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Copyright of Athenaeum: Polskie Studia Politologiczne is the property of Faculty of Political Science & Security Studies Nicolaus Copernicus University and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Based on three case studies, this paper examines the influence of parliamentary opposition parties on Georgia's foreign policy as a country with a hybrid regime. The study covers an eight-year period from the start of the Georgian Dream party's rule in 2012 to the end of 2020 when pro-Western opposition forces were strong and the government pursued a "normalization" policy with Russia. An analysis of the cases reveals that the parliamentary opposition has leverage in foreign policy to put pressure on the government. Yet the case studies show that the opposition's influence on foreign policy was manifested mainly by non-parliamentary means, particularly in mobilizing international actors and shaping public opinion on specific foreign policy issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article we empirically test the impact of ideological distance between opposition parties and incumbents on consensus in parliament in two different countries, Portugal and Spain, amid changing economic conditions. To do so, we employ the Comparative Manifesto Project database and develop a measure of ideological distance on the left-right and the centre-periphery dimensions based on parties' preferences as expressed in their manifestos. We demonstrate that the economic crisis had different effects in the two countries. In Portugal, it amplified the negative impact on consensus of ideological distance between the incumbent and opposition parties. As expected, parties more distant from the incumbent on the left-right continuum were more likely to vote against legislation. In Spain, by contrast, changes in the party system forced traditional mainstream parties, especially the socialists, to increase their opposition in parliament. Moreover, the crisis amplified the effect of the centre-periphery dimension on parliamentary conflict. As a result, not only parties ideologically distant from the incumbent on the left-right continuum were more likely to vote against legislation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The subject of this study is an analysis of different normative solutions and degrees of institutionalization of the role of the opposition in parliaments across a number of European states, ranging from stipulation in the parliamentary rules of procedure to formal recognition of the opposition in the constitution of the state. Balance of the parliamentary political power as well as acknowledgement of the legitimate role of opposition ensures prerequisites for democratic social dialogue and active participation of responsible citizens in the processes of strengthening institutions of representative democracy. Therefore, only consensual political culture contributes to the political trust that citizens place in political institutions. Although there is no universally adopted model that defines the role of the parliamentary majority and opposition, it is undeniable that the post-democracy era requires a redefinition of basic concepts, such as parliamentary majority and opposition, as well as the role of parliament. The scope of the analysis is limited to a comparative overview of constitutional solutions that guarantee the rights of the opposition and the legal framework regulating the part of the rights of parliamentary opposition, which are realized in the process of creating policies. The aim of the paper is to strengthen mechanisms of parliamentary democracy and, in particular, to strengthen trust in the work of the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia, as only through the effective implementation of European experiences can public trust be built and standards of political culture be improved. Methodologically, the comparative approach is complemented by the analysis of comments and interpretations of constitutional acts, laws, rules of procedure, as well as recommendations of the Venice Commission.

