scholarly journals Bicameralism in Lesotho: A review of the powers and composition of the second chamber

2019 ◽  
Vol 23 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hoolo 'Nyane
Keyword(s):  
Prime Minister ◽  
Legislative Process ◽  
Parliamentary Democracy ◽  
Common Cause ◽  
National Assembly ◽  
Parliamentary System ◽  
History Of ◽  
Considerable Controversy ◽  
The Government ◽  
Meaningful Role

ABSTRACT Lesotho has a bicameral parliamentary system based on the British model. While the National Assembly is clearly a representative House elected by the citizenry, the purpose, structure and legislative powers of the Senate as the Second Chamber have been a matter of considerable controversy throughout the history of parliamentary democracy in the country. The National Assembly generally has the upper hand not only in the legislative process but also in the broader parliamentary system - it chooses the Prime Minister, it places its confidence in the government and it can withdraw such confidence. The fact that the model generally gives the National Assembly the upper hand is a matter of common cause. What is in question, though, is the nature and extent of the limitation of the powers of the Senate in terms of the Constitution. This article investigates this question and contends that the composition of, and restrictions on, the Senate need to be reviewed in order to enable the Chamber to play a meaningful role in Lesotho's parliamentary democracy . Key words: Constitution of Lesotho, Bicameralism, Senate, National Assembly, Powers of the Second Chamber

Canada

2021 ◽  
pp. 193-213
Author(s):  
Christopher Cochrane ◽  
Jean-François Godbout ◽  
Jason Vandenbeukel
Keyword(s):  
Prime Minister ◽  
Dominant Role ◽  
National Level ◽  
Political Life ◽  
Independent Effect ◽  
Parliamentary Democracy ◽  
House Of Commons ◽  
Lower House ◽  
The Government

Canada is a federal parliamentary democracy with a bicameral legislature at the national level. Members of the upper House, styled the Senate, are appointed by the prime minister, and members of the lower House, the House of Commons, are elected in single-member plurality electoral districts. In practice, the House of Commons is by far the more important of the two chambers. This chapter, therefore, investigates access to the floor in the Canadian House of Commons. We find that the age, gender, and experience of MPs have little independent effect on access to the floor. Consistent with the dominant role of parties in Canadian political life, we find that an MP’s role within a party has by far the most significant impact on their access to the floor. Intriguingly, backbenchers in the government party have the least access of all.

Budget woes will slow Canada's hard power build-up

2017 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Global Governance ◽  
Prime Minister ◽  
White Paper ◽  
Foreign Affairs ◽  
House Of Commons ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Hard Power ◽  
Core Elements ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Government

Significance Ahead of the rollout of the Liberal government’s new defence white paper, Minister of Foreign Affairs Chrystia Freeland delivered a speech in the House of Commons arguing that Canada’s membership of NATO and history of peacekeeping are core elements of its internationalist foreign policy. The government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau wishes to finance greater Canadian involvement in multilateral security missions and institutions of liberal global governance. Impacts Defence issues are not politically salient to Canadian voters, but government backtracking on policy is. High polling support for peacekeeping would probably evaporate in the event of Canadian losses abroad. Operational setbacks could see Trudeau’s Liberals bleed support to their New Democratic and Conservative rivals.

scholarly journals From the history of uzbek-korean educational relations

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (7/S) ◽  
pp. 168-171
Author(s):  
Fazilat Nurmetova
Keyword(s):  
Detailed Analysis ◽  
Prime Minister ◽  
Republic Of Korea ◽  
National Assembly ◽  
South Korean ◽  
Head Of State ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Republic ◽  
Further Development

This article provides a detailed analysis of the history of Uzbek-Korean educational relations in the Commonwealth and its further development with the help of Internet data and sources. Research also gives latest information about the head of state also met with the Speaker of the National Assembly and the Prime Minister of the Republic of Korea and took part in the Uzbek-South Korean business forum with the participation of leaders of leading economic and financial structures of the two countries.

