Suchergebnisse

The article presents a case of successful constitutional change in Switzerland, the "re-assignment of responsibilities between the federal government and the cantons and the new fiscal equalization scheme," which was adopted in 2004 by referendum. By starting from the general assumption that ways and means are needed to strengthen general interests at the expense of distributive interests in constitutional discussions, the article endeavors to identify favorable conditions for successful constitutional change. By using insights from "constitutional political economy" and "actor-centered institutionalism," four such conditions are revealed: the procedural separation of problem solving and bargaining interaction modes; the importance of ideational factors like "frames," "causal theories," and focal points; active agenda-crafting; and the structuring of constitutional debates by earlier decisions. In addition, this article highlights that other conditions, more directly linked to interest and interest struggle, can help to mitigate the intensity of distributive conflicts and are therefore indirectly conducive to a problem-solving interaction orientation of actors. Adapted from the source document.

This article investigates Australia's economic success since the 1990s. As this was set in motion by fundamental political reforms, it asks to what extent Australian-type federalism has been an important factor in the reform process. By using two approaches - the market-preserving federalism approach of Weingast, which stresses the virtues of "limited government", decentralisation and competition together with the intergovernmental coordination approach of Scharpf which argues for a "problem-solving" orientation of territorial actors -, the structure of Australian federalism, changes in the working of the federal system in the 1990s, and effects on policy-making are scrutinised. The article demonstrates that a particular combination of a rather centralised federal structure and a particular type of intergovernmental coordination, i.e. collaboration, supplemented by the strong influence of new public management ideas, has been conducive to political reforms in Australia. This suggests that a decentralised and competitive version of federalism, as defended by Weingast, is not a necessary condition for embarking on a successful reform path in federal countries. In future research, both approaches or analytical dimensions should be used in order to better understand the relationship of intergovernmental relations and policy reforms. (Schweizerische Zeitschrift für Politikwissenschaft / FUB)