Reform of the British House of Lords: A Test of Lijphart and Tsebelis
نویسنده
چکیده
The British House of Lords is generally seen as an unimportant political actor. It is unelected and has a formal veto over only very limited forms of legislation. According to Lijphart this gives the UK a system of ‘weak bicameralism’, and contributes to its position as a majoritarian democracy. The alternative classification system offered by Tsebelis treats the UK as essentially unicameral, with the single veto player being the governing party. But a reform in 1999, which removed the great majority of hereditary peers, seems to have given new strength to the House of Lords. It has since defeated the government almost 400 times, and become an important site for interparty negotiation. This paper evaluates the changes to the role of the House of Lords in British politics and suggests that they are signficant, but largely invisible according to these well-established theories. Recent developments in Britain may therefore help to refine the theory of bicameralism and executive-legislative relations for the future.
منابع مشابه
Dimensions of House of Lords Reform , March 2007 Roll Calls , Cycling and the ‘ Iowa School ’ Research Tradition in British
We consider the recent British government attempts to reform the House of Lords at Westminster. We show that failures to achieve decisive change are a product of a multi-dimensional ideological space on the issue of institutional reform. In conducting our analysis we note that despite W.O. Adyelotte’s pioneering efforts, roll call voting in the UK parliament remains woefully understudied. We pr...
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