This study attempts to break new ground by systematically comparing oppositional behaviour of Members of Parliament (MPs) in the two key arenas found in parliament: the plenary and the committee. Do MPs express more opposition frontstage in the plenary than backstage in the committee when discussing European affairs? The article sheds new light on political opposition in parliament by using a dataset of hand-coded statements made by MPs during plenary debates and European Affairs committee deliberations in five national parliaments. The results lend strong support to the main hypothesis that MPs express more opposition during plenary debates than committee deliberations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID-19 pandemic and its effects on parliamentary activities have recently become a trending topic. The pandemic presented both challenges and opportunities for governments and parliaments. During times of crisis, government-parliament and government-opposition relations can result in contrasting expectations and outcomes with regard to democratic norms. While consensus on crisis measures between governments and opposition parties can increase public trust and legitimacy, criticism by the opposition is essential as a catalyst for fuelling public discourse. During a crisis, government-opposition relations can range from consensus-seeking to strictly adversarial. The paper1 aims to empirically analyse the impact of the COVID-19 crisis on relations between the government coalition of the Czech Republic and its polarised parliamentary opposition. Parliamentary elections coincided with the pandemic, and the minority government was replaced by a surplus majority coalition formed by the opposition parties from the previous legislature. The paper will examine whether the opposition adopted a differentiated strategy in its discussions regarding pandemic-related legislative proposals and to what extent it was able to act unanimously despite its polarization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Marmara Üniversitesi Hukuk Fakültesi Hukuk Araştırmaları Dergisi is the property of Marmara University and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In the midst of varying crises, South Africa has experienced a rise of populism in the last decade. New incomers have arrived in the electoral arena, presenting new challenges to the ruling party, African National Congress, with the remarkable electoral success of the Economic Freedom Fighters party, which has become the third largest party in parliament. At its core this article represents empirical research about the impact of populism on emergent democracies that focuses on what populists do, instead of what populists say. Addressing the question of whether the populist parties behave differently from other political parties in opposition at Parliament. It presents a preliminary analysis that takes into account the actual behaviour of populist and non-populist parties in the legislative institutions. The case study uses two dimensions from party behaviour literature, policy making and scrutiny strategy, in order to address this question and shed light upon populist politics in legislative institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Parliamentary elections produce winners and losers. For understandable reasons, winners become the government (coalition) and losers – the opposition. The article presents a framework for comparing the rights in policy-making of the parliamentary opposition in parliamentary Central and Eastern European democracies (Czechia, Hungary, Lithuania, Poland, Ukraine). In 2022, democracy demands an opposition party with a future (reinversion) in parliament. The right of the parliamentary opposition to oppose the government formed by the governing majority is a fundamental feature of liberal democracy. Application of constitutional values (democracy, the rule of law, etc.) in Central and Eastern European states demonstrates the actual level of opposition fragmentation, polarization, and even cartelization. Rule of Law Index 2021 explicitly shows that among researched Central and Eastern European countries, Lithuania is in 18 place, Czechia – 22, Poland – 36, Hungary – 69, and Ukraine – 74. The Rule of Law Index is about constraints of government powers, absence of corruption, open government, and other issues related to the mission of the parliamentary opposition. Distance (not only ideological) between governing majority and parliamentary opposition is based on the capacity for government formation, participation in policy-making, scrutinizing governmental (populistic) strategy and policy.

The policy influence of political parties is a classic subject of investigation in political science research. The typical conclusion is that parties influence policy only through government: The government controls the legislative process and has the parliamentary majority to legislate; the opposition is shut out. Yet the legislative process is merely the final part of a much longer policy process starting with an agenda‐setting phase that decides the issues of political conflict in the first place. This study proposes an agenda‐setting model of opposition policy influence which hypothesises sizable opposition policy influence through agenda‐setting: A government is likely to adopt legislation covering the opposition's position in order to silence opposition agenda‐setting. The model is tested on the manual coding of 316 Acts of Parliament adopted by the government and 26,533 Prime Minister's Questions from the Opposition across six issues in Britain (1979‒2015). The results have important implications for minority representation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Police stop and search powers have been on the statute book for many years and are widely regarded as being an important tool in the prevention or detection of criminal offences. Whilst most of these powers require that an officer has ‘reasonable grounds to suspect’ that a person is in possession of a prohibited item or