Executive and Legislature in advanced Democracies JF - Politische Vierteljahresschrift : Zeitschrift der Deutschen Vereinigung für Politische Wissenschaft N2 - A comprehensive typology of basic executive formats is presented and linked to a discussion of tradeoffs in the design of executive-legislative relations. The focus is on the tradeoffs between three goals: (1) programmatic parties, (2) identifiable cabinets and (3) issue -specific legislative coalitions. To include semi-presidentialism into the typology in a logically consistent manner, a heretofore neglected executive format has to be defined, which is labelled semi-parliamentarism. Based on a discussion of Australian states, it is argued that semi-parliamentarism has the potential to mitigate the trilemma. KW - executive-legislative relations KW - semi-parliamentarism KW - bicameralism Y1 - 2016 U6 - https://doi.org/10.5771/0032-3470-2016-1-27 SN - 0032-3470 SN - 1862-2860 VL - 57 SP - 27 EP - + PB - Nomos CY - Hannover ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Ganghof, Steffen T1 - A new political system model BT - Semi-parliamentary government JF - European Journal for Political Research N2 - Semi-parliamentary government is a distinct executive-legislative system that mirrors semi-presidentialism. It exists when the legislature is divided into two equally legitimate parts, only one of which can dismiss the prime minister in a no-confidence vote. This system has distinct advantages over pure parliamentary and presidential systems: it establishes a branch-based separation of powers and can balance the ‘majoritarian’ and ‘proportional’ visions of democracy without concentrating executive power in a single individual. This article analyses bicameral versions of semi-parliamentary government in Australia and Japan, and compares empirical patterns of democracy in the Australian Commonwealth as well as New South Wales to 20 advanced parliamentary and semi-presidential systems. It discusses new semi-parliamentary designs, some of which do not require formal bicameralism, and pays special attention to semi-parliamentary options for democratising the European Union. KW - semi-parliamentarism KW - bicameralism KW - Australia KW - New South Wales KW - Japan Y1 - 2018 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1111/1475-6765.12224 SN - 0304-4130 SN - 1475-6765 VL - 57 IS - 2 SP - 261 EP - 281 PB - Wiley CY - Hoboken ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Ganghof, Steffen A1 - Eppner, Sebastian A1 - Pörschke, Alexander T1 - Australian bicameralism as semi-parliamentarism BT - patterns of majority formation in 29 democracies JF - Australian Journal of Political Science N2 - The article analyses the type of bicameralism we find in Australia as a distinct executive-legislative system – a hybrid between parliamentary and presidential government – which we call ‘semi-parliamentary government’. We argue that this hybrid presents an important and underappreciated alternative to pure parliamentary government as well as presidential forms of the power-separation, and that it can achieve a certain balance between competing models or visions of democracy. We specify theoretically how the semi-parliamentary separation of powers contributes to the balancing of democratic visions and propose a conceptual framework for comparing democratic visions. We use this framework to locate the Australian Commonwealth, all Australian states and 22 advanced democratic nation-states on a two-dimensional empirical map of democratic patterns for the period from 1995 to 2015. KW - Executive-legislative relations KW - bicameralism KW - parliamentary government KW - presidential government KW - visions of democracy Y1 - 2018 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1080/10361146.2018.1451487 SN - 1036-1146 SN - 1363-030X VL - 53 IS - 2 SP - 211 EP - 233 PB - Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group CY - Abingdon ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Ganghof, Steffen A1 - Eppner, Sebastian A1 - Pörschke, Alexander T1 - Semi-parliamentary government in perspective BT - concepts, values, and designs JF - Australian Journal of Political Science N2 - The article responds to four commentaries on the concept of semi-parliamentary government and its application to Australian bicameralism. It highlights four main points: (1) Our preferred typology is not more ‘normative’ than existing approaches, but applies the criterion of ‘direct election’ equally to executive and legislature; (2) While the evolution of semi-parliamentary government had contingent elements, it plausibly also reflects the ‘equilibrium’ nature of certain institutional configurations; (3) The idea that a pure parliamentary system with pure proportional representation has absolute normative priority over ‘instrumentalist’ concerns about cabinet stability, identifiability and responsibility is questionable; and (4) The reforms we discuss may be unlikely to occur in Australia, but deserve consideration by scholars and institutional reformers in other democratic systems. KW - Executive-legislative relations KW - bicameralism KW - visions of democracy KW - parliamentary government KW - presidential government Y1 - 2018 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1080/10361146.2018.1451488 SN - 1036-1146 SN - 1363-030X VL - 53 IS - 2 SP - 264 EP - 269 PB - Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group CY - Abingdon ER -