Government Alternation : a New Explanatory Factor of the Quality of Democracies

In the last decades several elements indicate that democracies are changing and consequently also the categories commonly used to describe their structures and explain their performance seem to be less suitable. In particular the distinction between majoritarian and consensual patterns of democracy posited by Lijphart faces several problems given the increasing propensity of political systems to mix elements typical of both these patterns. This paper focuses on a phenomenon usually neglected by the literature, government alternation, understood both as a distinctive element of representative democracies and as a relevant factor to explain their transformations and performance. The research question basically is: does alternation matter? The general hypothesis that guides the empirical analysis is that the possibility of alternation, determined by the political-institutional structures, does not play a significant role in enhancing the quality of democracies, whereas another analytical level of the concept, the empirical occurrence of alternation, has positive effects on it. Although the pattern of alternation present in a country is only partially related to its political-institutional setting, it helps to determine the structure of inter-party competition and the consequent relation of accountability between representatives and represented. The effects of alternation are tested with a comparative research design based on a sample of representative democracies.