Segmented or "Entrenched" Electoral Systems

The author discusses the problem of segmented or "entrenched" electoral systems, which are not widely known or applied in the electoral practice of democratic states. However, in the post-communist states of Eastern Europe they have come to the forefront. Their main purpose is to combine the principles of the majority and the proportional electoral systems as well as both to highlight the advantages and and mitigate the shortcomings of both. The main findings of the study is that there isn\u27t a universal model of relations between segmented electoral systems and parliamentary party systems. Segemented systems have in some countries produced the effects of the majority system and in others of the proportional sytems. Institutional factors causing those differences cannot be positively established

Lijphart and Horowitz in Bosnia and Herzegovina: Institutional Design for Conflict Resolution or Conflict Reproduction?

The author analyses the prerequisites and consequences of the implementation of different conflict management mechanisms, consociational and centripetal, in deeply divided societies, by looking at the “Komšić case” in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The case concerns the election of the Croat member to the three-member Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Owing to the revision of electoral patterns laid down in the “Dayton Constitution” of 1995, prerequisites were created for the election of the Serb member of the Presidency by Serbs, the Bosniak member by Bosniaks, whereas only the Croat member could not be elected by Croats. Consequently, the Croat member of the Presidency was elected by votes of Bosniaks in the 2006 and 2010 presidential elections. This led to a political and constitutional crisis in the country

Bosnia and Herzegovina: Consociational or Liberal Democracy?

The author discusses the nature of the political system in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the possible outcome of the country’s institutional reforms. The article begins with giving a detailed overview of the structure of the main political institutions and it continues with presenting and evaluating favorable and unfavorable factors of consociationalism in BiH. In the conclusion, the author analyzes the political implications of the suggested constitutional reforms

Electoral Politics in Croatia 1990 – 2000

An analysis of the normative/institutional level of the Croatian politics shows that the constitutional arrangements at the levels of the social system and the political sub-system could be labelled as democratic, while the constitutional solutions that regulated the relations among major political institutions could turn out to be insufficient. Hence the semi-presidential system of government in the Croatian wartime/transitional context provided an appropriate institutional framework for authoritarian regressions in the processes of political decision-making and in the content of political decisions. The domination of the president of the state in Croatia’s political life did not stem solely from the existing constitutional arrangements; it also rested on a set of additional premises of activity: a) a decade of harmony between the president and the parliamentary majority; b) the charismatic/clientelist nature of the ruling party; c) a rather weak and suppressed opposition to the ruling party by the unconsolidated opposition parties; and d) the expressive model of orientation of the actors in political activity. Based on the above account of the institutional/political order and the activities of the major actors, it can be surmised that the democratic consolidation in Croatia at the beginning of 2000 was in its incipient stage. Also, the frequent and profound changes in the structure of the cleavageas and the electoral systems as well as the frequent party factioning stood in the way and slowed down the consolidation of the representational level of political system. Nevertheless, a certain level of consolidation is testified to by the four cycles of non-violent parliamentary elections, the peaceful alternation of the parties in power, the contextually relatively low fluctuation of voters, the moderate fragmentation of the parliament, and the acceptance of the parliamentary rules of the game by the majority of the population

Transition and Neoinstitutionalism: the Example of Croatia

The author examines the role of neoinstitutionalism in processes of transition in post-socialist countries, the renewal of a rather orthodox institutionalistic approch to problems of political and social transformation. For many structural reasons this approach does not produce the results Expected. This is proved on the example of the implementation of western poitical institutions and institutes in Croaria since 1990. The author primarily addresses the relationship between the electoral, party and parliamentary systems, especially the influence of the electoral system on the electoral and legislative party system, and on the government. She gives strcctural and institutional reasons for the „deviations" observed

