Transcript Diapositiva 1

Coalition agreements and Cabinet
Governance (Muller and Strom)
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Coalition agreements are one of the aspect of
the governance structure of multiparty coalition
in parliamentary democracy. However the two
most important stylized accounts of coalition
decision making did not consider the coalition
agreements:
1. Ministerial government (Laver&Shepsle)
Coalition agreements are futile
2. Veto Players (Tsebelis). Coalition agreements
are redundant
Ministerial government model’s
drawbacks
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1.
2.
Laver and Shepsle argue that delegation from the
prime minister or the coalition leaders to individual
cabinet ministers cannot work, since these ministers
can never be induced to pursue a policy different from
their own most preferred one. However:
Delegation is implicitly assumed to work from cabinet
ministers to civil servant, a relationship that seems
much more risky in terms of agency loss.
Ministerial government is largely suboptimal as
government stability results from the parties’ inability to
agree on any mutually benificial alternatives to the
status quo. Why the party leaders choose this decision
making structure ?
Veto Players model’s (Cabinet
government) drawbacks
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Tsebelis argues that in the cabinet any
coalition party is a veto player regardless of
the distribution of cabinet portfolios. Therefore
he emphasizes the centralization of cabinet
authority.
1. No all government parties in all governments
are pivotal .
2. Vetoing sometimes is not credible as the
political perspective after the government
collapse can be worse than the defeat in the
intragovernment bargaining.
Why coalition agreements
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Coalition agreements are indications that
political parties often find it difficult to
cooperate in the executive branch and that
neither ministerial government nor cabinet
government is an adequate description of the
process of coalition policy making in
parliamentary democracies.
1. No all government parties in all governments
are pivotal .
2. Vetoing sometimes is not credible as the
political perspective after the government
collapse can be worse than the defeat in the
intragovernment bargaining.
Coalition agreements functions
1. Internal: C.A are precommitments by
which the negotiating party leaders bind
themselves against intraparty pressure
2. External: C.A. tie together the leaders of
the coalition parties, ease comunication
between them, contain interparty conflict
or facilitate its resolution.
What makes difficult governing together
(and sometimes C.A necessary)?
• Preference divergence (about policy
benefits, office benefits, electoral
advantages)
Proposition 1. The greater the preference
diversity among the coalition parties, the
more formalized their coalition agreement
is likely to be
What makes difficult governing together
(and sometimes C.A necessary)?
• Uncertainty (about policy instruments,
policy agenda, voters)
Proposition 2. The greater the uncertainty
among the coalition parties, the more
formalized their coalition agreement is
likely to be
What makes difficult governing together
(and sometimes C.A. necessary)?
• Opportunism (sequence in which the
parties secure their gains
[Marshall&Weingast …], verification
problems )
Proposition 3. The greater the risk of
opportunistic behavior among the coalition
parties, the more formalized their coalition
agreement is likely to be.
What makes difficult governing together
(and sometimes C.A. necessary)?
• Opportunism (sequence in which the
parties secure their gains
[Marshall&Weingast …], verification
problems )
Proposition 3. The greater the risk of
opportunistic behavior among the coalition
parties, the more formalized their coalition
agreement is likely to be.
What makes difficult governing together
(and sometimes C.A. necessary)?
• Values of C.A. (Majority gov vs minority gov.,
period of birth in the parliamentary cycle.
• Costs of C.A.( writing costs, audience costs,
reputational costs)
Proposition 4. The more valuable the coalition,
the more formalized the coalition agreements is
likely to be.
Proposition 5 The greater the transaction and
audience costs of forging a C.A., the less
formalized such a C.A. is likely to be.
Mechanisms of centralized cabinet
authority
• Ex ante modes of coalition governance:
comprehensive initial policy agreement
• Ex post modes of coalition governance:
junior ministers, (parliamentary
committees)
4 modes of coalition governance
• Centralized
• Decentralized Ex ante modes of
governance
• Decentralized Ex post modes of
governance
• Decentralized Ex ante and Ex post modes
of governance
Why some coalition governance mechanisms instead
of others?
Path dependency …
Explaining Coalition Agreements
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1.
2.
3.
4.
Explanatory factors
Preference divergence
Uncertainty
Opportunism
Values and Cost of
C.A
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Clusters of
explanatory variables
The effects of time and
space
Structural attributes of
cabinets and party
systems
The preferences of the
players
Political institutions
Features of the
bargaining situation
Exogenous critical
events
Variables: Structural attributes of
bargaining environment
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Post election cabinet (+Value of C.A.)
Maximum government duration (+Uncertainty)
Minimal winning Coalition (+Opportunism)
Surplus majority cabinet (- Opportunism)
Cabinet seat share (+Opportunism)
Number of parliamentary parties (+ Uncertainty ;
+ writing costs)
• Size of the largest party (- Uncertainty; - writing
costs)
• Number of cabinet parties (+
Uncertainty;+writing costs)
Variables: Preferences
• Cabinet preference range (+preference
divergence.)
• Median party in the Cabinet (+Opportunism)
• Share of extremist parties (-Opportunism)
Wrong
• Weighted polarization of parliament (sign!
Opportunism)
• Presence of a core party (-Opportunism)
• Absence of policy connectedness (+preference
divergence)
Variables: Institutions
• Positive Parliamentarism (- Cost of writing)
• Ex ante Programme screening (- Cost of
writing)
Wrong sign!
• Bicameralism (-Cost of writing)
Wrong sign!
• PM powers (+Opportunism)
• Semipresidentialism (+Opportunism ; value of C.A.)
Variables: Bargaining environment
• Conflict termination (+Uncertainty;+
opportunism)
• Cabinet bargaining duration (+ cost C.A; cost C.A.)
• Inconclusive bargaining round (+ cost
C.A.)
Variables: Critical events
• Volatility (+Uncertainty)
• Terminal events previous cabinets
(+Uncertainty)
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