The Weimar Constitution

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter C. Caldwell
Keyword(s):  
Political Culture ◽  
Social Rights ◽  
Individual Rights ◽  
Parliamentary Democracy ◽  
National Assembly ◽  
Labour Rights ◽  
Basic Rights ◽  
The People ◽  
Democratic Change ◽  
The Government

The revolution of 1918 produced the basic decisions of Germany’s National Assembly in the Weimar Constitution: for parliamentary democracy, a more centralized state, and basic rights—including social rights. The National Assembly sought a form of parliamentary democracy that would ensure both stability and democratic change. It rejected both American presidentialism and French parliamentarianism in favour of a hybrid that balanced a president directly elected by the people with a strong Reichstag composed of representatives elected by proportional voting. The president’s emergency powers could be used if the Reichstag were divided to stabilize democracy, while the Reichstag had the power to rescind emergency acts and to remove the government. The constitution’s section on basic rights was extensive, eventually including fifty-seven articles. Among them were individual rights, the rights of family and youth, religious rights, and labour rights. The aim was a ‘social catechism’ of ethical and social aims that could unite the nation. The Weimar Constitution opened up democratic possibilities for Germany. The fact that its opponents were able to use its framework to undermine the Reichstag and to bring about democracy’s demise is a matter of politics and political culture rather than a matter of constitutional structure.

Papua New Guinea economy set to 'muddle down'

2016 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Papua New Guinea ◽  
Foreign Exchange ◽  
Prime Minister ◽  
Commodity Prices ◽  
New Guinea ◽  
Government Budget ◽  
Content Type ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Government ◽  
Economic Outlook

Subject The political and economic outlook for Papua New Guinea. Significance Despite combined GDP growth of nearly 20% over the last two years, the fall in commodity prices has exposed the downside risks in the government's economic strategy and seriously damaged its political credibility. A government cash crisis driven by a 20% fall in expected revenues in 2015 is fracturing the country's politics. Papua New Guinea (PNG) has a history of getting through crises, although this has usually involved a changing of the prime minister and an IMF programme. Impacts The government budget crisis and foreign exchange shortages will hurt growth in 2016. There is a risk of forced sale of foreign-owned businesses and land. Foreign exchange shortages may be the greatest risk to businesses.

Implications of the Proposed Communication Service Tax Bill on the Socio-Economic Development of Nigeria

2018 ◽  
pp. 22-46
Author(s):  
Benjamin Enahoro Assay
Keyword(s):  
Economic Development ◽  
Legislative Process ◽  
Communication Service ◽  
Economic Activities ◽  
Communication Services ◽  
National Assembly ◽  
Socio Economic Development ◽  
Nigerian Government ◽  
The Government ◽  
Financial Gains

This chapter describes how the decision of the Nigerian government to introduce a Communication Service Tax Bill to the National Assembly to compel consumers of certain communication services to pay a 9 percent tax has pitted the government against major stakeholders in the ICT sector who are concerned about the future of the industry. While the government wants the legislative process regarding the bill to go on because of the financial gains that will accrue to it monthly, the stakeholders want it jettisoned for fear that it would impact negatively on the ICT sector and the economy, which is currently in recession. This chapter wades through the controversy by presenting the various positions canvassed by stakeholders and points the way ahead for the sector, which is fast becoming the hub of economic activities in Nigeria, to harness its full potentials for the overall benefit of the Nigerian society.

5. The House of Commons

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ian Loveland
Keyword(s):  
Separation Of Powers ◽  
Party Politics ◽  
Legislative Process ◽  
House Of Commons ◽  
National Assembly ◽  
Parliamentary Sovereignty ◽  
The Government ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Modern Era

This chapter examines the relationship between the government and the legislature, in order to develop arguments concerning the doctrines of parliamentary sovereignty and the separation of powers within the contemporary constitution. It argues that, for most of the modern era, the House of Commons has been a body in which party politics is the dominant determinant both in the legislative process and in respect of executive accountability. The house is manifestly now a factional rather than national assembly for most purposes. But it would be premature to conclude that the constitution permits factional concerns to determine both the content of legislation and the parliamentary accountability of government behaviour.

