REPORTS AND RESEARCH ARTICLES: The Office of Leader of the Opposition: An Examination of the Whitehall Version in the Commonwealth Caribbean

Ghany, Hamid

doi:10.1080/714003875

Cited by 2 publications

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“…The Trinidad and Tobago example of a rift between the opposition Chief Whip and the Opposition Leader is rare and the resignation of the Chief Whip along with the Party Leader and some back-benchers to form a new party in Parliament is even rarer in politics and needs to be studied more closely for lessons in political sociology. Without reference to the Chief Whip, Gahny [13] notes that only the Constitution of the Dominica prohibits a member of parliament from becoming a Leader of the Opposition after being elected as a member of the governing party but he could continue to be Member of Parliament after changing allegiance.…”

Section: The Whip In the Caribbeanmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Whip in the House: Rituals of Social Control in Parliament and in Society

Agozino¹

2015

Social Crimonol

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This paper will attempt a comparison of the role of the Chief Whip or its equivalent in Caribbean, British and Canadian Parliamentary systems of government with similar offices in the US legislature. This office originated with the need to 'whip in' members of parliament from wherever they might be to save a crucial vote in a divided house. This office has since acquired the connotations of the disciplinarian who whips members into the party line even while managing to keep the party cohesive through persuasion and rewards for loyalty and rarely exercising the option of excluding members who often resign by themselves or even change allegiance although most of the rebels lose at the next election. The paper will explore the role of the whip from country to country and the implications of such differences and analogies for theories of power and social control.

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Section: The Whip In the Caribbeanmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Whip in the House: Rituals of Social Control in Parliament and in Society

Agozino¹

2015

Social Crimonol

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Constitutionalizing dissent: The universe of opposition rules in African constitutions

Schindler

2024

Glob. Con.

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Constitutions are the most important legal foundation of politics. At the same time, the existence of a viable parliamentary opposition has been regarded one of the most distinctive characteristics of democracy. Bringing the two perspectives together, the principle of opposition can be constitutionalized to gain the highest status. Importantly, we refer to norms recognizing the opposition as such. Such counter-majoritarian rules are distinct because they empower opposition forces irrespective of their seat share and explicitly acknowledge that power should not be monopolized. While our subject has attracted little interest from comparative constitutionalists, it is too important to be overlooked. This is particularly true for autocratizing regimes where incumbents seek to use legislative lawfare to repress their opponents. Empirically, the study focuses on Africa, which proves revealing for various reasons. Among others, it addresses the critique that constitutional law studies often concentrate on usual suspect cases used to reveal purportedly universal insights. Our exercise in comparative constitutional law leads to two main conclusions that go beyond the continent. First, while we find a high number of opposition-related rules, the variation in design details and scope suggests that referring to the principle of opposition in an abstract manner is somewhat obscuring. And second, the obvious virtues of constitutionalizing dissent face noteworthy pitfalls since pertinent rules can lack legal clarity and even suppress dissent. Hence, the dividends of nominally democratic rules might be smaller than expected even if constitutional designers sincerely intend to fully uphold them in practice.

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REPORTS AND RESEARCH ARTICLES: The Office of Leader of the Opposition: An Examination of the Whitehall Version in the Commonwealth Caribbean

Cited by 2 publications

References 0 publications

The Whip in the House: Rituals of Social Control in Parliament and in Society

The Whip in the House: Rituals of Social Control in Parliament and in Society

Constitutionalizing dissent: The universe of opposition rules in African constitutions

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