Parliaments, Presidents, and Bureaucracy

1. Parliaments, Presidents, and Bureaucracy

2. Parliamentary Government • Only vote citizen casts is for member of parliament • Parliament is only elected body • Executive power is lodged with a cabinet • Cabinet can fail or resign at any time • Prime minister can force new elections

3. Head of State and Cabinet • Heads of state are merely symbolic • Constitutional monarchs • “President” • Coalition government • What’s good? What’s bad?

4. Effects of Parliament • Public debate • Scrutiny • Oversight • Question time • Source of executive

5. Advantages/Disadvantages • Advantages • Government can respond directly because power is unified • Lines of responsibility are clear • Disadvantages • Few protections for a minority • Can produce unstable government

6. Presidential Government • Legislature and executive are elected independently of each other • Parties are more loosely unified • No guarantee that president’s party will also hold legislature

7. Differences • Policy leadership more clearly lodged with president • Responsibility for policy more difficult to identify in presidential • Comprehensive policy more difficult in presidential • Recruitment of leaders differs • Harder to control president • Process is less flexible in presidential • Constitutional review more important in presidential

8. Skills of Presidents • Proficiency as public communicator • Organizational capacity • Political skill • Vision • Cognitive style • Emotional intelligence

9. Public Administration • We need people who are not directly involved in politics in the sense that they share in making major decisions but who are involved in the construction and implementation of the policies that carry out those decisions • A significant part of the governmental power of any state us if necessity not under close political control • Street-level bureaucracy

10. “Good” P.A. • Honest, accurate translation of political leaders’ decisions into more specifically designed policies • Flexibility in dealing with special cases at the point of delivery • Non-arbitrary use of flexibility • Feedback of expert advice; active imagination and assertive inquiry on the part of administrators • Efficiency

11. Bureaucracy • One way to organize the public administration • Weber’s characteristics • Members appointed and promoted based on their qualifications • Special requirements of training or experience • Administrative procedures are standardized • Hierarchical command structure • Shielded from day-to-day political pressures

12. Problems and Changes • Difficulties in evaluating public administrators v. in private business • Requirement that bureaucrats be shielded from politics • Office of ombudsman • Freedom of information laws • Interference by political leaders • Pressure from public opinion • Representative bureaucracy