A Case of a Surplus Majority Government: The Finnish Rainbow Coalition

Jungar, Ann-Cathrine

doi:10.1111/1467-9477.00063

Cited by 24 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 0 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…The importance of positional considerations of parties can best be exemplified by the left flank parties of the Rainbow Coalition, VAS and VIHR (Jungar, 2002). Prime Minister Paavo Lipponen (SDP) formed the coalition with both parties explicitly to reduce the blocking power of each of them and to ensure that no party would be able to require more than it was entitled to with respect to its electoral strength.…”

Section: Finlandmentioning

confidence: 99%

Government Status and Legislative Behaviour

Ganghof¹,

Bräuninger²

2006

Party Politics

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

A B S T R A C TIn parliamentary systems, parties compete for votes and offices in the electoral arena, but in many systems they also cooperate in the legislative arena. This article examines the question of how the government status of parties affects their legislative behaviour. We develop a simple spatial model that includes parties' positional goals (vote, office, etc.) to formalize the notion of accommodating legislative behaviour. The model implies that government parties are most accommodating while opposition parties are least accommodating. The hypothesis is evaluated by comparing two pairs of similar political systems: Danish and Finnish coalition governments, as well as German and Australian bicameralism. The case studies support the main hypothesis that government status systematically affects parties' level of accommodation. We discuss the implications for two seminal approaches in comparative institutional analysis advanced by Lijphart (1999b) and Tsebelis (2002).

show abstract

Section: Finlandmentioning

confidence: 99%

Government Status and Legislative Behaviour

Ganghof¹,

Bräuninger²

2006

Party Politics

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Moreover, the SDP and the NCP-the two main parties that were also the principal advocates of a comprehensive program of reforms-commanded a sufficient majority in parliament and thus would unlikely have had problems securing legislative approval for this program even without the other coalition partners. However, the government considered that a negotiated compromise with the unions was essential for successful implementation of the reforms and consequently emphasized a need for political unity and joint actions to fight unemployment and restore the health of the economy (Jungar, 2002). Given the government's insistence on concertation and its resoluteness to obtain union support, we could speculate whether the government may have in fact felt vulnerable despite its electoral strength.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

When Are Concerted Reforms Feasible? Explaining the Emergence of Social Pacts in Western Europe

Avdagic

2010

Comparative Political Studies

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Under what conditions do governments, employers, and unions enter formal policy agreements on incomes, employment, and social security? Such agree ments, widely known as social pacts, became particularly prominent during the 1990s when European economies underwent major adjustment. This article seeks to explain national variation in adjustment strategies and specifically why concerted agreements were struck in some countries but not in others. A fuzzyset qualitative comparative analysis of 14 European countries is employed to assess main arguments about the emergence of pacts. The analysis yields two key findings. First, although prevailing arguments emphasize Economic and Monetary Union-related pressures, or alternatively unemployment, these factors were neither necessary nor in themselves sufficient for pacts to materialize. Rather, a high economic "problem load" appears to be causally relevant only when combined with particular political and institutional conditions, namely, the prevalence of electorally weak governments and/or an intermediate level of union centralization. Second, the analysis refines existing multicausal explanations of pacts by demonstrating three distinct, theoretically and empirically relevant causal pathways to concerted agreements.

show abstract

“…National unity, including reviving close ties with the trade unions, was seen as important: "not only would a broad coalition be superior from the point of view of decision making, but such a government would also more easily retain external confidence in Finland's ability to come to terms with the pressing economic problems." (Jungar 2002a, 64) 12. A nice illustration of the impact of government formation on parties' EU policies occurred in December 2001 when the party council of the Centre Party adopted the new European programme.…”

Section: Notesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Hesitant Voters, Committed Elite: Explaining the Lack of Eurosceptic Parties in Finland

Raunio

2005

Journal of European Integration

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Considering the relatively narrow majority in favour of joining the European Union in the referendum held in 1994, the traditionally state-centric political culture, and low public support for the EU, Finland would seem to have all the key preconditions for adopting a more intergovernmental approach to European integration. Yet, paradoxically, the situation is very much the opposite, with successive Finnish governments consistently in favour of both deeper policy integration and of increasing the powers of supranational institutions. This article examines the lack of elite-level opposition to European integration in Finland, arguing that elite commitment to deeper integration is explained by three factors: the consensual style of politics and bargaining involved in forming coalition governments, the system of formulating national EU policy and the candidate-centred electoral system. Despite the lack of similar support for the EU among the electorate, the main lines of Finnish integration policy will remain stable in the coming years.

show abstract

A Case of a Surplus Majority Government: The Finnish Rainbow Coalition

Cited by 24 publications

References 0 publications

Government Status and Legislative Behaviour

Government Status and Legislative Behaviour

When Are Concerted Reforms Feasible? Explaining the Emergence of Social Pacts in Western Europe

Hesitant Voters, Committed Elite: Explaining the Lack of Eurosceptic Parties in Finland

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About