Suchergebnisse

This book shows that constitutional courts exercise direct and indirect power on political branches through decision-making. The first face of judicial power is characterized by courts directing political actors to implement judicial decisions in specific ways. The second face leads political actors to anticipate judicial review and draft policies accordingly. The judicial–political interaction originating from both faces is herein formally modeled. A cross-European comparison of pre-conditions of judicial power shows that the German Federal Constitutional Court is a well-suited representative case for a quantitative assessment of judicial power. Multinomial logistic regressions show that the court uses directives when evasion of decisions is costly while accounting for the government's ability to implement decisions. Causal analyses of the second face of judicial power show that bills exposed to legal signals are drafted accounting for the court. These findings re-shape our understanding of judicialization and shed light on a silent form of judicialization. Benjamin G. Engst is a Postdoctoral Researcher in Political Science at the University of Mannheim, Germany.

Does a government in a bicameral system strategically alter the length of the legislative process in the first chamber in anticipation of future majorities in the second chamber? Drawing on an existing formal model of dynamic policymaking, we argue that governing majorities strategically accelerate or delay their agenda when a potential majority change in the second chamber is imminent. If the government fears losing control over the second chamber, then the government accelerates their agenda. By contrast, if the government hopes to gain control over the second chamber, the government decelerates their agenda. We test our argument in Germany's symmetric and asymmetric bicameralism by analyzing 1,966 governmental bills from 1998 to 2013. The analyses confirm our expectations for symmetric bicameralism, thus suggesting that the synchronicity of election cycles should be taken into account both in the analysis of bicameral systems and in institutional design of such systems. © 2020 The Authors. Legislative Studies Quarterly published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of Washington University in St. Louis

Does a government in a bicameral system strategically alter the length of the legislative process in the first chamber in anticipation of future majorities in the second chamber? Drawing on an existing formal model of dynamic policymaking, we argue that governing majorities strategically accelerate or delay their agenda when a potential majority change in the second chamber is imminent. If the government fears losing control over the second chamber, then the government accelerates their agenda. By contrast, if the government hopes to gain control over the second chamber, the government decelerates their agenda. We test our argument in Germany's symmetric and asymmetric bicameralism by analyzing 1,966 governmental bills from 1998 to 2013. The analyses confirm our expectations for symmetric bicameralism, thus suggesting that the synchronicity of election cycles should be taken into account both in the analysis of bicameral systems and in institutional design of such systems.