Deliberative Democracy in the EU. Countering Populism with Participation and Debate. CEPS Paperback

Elections are the preferred way to freely transfer power from one term to the next and from one political party or coalition to another. They are an essential element of democracy. But if the process of power transfer is corrupted, democracy risks collapse. Reliance on voters, civil society organisations and neutral observers to fully exercise their freedoms as laid down in international human rights conventions is an integral part of holding democratic elections. Without free, fair and regular elections, liberal democracy is inconceivable. Elections are no guarantee that democracy will take root and hold, however. If the history of political participation in Europe over the past 800 years is anything to go by, successful attempts at gaining voice have been patchy, while leaders’ attempts to silence these voices and consolidate their own power have been almost constant (Blockmans, 2020). Recent developments in certain EU member states have again shown us that democratically elected leaders will try and use majoritarian rule to curb freedoms, overstep the constitutional limits of their powers, protect the interests of their cronies and recycle themselves through seemingly free and fair elections. In their recent book How Democracies Die, two Harvard professors of politics write: “Since the end of the Cold War, most democratic breakdowns have been caused not by generals and soldiers but by elected governments themselves” (Levitsky and Ziblatt, 2018)

Multilayered international parliamentarism: the case of EU-Brazil relations

Challenging the predominant scholarly focus on international parliamentary institutions as the sole and sufficient object of inquiry into the global role of parliaments, this article argues that international interparliamentary relations do not occur merely within isolated forums, but may and do de facto evolve in layers of overlapping forums whenever circumstances allow it. This article conceptualises multilayered international parliamentarism as developing in webs of formal and informal linkages between the same parliamentary institutions in a variety of bilateral and multilateral frameworks regarding the same region. To this end, I conduct an in-depth case study of bilateral and multilateral relations between the parliaments of the EU and Brazil through the lens of institutional arrangements as well as by examining the reaction of the Brazilian and certain other Latin American parliaments to the EU’s Returns Directive. The analysis shows that intensified international contacts among parliamentarians accentuate the deliberative function of parliaments and foster their ‘diplomatic’ actorship in foreign affairs in a concerted attempt to counterbalance globalisation-propelled ‘negotiated democracy’ nurtured by intergovernmental and transgovernmental ways of doing politics and making law

Does parliamentary development assistance matter? : an examination of the aid effectiveness in parliamentary oversight

As the central institution of democracy, parliaments embody the will of the people in government, and carry all their expectations that democracy will be truly responsive to their needs and help solve the most pressing problems that confront them in their daily lives. With more countries preferring democracy over other systems of government, parliaments and other legislative assemblies have become increasingly pertinent. In broad terms, everybody agrees on what the functions of a parliament are. These bodies make laws, hold the executive branch accountable, and represent citizen interests. Achieving democratic governance, therefore, requires the existence of a strong, effective and efficient parliament or legislative body.The thesis highlights the specific challenges parliaments face in performing such crucial role, particularly fulfilling its oversight mandate. This becomes more daunting where parliaments and legislative bodies are not considered credible or trustworthy institutions, or do not enjoy the support from executives. Many parliaments and the likes are chronically under-staffed and ill-informed. More often than not, they are sorely under-resourced and vital research, legislative drafting, and other capacities are often in short supply. That is why parliaments in most emerging democracies look to the international community for support, as do civil society organisations. Support to ‘parliaments and parliamentarians’ is a relatively new, but rapidly growing area of cooperation provided by different donors and international organisations to representative institutions.The thesis attempts to do primarily three things: firstly, it offers a framework that links a set of specific democratic and aid effectiveness principles to the institutional means by which democratic and parliamentary institutions are supported. As part of this, it provides a compilation of practices whereby parliaments seek to put these principles into effect with international assistance, known as Parliamentary Development Assistance (PDA). In fact, a clear and consistent set of lessons and recommendations about how international development and parliamentary actors can improve their assistance has emerged over the past two decades [‘Lessons learned’ and ‘Good practices’]. Secondly, it explores whether this results into any distinct approach to parliamentary oversight. It examines whether the PDA demonstrated capacity to promote substantial changes to the parliamentary oversight mechanisms in order to address the challenges of corruption better. Thirdly, the thesis sheds light on the nexus between technical support and political environment – often expressed through political will - and, political economy analysis, ignored too long in the name of ‘neutral technical support’. The thesis reinforces that political behaviour and culture cannot be changed quickly. This requires long term engagements, and, calls for enduring commitment and collaboration.The thesis identifies distinct gaps in the literature of studies of the impact of parliamentary development assistance (PDA). It seeks to consider the work of international organisations, research institutions, and donors with the parliaments of different countries and developmental situations in terms of their capacity to make a difference to the strengthening of parliamentary development and oversight work. Donors - development partners and international actors will need to make a durable commitment to programmes based on robust local and political analysis, and reduce the number of short-term interventions, quick fixes, and small-scale projects

Interdependent policy instrument preferences: a two-mode network approach

In policymaking, actors are likely to take the preferences of others into account when strategically positioning themselves. However, there is a lack of research that conceives of policy preferences as an interdependent system. In order to analyse interdependencies, we link actors to their policy preferences in water protection, which results in an actor-instrument network. As actors exhibit multiple preferences, a complex two-mode network between actors and policies emerges. We analyse whether actors exhibit interdependent preference profiles given shared policy objectives or social interactions among them. By fitting an exponential random graph model to the actor-instrument network, we find considerable clustering, meaning that actors tend to exhibit preferences for multiple policy instruments in common. Actors tend to exhibit interdependent policy preferences when they are interconnected, that is, they collaborate with each other. By contrast, actors are less likely to share policy preferences when a conflict line divides them