article before they may be exercised, the last 30 or so years has seen the emergence of ‘suspicionless’ stop and search powers on the statute book. These have proved to be controversial for a number of reasons, not least because they permit random stop and searches to occur which rarely result in officers finding what they were looking for, and have the potential to strain relations between the police and the communities they serve. Official data also makes clear that they have consistently been used in a racially disproportionate way. Under the Public Order Act 2023, a new suspicionless stop and search power has been created which is exercisable by the police in the context of peaceful protests. The case against it was strongly made in the House of Lords and beyond Parliament. Regrettably, it was not accepted by a government which was also unwilling to amend the legislation so as to enhance the safeguards designed to prevent the misuse of the power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Cuestiones Políticas is the property of Revista Cuestiones Politicas and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Athenaeum: Polskie Studia Politologiczne is the property of Faculty of Political Science & Security Studies Nicolaus Copernicus University and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Przeglad Sejmowy is the property of Kancelaria Sejmu and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Legislative body Parliament through its representatives plays the decisive role in the democratic development of the rule of law. In order to establish a constructive line leading to a constitutional democracy, the Parliament was made up of two electoral cores, the parliamentary majority, those under the auspices of the government, those who exercise power and the opposition, minorities from an electoral point of view but who have critical dialogue and sanctioning acts that do not target the interest of the voter. Thus, the binomial opposition/parliamentary majority has always been based on the principle of dualism, in which the one who makes a mistake is corrected in the issue of governance. The two cores can also be viewed as an effective contrast that through democratic means participates in the governance of the rule of law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Pakistan Peoples Party, one of the oldest and major political parties in Pakistan has completed more than fifty years of their political journey. It has the most distinct struggle for democracy, as well as for the supremacy of Pakistan's Parliament and constitution. During this political journey it has seen its rise and endured falls and inarguable sacrificed in term of leadership. This study describes the PPP’s political history up to 2018 since its inception in the light of decades with specific name. This study highlights the political struggle of PPP for democracy against military regimes in Pakistan. The study also discusses the party role as governing and parliamentary opposition during different eras. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The organisation of legislative chambers and the consequences of parliamentary procedures have been among the most prominent research questions in legislative studies. Even though democratic elections not only lead to the formation of a government but also result in an opposition, the literature has mostly neglected oppositions and their role in legislative chambers. This paper proposes to fill this gap by looking at the legislative organisation from the perspective of opposition players. The paper focuses on the potential influence of opposition players in the policy-making process and presents data on more than 50 legislative chambers. The paper shows considerable variance of the formal power granted to opposition players. Furthermore, the degree of institutionalisation of opposition rights is connected to electoral systems and not necessarily correlated with other institutional characteristics such as regime type or the size of legislative chambers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given that political parties participate in the formation, structuring and activity of the parliament, their presence has had a dual impact on the National Assembly of Serbia in the past three decades. On the one hand, their influence has been reflected on the internal structure and efficiency of parliamentary work. On the other hand, the party system combined with the electoral model has left its mark on the mode of political representation. The paper focuses on the impact the political parties have had on the National Assembly in the Republic of Serbia, particularly their influence on the internal organization of the Assembly and the effectiveness in the parliamentary process. The main goal is to explore the normative framework and parliamentary practice in order to analyze the actual prospects of the National Assembly to meet the basic postulates for exercising effective national representation. The main question is whether the Assembly, relying on its constitutional autonomy, is able to achieve the goals of the "working parliament" and the political representation of all citizens. The problem develops around the extent to which the people's representation is capable of exercising its constitutional functions if it does not support and protect the differentiated political will of the people. The aim is to point out to the possibilities provided by the normative framework and the need for successful parliamentary practice in exercising parliamentary autonomy. Parliamentary autonomy is necessary not only for good internal organization of parliament and effectiveness in the parliamentary process but also in terms of strengthening the National Assembly's external impact and position towards the holders of the executive power. The subject matter of analysis are the activities of political parties in parliament, observed through the work of parliamentary groups and parliamentary committees, as well as a lack of the parliamentary opposition guarantees.

