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To what extent have parliaments a responsibility to monitor how laws are implemented as intended and have the expected impact? Is the practice of Post-Legislative Scrutiny emerging as a new dimension within the oversight role of parliament? What approach do parliaments apply in assessing the implementation and impact of legislation? These are the fascinating questions guiding this book. Case studies offer an in-depth look at how particular countries and the European Union conduct Post-Legislative Scrutiny. The analysis puts Post-Legislative Scrutiny in the context of parliamentary oversight and parliaments’ engagement in the legislative cycle. The purpose of this book is to demonstrate the...
In Parliamentary Diplomacy in European and Global Governance, 27 experts from all over the world analyse the fast-expanding phenomenon of parliamentary diplomacy. Through a wealth of empirical case studies, the book demonstrates that parliamentarians and parliamentary assemblies have an increasingly important international role. The volume begins with parliamentary diplomacy in Europe, because the European Parliament is one of the strongest autonomous institutional actors in world politics. The study then examines parliamentary diplomacy in relations between Europe and third countries or regions (Mexico, Turkey, Russia, the Mediterranean), before turning attention to the rest of the world: North and South America, Asia, Africa and Australia. This pioneering volume confirms the worldwide nature and salience of parliamentary diplomacy in contemporary global politics.
This book traces the failure of international action in Kosovo from the late 1980s until NATO intervention in 1999, and endeavours to explain why, during that time, so many opportunities for making peace were squandered. Applying methodology developed by the EU Conflict Prevention Network, it divides the conflict into four main phases and examines how, at each, chances for settlement were either lost or overlooked. It considers policy alternatives available at the time, and hypothesises reasons why these were ultimately discarded. Drawing on a wide range of sources, including the author’s own experience of the negotiations process, this book presents a hitherto unexplored thesis of the Kosovo conflict, that of a ‘lag’ in international action in relation to the situation on the ground, and seeks to draw from these failures some central lessons for the future of conflict prevention.
Based on unprecedented access to the UK Parliament, this book challenges how we understand and think about accountability between government and Parliament. Drawing on three months of research in Westminster, and over forty-five interviews, this book focuses on the everyday practices of Members of Parliament and officials to reveal how parliamentarians perform their scrutiny roles. Some MPs become specialists while others act as lone wolves; some are there to try to defend their party while others want to learn about policy. Amongst these different styles, chairs of committees have to try to reconcile these interpretations and either act as committee-orientated catalysts or attempt to impose...
Northern Ireland’s power- sharing Assembly is understudied in the legislative studies literature. Having been suspended (or de facto suspended) for around 40% of its existence, conversation has tended to focus more on the wider political problems in which the Assembly has been enmeshed and less on its day-to-day functions as a legislature. This book is the first to examine how the Assembly fulfils the four core functions of a legislature: representation, linkage, scrutiny, and policy- making. Using Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLAs) as the primary unit of analysis, the book explores: who and how MLAs represent; their approach to cultivating links with constituents; their use of par...
This book is a study of regime change in the context of international administration, where the United Nations and other multilateral organisations hold temporary executive authority at the domestic level. Work on the politics of state-building has highlighted how these administration operations can influence nearly every aspect of politics in the country or territory in which they are deployed. This book concentrates in particular on the 'regime-building' practices of these missions, and examines the aims and influences of international administrations in the area of democratic development, as well as their ultimate impact on the process of regime change. Through a comparative analysis of e...
In today’s increasingly complex and interdependent world, the role of parliaments in external affairs remains a relatively under explored topic of research. The multiple patterns of global governance are mostly dominated by the executive branches of government, with parliaments relegated to the sidelines. This insightful book aims to challenge this dominant perspective and demonstrate the increased networking of parliaments both within the EU and with external actors outside the EU. It not only sheds light on EU parliamentary cooperation and networking, but also reveals the growing scope and role of parliamentary scrutiny, control and conflict mediation.
The international community's practice of administering territories in post-conflict environments has raised important legal questions. Using Kosovo as a case study, Bernhard Knoll analyses the identity of the administrating UN organ, the ways in which the territories under consideration have acquired partial subjectivity in international law and the nature of legal obligations in the fiduciary exercise of transitional administration developed within the League of Nations' Mandate and the UN Trusteeship systems. Knoll discusses Kosovo's internal political and constitutional order and notes the absence of some of the characteristics normally found in liberal democracies, before proposing that the UN consolidates accountability guidelines related to the protection of human rights and the development of democratic standards should it engage in the transitional administration of territory.
This book analyses the public accountability of political actors in contemporary democratic states. Accountability as understood here is a necessary condition of democracy: delegation of power with transparency and supervision over those who are chosen to exercise the power of the state. The authors identify paths of executing accountability in the electoral process, as well as in traditional instruments of parliamentary scrutiny and other relationships between the legislative, executive and judicial branches. They track how well-known mechanisms of democracy fulfil the need to report on the exercising of an entrusted power. They also explore how new developments in the constitutional framework, that is, the post-evaluation of legislation, and beyond it in mass social movements, Big Tech companies and social media, are changing the classic and established concepts of accountable power. The book will be a valuable resource for academics, researchers and policymakers working it the areas of Constitutional Law and Politics and Accountability Studies.