Globalizing Representative Democracy: The Emergence of Multilayered International Parliamentalism

As globalization penetrates the realm of democracy, the internationalization of the institution of parliament, as the epitome of popular representation in liberal democracies - continues to be largely ignored by key studies in international law, constitutional law and global governance. This article seeks to place international parliamentarism on the radar of legal scholarship, reassess the value that representative democracy has in the globalized world, and demonstrate that understanding parliaments as purely domestic institutions immune from international integrative forces is no longer tenable. This article argues that international interparliamentary relations do not occur merely within isolated forums but can and do de facto evolve in layers of overlapping forums whenever circumstances allow it. To capture this phenomenon, the article conceptualizes multilayered international parliamentarism as developing in webs of linkages between the same parliamentary institutions in various bilateral and multilateral frameworks regarding the same region. This represents the most complex form of parliamentarism in contemporary global affairs. To demonstrate this, the article conducts an in-depth case study of relations between the parliaments of the EU and Brazil and examines the reaction of the Brazilian and supranational regional Latin American parliaments to the EU Returns Directive. The analysis shows that the traditional, inwardlooking role of parliaments is gradually changing under the pressure of transnational policy challenges. Increased international contacts among parliaments accentuate their deliberative functions and create new avenues for parliamentary input in international affairs. This kind of interaction fosters the diplomatic actorship of parliaments in foreign affairs in a concerted attempt to counterbalance intergovernmental and transgovernmental ways of doing politics and making law

African legislatures active in the budget process?! Emerging trends and consequences for legislative identity

Legislatures in the Southern Africa have made recent signals that they are becoming active in the budget process through the establishment of Budget Committees, Parliamentary Budget Offices, and Constituency Development Funds. These developments are surprising given the Westminster heritage of these institutions and periods of executive dominance that precluded such involvement from independence. If these legislatures are, indeed, modifying their involvement in budgetary matters, this could pointto a fundamental shiftin their overall function and identity. This study thus asks: Are changes really unfolding? And, if so, why? The research employs data collected on the basis of extensive fieldwork in five parliaments in Southern Africa with similar historical attributes. This includes semi-structured interviews with over 160 MPs and staff, focus group discussions, and archival analysis in the Parliaments of Namibia, Lesotho, Malawi, Zimbabwe, and Zambia. The results of the study find support for the initial hypothesis: public signals are, indeed, indicative of more extensive changes in legislative budgetary engagement, though to varying degrees within each. Formal legal authority was found to be a poor predictor of legislative change, as were emerging technical abilities. A final congruence test found that a combination of external donor influence and regional peer-to peer legislative exchange are best able to account for the developments underway. The results of this exploratory study serve as an orientation for parliaments presently undergoing institutional change in budgetary matters as well as a basis for further research

Parliamentary online public engagement in the 21st Century : A comparative perspective with a focus on Austria and Portugal

This thesis concerns how parliaments, as institutions, utilise the Internet (and ICTs) to reach and engage citizen. It is structured around the concept of parliamentary (online) public engagement, which has only recently gained some attention in the research agendas of political science and legislative studies. This concept covers a very wide range of outlets and activities offered by parliaments, which can have different purposes and can assume both passive and active forms of engaging with citizens. This thesis focuses on a comparative study of PWs in 21 countries in Europe, and it is complemented by multiple case studies. A mixed method approach was applied, relying on both quantitative and qualitative data and methods. First, the measurement and description of parliamentary online public engagement activities and tools in 21 European parliaments was undergone. Then, it proceeded to a qualitative strand, first assessing the causal conditions necessary and/or sufficient for explaining the results from the quantitative strand and second studying in two case studies in depth – Portugal and Austria – in order to understand the relevant mechanisms, processes and critical actors behind parliaments’ online public engagement strategies over time. Empirically, the study finds that parliaments are selective in their strategies for engaging with the public. In their selectivity, most parliaments choose to invest largely in information provision, leaving other activities of public engagement as secondary. This means that most parliaments have not yet implemented activities and tools to truly engage with their citizens. Additionally, some of the examples found are of an experimental nature or are still in their infancy. Furthermore, parliaments still have a long way to go in pursuing the way they delivery public engagement activities to their audiences. Descriptive results also show that parliaments are cautious when it comes to citizen’s actual participation in the policymaking and prefer to convert conventional forms of participation to digital versions instead of creating innovative democratic instruments. From the explanatory analysis it was possible to conclude that besides parliamentary resources, a committed leadership and political will from key critical actors are also important when it comes to changing the way parliaments engage with citizens through digital media. Additionally, these institutions are mimicking other parliaments that are perceived as successful in using ICTs to communicate and engage with citizens as a response to environmental uncertainty. Finally, it seems that inter-parliamentary cooperation, i.e. learning mechanisms, are increasingly relevant for parliaments on these matters

A penalized inference approach to stochastic block modelling of community structure in the Italian Parliament

We analyse bill cosponsorship networks in the Italian Chamber of Deputies. In comparison with other parliaments, a distinguishing feature of the Chamber is the large number of political groups. Our analysis aims to infer the pattern of collaborations between these groups from data on bill cosponsorships. We propose an extension of stochastic block models for edge-valued graphs and derive measures of group productivity and of collaboration between political parties. As the model proposed encloses a large number of parameters, we pursue a penalized likelihood approach that enables us to infer a sparse reduced graph displaying collaborations between political parties