Electoral Politics in Croatia 1990 – 2000

An analysis of the normative/institutional level of the Croatian politics shows that the constitutional arrangements at the levels of the social system and the political sub-system could be labelled as democratic, while the constitutional solutions that regulated the relations among major political institutions could turn out to be insufficient. Hence the semi-presidential system of government in the Croatian wartime/transitional context provided an appropriate institutional framework for authoritarian regressions in the processes of political decision-making and in the content of political decisions. The domination of the president of the state in Croatia’s political life did not stem solely from the existing constitutional arrangements; it also rested on a set of additional premises of activity: a) a decade of harmony between the president and the parliamentary majority; b) the charismatic/clientelist nature of the ruling party; c) a rather weak and suppressed opposition to the ruling party by the unconsolidated opposition parties; and d) the expressive model of orientation of the actors in political activity. Based on the above account of the institutional/political order and the activities of the major actors, it can be surmised that the democratic consolidation in Croatia at the beginning of 2000 was in its incipient stage. Also, the frequent and profound changes in the structure of the cleavageas and the electoral systems as well as the frequent party factioning stood in the way and slowed down the consolidation of the representational level of political system. Nevertheless, a certain level of consolidation is testified to by the four cycles of non-violent parliamentary elections, the peaceful alternation of the parties in power, the contextually relatively low fluctuation of voters, the moderate fragmentation of the parliament, and the acceptance of the parliamentary rules of the game by the majority of the population

Coalition Governments in Croatia: First Experience 2000-2003

The author analyzes the formation, functioning and termination of the mandate of the first coalition governments in the history of Croatia between 2000 and 2003. She suggests that the parliamentary system of moderate pluralism after the elections, as well as the pre-electoral coalition agreements, contributed to the building of coalition governments, but that this process was undermined by a lack of a developed coalition political culture among the creators of the coalition as well as among the public in general. The coalition governments operated on the basis of a written coalition agreement that identified the mechanisms for coalition management among the coalition partners and implicitly introduced voting discipline in the parliament and the patterns of the distribution of posts in ministries, parliamentary bodies and public companies. Its main drawback were sketchy public policies which means that these were policy blind coalitions. The first coalition government (2000-2002) was terminated due to the feuding among the key coalition partners, and the second coalition government (2002-2003) ended due to the regular parliamentary elections. Though the government of 2000-2002 was the first coalition government in Croatia’s history and an oversized coalition government to boot, it nevertheless lasted longer than the average similar governments in other European countries

THE PROBLEMS OF RECENT COMPARATIVE POLITICS SCHOLARSHIP IN GERMANY

U uvodnom dijelu autorica se osvrće na suvremeno stanje komparativne politike u Njemačkoj, te konstatira da se strukturni nedostatci u razvoju te poddiscipline političke znanosti nastoje ozbiljnije nadoknaditi tek od devedesetih godina prošlog stoljeća. Najveću su zaslugu u tome imale transformacijske studije koje su bitno pridonijele i razvoju regionalne komparatistike. U drugom su dijelu pozitivni pomaci, ali i stare slabosti suvremene njemačke komparativne politike prikazani na primjeru pet novih autorskih studija. Među slabostima najvažnija je “zarobljenost” u predmetne okvire tradicionalnog studija sustava vlasti, te nedostatna metodološka osviještenost, pretjerana teorijska eklektičnost, izraženi deskriptivni normativizam i selekcijska pristranost u izboru slučajeva itd.The first part of the article is a review of contemporary comparative politics research in Germany. The conclusion of the first part is that serious attempts to overcome the structural weaknesses of this political science sub discipline are made only from the 1990’s on. The biggest credit for it goes to the research on political and social transformation that has also contributed substantially to the development of regional comparative studies. In the second part, the author shows both the structural weaknesses and the new positive developments by reviewing five recently published comparative studies. The most important among the weaknesses is the “lockedness” into the traditional framework of studying systems of government, as well as a lack of methodological consciousness, theoretical eclecticism, strong descriptive normativism and a bias in the selection of study cases

BUDIMIR LONČAR. OD PREKA DO VRHA SVIJETA

Tvrtko Jakovina, Zaprešić: Fraktura, 2020. (1. izd.) i 2023. (3. izd.)