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Committees are the backbone of any modern legislature. Membership of committees is in most parliaments a gift within the reach of the party groups. Yet, both theoretically and empirically, little is known about committee allocation in parliaments. Using theories from the literature of the US Congress, a framework for analysis of the committee assignments in Dáil Éireann is presented. Empirically, the contribution of this paper is twofold. First, it analyzes what factors influence the allocation of Teachta Dálas (TDs) to Dáil committees. Second, it analyzes to what extent the participation of TDs in committee changes over time. The former analysis corroborates results found in other parliaments; few factors seem to have an influence. The latter analysis confirms that the participation of TDs changes over time and seems to be tied in with the changing scope and influence of the committee system. The analyzes rely on a data set consisting of all committee assignments in the Dáil since November 1982 until June 2010. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper deals with how minor parties and independents act once they have won election to the parliament. Using a dataset of all votes in Dail Eireann from 1937 to 2007 the rate of agreement with Fianna Fail, Fine Gael and Labour for each independent and minor party candidate is calculated. Based on theories of the behaviour of parties and independents a number of hypotheses are formulated and tested. The conclusions of the paper are that minor parties are very likely to vote against the government when they are not a part of it and that for independents the particular typology matters. When independents are needed by the government, not only those independents needed but the entire body of independents are significantly more in agreement with the government than when they are not needed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ireland is often described as the odd country out in studies of west European politics. Its parties do not readily fit into the classical European definitions of party families. This paper estimates the positions of the parliamentary parties since 1937, based on a dataset consisting of all parliamentary votes from 1937 to 2006 using a Bayesian ideal point estimation framework. It is shown that party competition in the Irish parliament adheres to a government-opposition dimension, and that it is possible to distinguish only two blocs of parties in each period, one consisting of the parties supporting the government and one comprising the remaining parties as the opposition. It is argued that the estimated positions do not reflect party policy positions but are instead voting cohesion of two distinct blocs of the parliamentary parties. The findings are validated by a comparison with various expert surveys of Irish party positions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article analyzes the important events that cause the disbanding of the Irish political party Progressive Democrats which operated from 1985 to 2009. It mentions that the failure of the members of the political party to reinvent themselves or merge with other parties in Ireland have affected its stability. The author adds that another factor that cause the disbanding of the party is the resignation of politician Charles J. Haughey. It also states that repeated electoral losses had a great impact on the representation of the group in the parliament.