Making Rules about Rulemaking: A Comparison of Presidential and Parliamentary Systems

In: Political research quarterly: PRQ ; official journal of the Western Political Science Association and other associations, Volume 64, Issue 3

Abstract

The authors examine the administrative procedures acts (APAs) of separation of powers and parliamentary systems. They examine sixteen national APAs (thirteen parliamentary and three presidential) and forty-eight APAs from the U.S. states that have institutional structures analogous to the presidential systems. They identify a very stark difference between the parliamentary and presidential APAs. While all of the presidential system APAs place constraints on both adjudicative and rulemaking activities, only two of the parliamentary APAs make any reference to rulemaking at all. The authors present an institutional explanation for this observation based on recent work on veto players and delegated discretion to administrative agents. They argue that the presence of partisan veto players discourages focus on rulemaking in APAs. Adapted from the source document.