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This article reviews the scholarship on semi-presidentialism since the early 1990s. We identify three waves of semi-presidential studies. The first wave focused on the concept of semi-presidentialism, how it should be defined, and what countries should be classified as semi-presidential. The second wave examined the effect of semi-presidential institutions on newly democratized countries. Does semi-presidentialism help or hinder the process of democratic consolidation? The third wave examines the effect of semi-presidential institutions on both recent and consolidated democracies. Third-wave studies have been characterized by three questions: to what extent does the direct election of the president make a difference to outcomes; to what extent does variation in presidential power make a difference; and what other factors interact with presidential power to help to bring about differential outcomes? The article argues that the concept of semi-presidentialism remains taxonomically valid, but that the empirical scholarship on countries with semi-presidential institutions needs to respond to broader developments within the discipline if it is to remain relevant.

Relative to presidentialism and parliamentarism, the study of semi-presidentialism is still in its infancy. The term was coined in 1970 and, apart from the pioneering work of Maurice Duverger, systematic study began only in the 1990s. Previously, the definition of semi-presidentialism was the subject of much debate. Now, most scholars agree that semi-presidentialism is where there is both a directly elected fixed-term president and a prime minister and cabinet that are collectively responsible to the legislature. The key contribution of recent scholarship is that semi-presidentialism is not a unimodal category. Instead, there is a tremendous variety of executive politics in countries with a semi-presidential constitution. This work has identified the effects of such variation on topics such as democratic performance and both government formation and termination. Given so many countries now have semi-presidential constitutions, the study of this topic is likely to remain salient. In the future, there should be more comparative studies of semi-presidential countries and more systematic comparisons of semi-presidentialism with presidentialism and parliamentarism.

The concepts of semi-presidentialism by Robert Elgie and Matthew S. Shugart differ greatly. When applied to Ukraine and Slovenia, this shows how a country can be categorized differently depending on the author's understanding of what the defining properties of semi-presidentialism are. Elgie's minimalist concept classifies both countries as semi-presidential, while Shugart's concept points out major differences between the systems of government of these two countries. According to the Shugart's concept, Ukraine is a semi-presidential regime; Slovenia is not. These two concepts illustrate the divergences in defining semi-presidential systems and, consequently, the differences in the understanding of the properties and the functioning of political systems in various countries. By comparing the systems of government in those two countries and by the application of Robert Elgie's minimalist and Matthew Shugart's non-minimalist concepts I will test the usefulness of the minimalist concepts in a theoretical and practical way. Adapted from the source document.

AbstractAs semi‐presidentialism has become increasingly common in European democracies, so have the debates about the consequences of several of its political and institutional features. In particular, in those regimes, cohabitation between presidents and cabinets of different parties and cabinet dismissal powers on the part of presidents are thought to be a source of inter‐branch conflict and government instability. However, so far, most empirical work on government survival has failed to confirm any of these expectations. This article addresses this disjuncture between theory and empirical results by making a twofold contribution. First, it takes into account the internal diversity within semi‐presidentialism, modeling the implications for government survival of different configurations between presidential powers' of cabinet dismissal, parliament dissolution and cohabitation in European semi‐presidential systems. Second, it reconsiders traditional government survival using the competing risks framework by adding a distinction between two different types of non‐electoral replacement: those where replacements imply a change in the party of the prime minister and those where they do not. Once such an approach is adopted, that presidential powers of parliamentary dissolution and cabinet dismissal indeed emerge as highly relevant for explaining government survival in these regimes.

Although a large body of research has been produced both on semi-presidential regimes and patterns of electoral change from general elections to midterm or other non-general elections, the study of presidential elections in semi-presidential regimes remains, to quote one of the few exceptions in this regard, "uncharted territory" in the political science literature. Using a dataset on election results and turnout levels in all semi-presidential democracies since 1945, we test several hypotheses about changes in turnout levels and government parties and coalitions' gains and losses in presidential elections. We show that while semi-presidential democracies with weaker presidencies do approximate the patterns predicted by the "second-order" model, that is clearly not the case where presidents hold more considerable powers, where government losses are explained by "negative voting" and "balancing" theories. The implications of these findings for the very definition of "semi-presidentialism" and the consequences of these regimes are also discussed.

Abstract. The role of the president is presumed to vary amongst presidential, semi‐presidential and parliamentary systems. However, there are a variety of subtypes within semi‐presidential systems. Debate often hinges on the prime minister and government, and to whom they are more accountable. However, the accountability of prime ministers and governments to presidents can be rather 'fuzzy'. This article looks through the prism of the president rather than that of the government. After examining definitions of presidential, parliamentary and semi‐presidential systems, several dispositional categories of political regimes will be established. Then presidential power will be assessed through a series of dichotomous measures, and for all electoral democracies with a president. Finally, the character of each category will be assessed. The concept of 'semi‐presidentialism' is rejected in favour of more meaningful labels: presidential systems, parliamentary systems with presidential dominance, parliamentary systems with a presidential corrective and parliamentary systems with figurehead presidents.

The role of the president is presumed to vary amongst presidential, semi-presidential and parliamentary systems. However, there are a variety of subtypes within semi-presidential systems. Debate often hinges on the prime minister and government, and to whom they are more accountable. However, the accountability of prime ministers and governments to presidents can be rather 'fuzzy'. This article looks through the prism of the president rather than that of the government. After examining definitions of presidential, parliamentary and semi-presidential systems, several dispositional categories of political regimes will be established. Then presidential power will be assessed through a series of dichotomous measures, and for all electoral democracies with a president. Finally, the character of each category will be assessed. The concept of 'semi-presidentialism' is rejected in favour of more meaningful labels: presidential systems, parliamentary systems with presidential dominance, parliamentary systems with a presidential corrective and parliamentary systems with figurehead presidents. (European Journal of Political Research / FUB)

Abstract The article attempts to follow up the fate of the concept Maurice Duverger created to explain the regime of the French Fifth Republic: semi–presidential government. Duverger expounded the concept in his fundamental book Échec au roi in 1978, trying to illustrate the fact that regimes of this type worked quite differently in the seven Western and Northern European countries that institutionalized it. 'Semi–presidentialism' is now widely, but very often controversially, used. The recent appearance of such regimes in newly democratizing states points to the fact that this form of government is often the preferred solution in times of transition. A critical review of Duverger's concept seems expedient as the diversification of these regimes raises new and perhaps intriguing questions. Due to the rejection of Duverger's concept or its ignorance in parts of the European scientific community, it is necessary to defend it as an important tool for political analysis. Moreover, it opens the opportunity for the examination of fundamental problems in political science.