The Price of Offices in Pre-Revolutionary France

1984 ◽  
Vol 27 (4) ◽  
pp. 831-860 ◽  
Author(s):  
William Doyle
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Social Status ◽  
Early History ◽  
Early Nineteenth Century ◽  
Distinctive Features ◽  
National Assembly ◽  
History Of ◽  
Local Courts ◽  
The Government

One of the most distinctive features of the French Ancien Régime was the sale of offices. Several European states resorted to this method of tapping the wealth of their richer subjects in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, but nowhere did venality spread further through society than in France, and nowhere did its importance persist so long. Although the revolutionaries of 1789 abolished it, it reappeared for certain public functions in the early nineteenth century, and has not quite vanished even today. The origins and early history of the system have been authoritatively studied, but its eighteenth-century history has received very little attention. This is all the more curious in that France continued to be governed largely by holders of venal offices, they constituted the backbone of opposition to the government in the form of the magistrates of the parlements, and huge amounts of capital continued to be absorbed by office-buying. Even so, most historians consider that by this time the venal system was in decline. This seemed to be demonstrated by unsold offices remaining on the market, and above all by falling, office prices. For Alfred Cobban, indeed, these trends were symptoms of the decline of a whole class, the officiers. Here was ‘a section of society which was definitely not rising in wealth, and was barely holding its own in social status’ as falling office prices showed. ‘The decline seems to have been general, from the parlements downwards, though until the end of the eighteenth century it was much less marked in the offices of the parlements than in those of the présidiaux, élections, maréchaussées and other local courts.’ Resentment at this decline explained the revolutionary fervour of the officiers, whom Cobban had previously shown to be the largest bourgeois group in the National Assembly; and 1789 was largely the work not of a rising capitalist bourgeoisie, but rather of a declining professional one.

Fragmenting the Nation: Divisible Sovereignty and Travancore's Quest for Federal Independence

2016 ◽  
Vol 34 (3) ◽  
pp. 743-782 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarath Pillai
Keyword(s):  
British Empire ◽  
Prime Minister ◽  
The Political ◽  
Fundamental Idea ◽  
Indian States ◽  
Colonial India ◽  
British Occupation ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Government ◽  
Political Form

Speaking at the Travancore legislative assembly on February 2, 1938, Sir C.P. Ramaswamy Aiyar said: “The federation contemplated in the Government of India Act (1935) was founded on the recognition of the fundamental idea that the Ruler alone represents his state and that the Ruler is the government of the state.” Travancore was one of the oldest princely states in India, which antedated the British occupation and claimed a dynastic rule uninterrupted by any foreign or domestic powers. Its history of constitutional reforms and economic advancement enabled it to occupy a pivotal position in colonial India. As the Dewan (prime minister) of Travancore, Sir C.P. played a crucial role in the constitutional debates on the political form of postcolonial India, especially federation, in the last two decades of the British Empire in India. He argued that Indian states were inherently sovereign, and that the only locus of sovereignty in the states was their rulers. In doing so, he imagined a future Indian federation predicated on the idea of divisible sovereignty, which was given constitutional effect by the Government of India (GOI) Act (1935). Sir C.P.'s expositions on the sovereignty of the states and Travancore's constitutionalism offer analytical lenses to recuperate a history of imperial constitutionalism and the grand political project it enabled: Indian federation.

scholarly journals Undemocratic Centralism and Neo-Corporatism: The New British Constitution

1969 ◽  
pp. 540
Author(s):  
Norman Lewis
Keyword(s):  
Party System ◽  
Prime Minister ◽  
Civil Liberties ◽  
Individual Rights ◽  
Parliamentary Democracy ◽  
Bill Of Rights ◽  
Checks And Balances ◽  
Parliamentary System ◽  
Rational Discourse ◽  
Presidential System

Professor Lewis argues that Britain's lack of a constitutionally entrenched bill of rights, combined with the failure of the English courts to sufficiently protect individual rights and interests, has served to create a void of adequate protections for those freedoms which seen as being fundamental to a parliamentary democracy. Furthermore, the author argues that the parliamentary system of government in Britain has devolved from a forum of rational discourse, into a party system, and more recently into a quasi-presidential system where ultimate power lies with the Prime Minister. The devolution of the parliamentary system, when combined with the lack of adequate protections of civil liberties, is seen as creating a system of "undemocratic centralism", examples of which are These factors, Professor Lewis argues, are indicative of Britain's need of a more adequate system of checks and balances, and a Charter of Rights similar to Canada's, each of which can be achieved by a new Constitutional "settlement''.

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