Because Parliament Can

Move!—Because Exercise Can Boost Your Brainpower

Have you ever considered preparing for an exam by doing physical exercise? Would it not be great to go outside and play capture the flag or double Dutch with your friends instead of doing math? Of course, you already know that this is wishful thinking. Everyone has to prepare carefully and learn attentively if they want to do better on their exams. However, it is also true that physical activit...

How can an act of parliament cure cancer?

Accidental Politicians: How Randomly Selected Legislators Can Improve Parliament Efficiency

We study a prototypical model of a Parliament with two Parties or two Political Coalitions and we show how the introduction of a variable percentage of randomly selected independent legislators can increase the global efficiency of a Legislature, in terms of both the number of laws passed and the average social welfare obtained. We also analytically find an ”efficiency golden rule” which allows...

How Can the Scottish Parliament Be Improved as a Legislature?

There will be a referendum on Scottish independence in 2014. The prospect of further constitutional change might prompt us to reconsider the role and influence of the Scottish Parliament as a legislature. Fourteen years of devolution has also given us plenty of experience on which to make our assessment of the limitations of the new Scottish political system. Yet, the title of this article also...

Parliament

Disaster concentrates the mind wonderfully. The Shelton tragedy forced M.P.s to grapple with mental illness once more in Parliament's spring term after a long lull in which national economic troubles claimed their attention to the exclusion of almost all else. Mr. Kenneth Robinson, the Minister of Health, finally agreed ?and to be fair, without too much reluctance?to hold the Shelton inquiry in...