In bicameral parliaments, upper chambers amend the bills that have been passed by lower chambers, and sometimes bills that are passed in one chamber never become law and just ‘die’ in the other. Why does one chamber fail or refuse to anticipate what the other will do? What can lead the political actors in one chamber to ‘waste’ their time and resources on a bill that will be never approved as law? How can we explain the variations in the number of such ‘useless’ approvals? This article helps answer these questions by focusing on ‘useless approvals’ in the Italian parliament (1979–2018). Italy offers an ideal setting to analyse this phenomenon, with two houses holding the same powers but characterised by varying degrees of political incongruence over time. We found that differences in preference between the two chambers positively affect the chances of useless approvals, above all for private members’ bills.
Useless approvals : Italian bicameralism and its decisional capacity / A. Pedrazzani, F. Zucchini. - In: THE JOURNAL OF LEGISLATIVE STUDIES. - ISSN 1357-2334. - 26:4(2020 Oct 01), pp. 578-605. [10.1080/13572334.2020.1787014]
Useless approvals : Italian bicameralism and its decisional capacity
A. Pedrazzani
Primo
;F. ZucchiniUltimo
2020
Abstract
In bicameral parliaments, upper chambers amend the bills that have been passed by lower chambers, and sometimes bills that are passed in one chamber never become law and just ‘die’ in the other. Why does one chamber fail or refuse to anticipate what the other will do? What can lead the political actors in one chamber to ‘waste’ their time and resources on a bill that will be never approved as law? How can we explain the variations in the number of such ‘useless’ approvals? This article helps answer these questions by focusing on ‘useless approvals’ in the Italian parliament (1979–2018). Italy offers an ideal setting to analyse this phenomenon, with two houses holding the same powers but characterised by varying degrees of political incongruence over time. We found that differences in preference between the two chambers positively affect the chances of useless approvals, above all for private members’ bills.File | Dimensione | Formato | |
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Pedrazzani Zucchini 2020.pdf
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