This article offers a comprehensive comparison of oppositional behaviour in European Union (EU) affairs in six countries: Austria, Denmark, Germany, Ireland, Sweden and the United Kingdom. By drawing on a unique data set of hand-coded statements made by Members of Parliament during European Affairs Committee (EAC) meetings it provides new knowledge on political opposition. The data uncover that there is more opposition expressed in EU affairs than has been assumed by previous research. The results also reveal that there exists considerable cross-national variation in oppositional behaviour during EAC deliberations in the six countries. The study finally shows that Eurosceptic parties are key drivers of opposition in EU affairs, especially when it comes to opposition directed at the EU political system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Athenaeum: Polskie Studia Politologiczne is the property of Faculty of Political Science & Security Studies Nicolaus Copernicus University and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The 2019 Polish parliamentary elections were the last in a series of three elections held within 12 months (chronologically: local elections, European Parliament election, elections to the Sejm and the Senate). The three consecutive elections opened up the possibility for cooperation within the parliamentary opposition with the aim of political victory. This article examines the relations between opposition groups in 2018-2019. Each election is analyzed in terms of the nature of relations within the opposition as well as cooperation and interparty competition. The hypothesis assumes that the types of relations among parliamentary opposition groups were shaped by the character of the given elections and the decisions taken by individual parties choosing between maintaining their independence and steps to potentially increase their electoral chances. The analysis shows that during the period in question the opposition did not develop a stable unified model of cooperation and that relations between individual groups were dominated by competition; however, depending on the election, cooperation was possible and was pragmatically pursued by the parties, as in the case of the European Coalition. The only stable cooperation was between Civic Platform and Modern. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Annales UMCS, Sectio K (Politologia) is the property of Maria Curie-Sklodowska University in Lublin and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The article deals with the principle of parliamentary autonomy and the role it plays in decisions of courts carrying out constitutional review. The principles and interests competing with parliamentary autonomy are categorized and analysed against the backdrop of relevant case-law, offering awide scale of approaches used by courts around the world. Three groups of competing interests are analysed separately: (i) public control of parliaments, (ii) the principle of representation and (iii) the rights of parliamentary opposition and individual members of parliament. Within the analysis, examples of good practice as well as those of unpersuasive approaches are offered. Subsequently, the article offers general doctrinal principles, the observance of which would help ensure that courts do not overreach in regulating parliamentary internal affairs, thus triggering unwanted consequences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Al Malweah for Archaeological & Historical Studies is the property of Republic of Iraq Ministry of Higher Education & Scientific Research (MOHESR) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Lua Nova is the property of CEDEC and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Under what conditions are opposition parties better at delivering on their electoral promises? Existing approaches to party mandates typically focus on governmental mandates and have disregarded the roles of other parties in parliament. However, such approaches encompass an imbalance regarding the comparison of pledge fulfilment between governing and opposition parties, and specially neglect the differences between permanent and alternating opposition. This article has the ambition to extend the mandate theory to opposition parties, exploring the conditions underlying their pledge fulfilment. Using a dataset of Portuguese opposition parties with more than 3000 electoral pledges for six different legislatures (1995–2015), our evidence suggests that: (1) alternating opposition parties have a significantly higher probability of fulfilling their mandate than permanent opposition; (2) opposition parties fulfil as much of their promises as the fulfilment costs decrease; (3) and the odds of opposition parties' mandate fulfilment is also increased when there is policy congruence between the pledge and a legislative initiative. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyzes the Argentinan parliamentary opposition in legal reform debates between 2009 and 2010, that searched to extend rights concerning to communicative and sexual citizenship in that country. From analysis of interventions in the Congress' voting sessions, the paper proposes two categories to describe strategies of displacement of the parliamentary opposition: displacements by procedures flaws and displacements by political feuds. Both categories group discursive operations that question the democratic institutions based on external factors, displace the object of legislative debate and seek the annulment of parliamentary debate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the article, the author investigates the influence of the Ukrainian nationalist structures on the course of the Revolution of Dignity of 2013–2014. On the basis of the comparative analysis of the nationalist movement state in previous revolutionary events he concludes that it became more crystalized before the Revolution. At the initial stage of the Revolution the parliamentary party «Svoboda» was the undisputed leader of the nationalist movement. At this time, previously influential nationalist structures ceased to exist, or lost their influence, while others were at the stage of formation. At the revolutionary Maidan, a number of them were united in the «Right Sector» public movement, which was competitive to «Svoboda» and based on the members of «Trident», UNA–UNSO, «Patriot of Ukraine». During the Revolution of Dignity «Svoboda» and «Right Sector» had a disciplined and ideologically motivated membership, possessed paramilitary experience and therefore had a significant influence on the organization and functioning of the revolutionary Maidan, on the ideological transformation of its participants and the post–revolutionary Ukrainian society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explains the variation in opposition behavior by investigating parliamentary voting of opposition parties across 16 European national parliaments. It finds that features of an opposition party that increase its likelihood of winning office in future elections—its size and experience in government—increase the party’s tendency toward confrontation with the government, as do features that increase the party’s need to differentiate itself from the government. At the systemic level, features that increase the attractiveness of cooperation—such as an open structure of competition and considerable influence of the opposition on parliamentary decision-making—decrease tendencies toward confrontation. Together, party-specific and systemic features explain two-thirds of the observed variation in the behavior of opposition parties, even without controlling for vote-specific factors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While it is commonly assumed that parliamentary opposition is on the wane in Western democracies, we argue that evidence supporting this established proposition is lacking. Therefore, drawing on unique data from the Swedish parliament (the Riksdag), between 1970 and 2014, this article breaks new ground by systematically testing the ‘waning-of-opposition thesis’. First, we explore patterns of cross-partisan cooperation by gauging the extent to which governments seek to accommodate the position of the opposition. Second, we study the degree of partisan conflict over time by mapping the degree to which the opposition politicizes and rejects government policies. Our findings directly contradict the waning-of-opposition thesis. In contrast to theoretical expectations, including the influential ‘cartel-party thesis’, the article finds that partisan struggles in general have intensified significantly over time. Therefore, the article casts significant doubt over the influential idea that parliamentary opposition is waning. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

With no formal division between majority and opposition in the parliamentary arena, the European Union (EU) calls for an approach to political opposition which considers the role of civil society. This article explores the case of opposition to the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) within and without the European Parliament (EP) through a political opportunity approach, using the case to reflect on conditions for effective opposition in the EU. The ACTA campaign saw opposed actors within the EP and digital rights groups work together to build coalitions against the agreement. Protests then opened the way for these groups to broker a change of position among other actors, allowing a majority rejection. The ACTA case suggests the need for advocacy by organised groups both within and without the Parliament to construct majorities. Comparisons to similarly successful campaigns bolster this view, as do examples of less effective opposition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the welfare state is a core theme in most national elections in Western democracies, surprisingly little attention has been paid to the causes of welfare state pledge-breaking. This article presents an argument that explains when governments do not do what they promised and tests it using an innovative research design with data covering four decades and 18 countries. The argument is able to account for several important but, until now, undescribed phenomena. First, nowadays, governments, on average, deliver less welfare than they promised, whereas in the 1970s they used to deliver more than promised. Second, the pledge-breaking of governments has become highly dependent on the parliamentary opposition's position on the welfare issue. When the opposition favours fiscal and economic responsibility, governments' tendency to deliver less welfare than promised is amplified. In contrast, when the opposition emphasises the positive benefits of generous welfare, such as equality and social justice, governments become more prone to keep their promises. Third, this conditional effect of the opposition is a recent occurrence that only emerged after the number of potential swing voters increased as class-based voting gradually declined from the 1970s onwards. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A political system cannot be imagined without opposition. Despite this crucial position in politics, political science has largely neglected to study oppositions. Attempting to fill this gap, this article analyses the institutional opportunities of parliamentary oppositions. It offers a parsimonious framework by distinguishing two dimensions of opposition influence: some institutions enable oppositions to control governments, while others offer opportunities to present alternatives. A comparison of oppositions’ opportunities in 21 democracies shows that countries fall into four groups along these dimensions: in majoritarian democracies, weak control mechanisms are countered by excellent opportunities to publicise alternatives. Consociational democracies are characterised by strong control mechanisms, but provide only weak opportunities to present alternatives. Moreover, in Southern Europe, control mechanisms and opportunities to present alternatives are weak, while both are pronounced in Nordic Europe. The results are summarised in three indices that can easily be applied in future research examining oppositions and their power. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The Czech Constitutional Court has gained a strong position within the political system. This article examines the judicial review of legislation from the point of view of the relation between the court and the parliament. The authors analyze trends in the use of petitions proposing the annulment of statutes, who makes use of the petitions, how successful the petitioners are, and what issues the petitions concern. The article pairs a quantitative view with a qualitative analysis of key selected decisions by the court, especially in the sphere of mega-politics. The authors test whether judicial review of legislation serves as a tool for parliamentary opposition. The results show the decisive effects of a legislative majority in the lower house of the parliament. If the government lacks a majority, the use of judicial review of legislation as an oppositional tool fades. Also important is the weakness of the upper house, which makes senators more likely to resort to using judicial review of legislation. An especially crucial factor is the presence of independent and semi-independent senators who, without broader political backing, see judicial review of legislation as a welcome tool. The most frequent topics of the petitions were transitional justice, social policy, and the legislative process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the evolution of the political opposition in Ukraine. The author provides the legal basis for the formation and activities of the political opposition and their evolution, as well as the factors facilitating functioning of the political opposition - a form of government and electoral system. We consider four stages evolution of the political opposition. The parliamentary and nonparliamentary forms of opposition are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Government–opposition relations in Spain have been long characterised by a high level of consensus and cooperation. The question analysed here is whether the economic crisis initiated in 2008 has created unprecedented levels of conflict in the political system or whether opposition parties have maintained a cooperative strategy oriented to influence far-reaching policy decisions. Results illustrate that patterns of consensus have decreased significantly since the outbreak of the crisis, and this is partly explained by the rising amount of legislation with socio-economic content, variations in the government's popularity, and the type of government. The analysis also shows that the crisis has increased the incentives of opposition parliamentary groups to oppose European Union legislation, especially among left parties. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Since the onset of the economic crisis, parties in parliament (especially those in opposition) have found themselves faced with a dilemma: choosing between the need to cooperate with the government in order to overcome the crisis and the opportunity provided by a weakened government to stress their adversarial position so as to be more easily re-elected and possibly get into power. What have they decided to do? The present contribution introduces a collection of works exploring this dilemma in southern European countries, by examining the opposition behaviour in Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain; and in the European Parliament. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Portuguese case provides a unique opportunity to study the opposition's behaviour in a variety of political conditions. It offers an insight into the impact of the financial crisis on the opposition's behaviour in both majority and minority political settings. It allows the comparison of the opposition's relationship with a minority government, during which non-collaboration could have dramatic consequences, and also with a majority government, when such a choice does not have major political or policy implications. Moreover, it enables us to study the effect of an additional veto player (the so-called troika composed of the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund), which not only constrains both majority and opposition parties, but also gives political entrepreneurs a unique opportunity to push ahead with liberal measures – in this case, clearly in disagreement with the moderate and radical left programmes. Relying on quantitative data on the legislative behaviour of the parliamentary party groups in the period 1995–2012, and on qualitative process-tracking of the opposition's positions on key economic issues – such as the decision to vote against Prime Minister Sócrates' last austerity package after a series of approvals – this article aims to determine whether, and if yes how, the financial crisis has affected the behaviour of the Portuguese opposition parties in parliament, by examining and comparing their behaviour in hard and in normal times. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Contributions to this study clearly support our initial hypotheses. It is observed, as expected, that the economic crisis has considerably decreased consensual behaviour in parliament. However, the nature of parties constitutes a crucial variable in order to explain the conduct of the opposition in the legislative arena better: since the outbreak of the crisis, radical parties have turned even more adversarial than before; whereas mainstream parties – who want to appear as a credible alternative to the government in office – have drifted towards more cooperative behaviour. Given the growing influence of the European Union on the legislation approved in response to the crisis, it was also expected (and demonstrated) that the traditionally pro-European parties would be more likely to cooperate on socio-economic issues than Eurosceptic parties. Finally, it has also been shown that timing also plays an important role in the opposition's decision either to support or to oppose the government: with opposition parties more inclined to contest the government's proposals when their chances of getting into power are higher, and vice versa. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Horizontal accountability, in which institutional actors with equivalent levels of authority possess tools to challenge one another, is a critical component of mature and stable democracy. This article investigates ways in which partisanship differentiates how political actors use a specific accountability tool – legislative questions – and the responsiveness of government institutions to inquiries. We take advantage of the unanticipated change in Ukraine's executive leadership in 2004 to assess the relationship between partisan identity and accountability. The analysis of nearly 16,000 legislative requests from Ukraine illustrates the pivotal role of partisanship in accountability and institutional responsiveness, a finding that is particularly notable given Ukraine's inchoate party system and under-developed democratic norms. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]