Limiting Party Representation: Evidence from a Small Parliamentary Chamber

Abstract

Parties are seen as vital for the maintenance of parliamentary government and as necessary intermediaries between voters and legislators; an elected parliamentary chamber not controlled by parties is highly anomalous. This study contrasts the party‐controlled Tasmanian lower house with its Independent‐dominated elected upper house and finds that the major source of constraints on party representation is not a clientelistic style of politics but the persistence of a distinctive institutional design and electoral rules based on fixed terms and annual staggered elections. The consequences of these rules are explored for their effects on voter choice and legislative behaviour.

A new political system model: Semi‐parliamentary government

“…As Table shows, Tasmania differs from the other Australian polities. It uses semi‐parliamentarism to achieve local, non‐partisan representation in the upper house (Sharman ). Alternative vote in single‐member districts (SMD) is one important element of this design; staggered yearly elections and a small assembly size are others (see Table ).…”

“…Partly due to these features, the Tasmanian upper house is dominated by independents. The resulting normative balance is that ‘[p]rogrammatic choices can be made through parties at lower‐house elections, supplemented with local representation through Independents in the upper house’ (Sharman : 344).…”

Why are there Independents in Ireland?

“…In small arenas it might be easier and more beneficial for members to form temporary coalitions; this would allow them to reap both the benefits of collective action in parliament and non-partisanship in the electoral arena. Sharman (2013) cites the size of the Tasmanian Legislative Council (15 members) as a potential factor as to why it has never been controlled by political parties; a similar case could be made for the assemblies of the Nunavut and Northwest Territories in Canada, the non-partisan state legislature of Nebraska and territorial assemblies in the Falkland Islands, Guernsey and the Isle of Man. Similarly, the mean size of the parliaments of the five Pacific island states without parties is 25.…”

Australian bicameralism as semi-parliamentarism: patterns of majority formation in 29 democracies

“…Its use of the 'sweet spot' (Carey and Hix 2011) solution of small (five-member) districts in the lower house makes democratic majority formation slightly more 'complex', but cannot mitigate the conflict between the two visions. Tasmania does not use the upper house to achieve more flexible coalition building between parties, but to complement party-based coalition building in the lower house with a more personalist, locally based form of majority formation in the upper house (Sharman 2013). 10 …”

“…Sharman 2013;Smith 2012, 55). Many authors have drawn on the comparative studies of Lijphart (1984Lijphart ( , 2012 and characterised the Australian Commonwealth as a sort of 'semi-consensual parliamentary system' (Uhr 2009, 132).…”