Votes of No-Consequence?

• In Event: Voting Behavior for and in Parliament

Abstract

The Vote of No Confidence (VONC) is a key component of the relationship between legislature and executive in parliamentary systems. It is also one that seems more relevant in textbook descriptions than in actual practice. While the vote of no confidence embodies the principle of parliamentary government and the fusion of executive and legislative powers, in real-world legislatures, the combination of party discipline and legislative majorities makes VONCs largely irrelevant to actual governing. In principle, the practice of coalition government may open up space for VONCs to have consequences. Although here, too, party discipline helps to blunt those consequences The situation in which VONCs are relevant is when minority governments form. Here party discipline reinforces, rather than undermines, the relevance of VONCs.

In this paper, we examine the role of VONCs in relation to coalition government in general and minority governments in particular. We show that variation in the ease with which VONCs may be proposed and passed have consequences for the formation and longevity of coalition governments, but that those consequences are largely seen in minority government.

Author

• Indridi Haukur Indridason, University of California, Riverside