Chapter Six

Government and
Policymaking
 Chapter Objectives
• 6.1 Describe the features of a constitution, focusing on decision rules, and
explain why Britain is unusual.
• 6.2 Compare and contrast democratic and authoritarian systems.
• 6.3 Discuss the presidential and parliamentary forms of democratic
government, using the United States and Britain, respectively, as examples.
• 6.4 Define confederal, federal, and unitary divisions of governmental power.
• 6.5 Discuss the role of the courts in overseeing democracies and give
examples from several countries.
• 6.6 List three methods used to remove political leaders from office.
• 6.7 Describe the varied forms, functions, and compositions of government
assemblies.
• 6.8 Discuss the ways chief executives are chosen, their powers, and the
role played by cabinets.
• 6.9 Explain Max Weber’s definition of a bureaucracy and describe the forms
bureaucracies can take.

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 Government and Policymaking
• Policymaking is pivotal stage in political process
• To understand public policy, must know how
decisions are made
• Government officials do initiation and
formulation of policy proposals
• Two-way process:
• Upward flow of demands from society
• Downward flow of decisions from
government

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 Constitutions and Decision Rules
• Constitution establishes basic rules of decision-making,
rights, distribution of authority
• Policymaking: conversion of interests and demands into
public decisions
• Decision rules determine what political resources are
valuable and how to acquire and use resources
• Government and its institutions have decision rules
• Numerous rules affect the policymaking process
• Important that decision rules in a democracy be
transparent and stable

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 Making Constitutions
• Constitution making is fundamental political act
• Creates or transforms decision rules
• Often new constitutions arise with civil upheaval
• Decades since WWII have seen much constitutional
experimentation
• India
• Nigeria
• Eastern Europe
• Russia
• Soviet successor states
• South Africa

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 Democracy and Authoritarianism
• Distinction between democratic and authoritarian
systems:
• Democracy means government by the people
• Direct or indirect participation by public
• Institutions facilitate indirect participation:
elections, parties, media, assemblies
• Authoritarian regimes: policymakers chosen by
military councils, hereditary families, dominant
political parties
• Citizens are ignored or pressed into symbolic
assent

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 Democracy and Authoritarianism
• Decision rules of political systems (democratic
and authoritarian) - differ along three
dimensions:
• separation of powers between branches of
government
• geographic distribution of authority between
central government and lower levels
• limitations on government authority

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 Separation of Government Powers
• Theory of separation of powers
• Locke and Montesquieu
• Madison and Hamilton
• Classic separation of powers theory
• Argued there are two forms of representative
democratic government
• Presidential
• Parliamentary

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© 2014 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.
 Geographic Distribution of Government
Power
• Confederal - U.S. under Articles of Confederation
• Federal - U.S., Germany, Russia, India, Nigeria, Mexico, Brazil
• Unitary – Britain, France, China, Japan, Iran
• Most of the world’s states are unitary
• Federalism thought to have several advantages:
• In divided societies helps protect ethnic, linguistic, religious
minorities
• Serves as check on ambitious rules and protects freedoms
• Allows subunits to experiment with policy programs
• But promotes choice and diversity at expense of equality

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 Limitations on Government Power
• Constitutional regimes
• Civil rights protected
• Courts are crucial to limitations on government power
• Judicial review
• Lijphart characterizes four of 36 democratic
systems examined as having “strong” judicial
review
• Often in constitution but hard to implement in
practice
• Amending procedures
• Vary widely: simple to complex

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 Checking the Top Policymakers
• Challenge: control excesses of top political
leaders
• Authoritarian systems: leader can
change/ignore constitution
• Democracies: procedures vary
• Parliamentary system: executive
removed at any time
• Presidential system: impeachment
• Ultimate control of democratic order is
periodic competitive elections

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 Assemblies
• Almost all contemporary political systems
have assemblies.
• Assembly Structure:
• Vary in structure; bicameralism is
common
• Differ in internal organization
• All have committee structure

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Assembly Functions
• Deliberate, debate, vote on policies
• Control public spending
• Some have appointment powers
• Some serve as court of appeals
• Range in role as policymaking agencies:
• U.S. - highly active role
• People’s Republic of China - rubberstamp
• Assemblies should not be viewed only as
legislative bodies.
 Representation: Mirroring and
Representational Biases
• Descriptive representation/mirroring
• For politicians to be good agents:
• need similar preferences to citizens they represent
• need appropriate skills to do job
• Mirroring versus expert delegation
• elected members of legislative assemblies seldom
mirror citizens they represent on social
characteristics
• working class
• advancement of women- visible but uneven
• age

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 Political Executives
• Executive branch is largest, most complex, most
powerful branch of government
• Chief executives
• Single or split: Divided between effective power
over policy, purely ceremonial role
• Presidents and Prime Ministers

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 Recruitment of Chief Executives
• Recruitment structures
• Competitive party systems
• Noncompetitive parties and military
organizations
• Authoritarian systems rarely have effective
procedures for leadership succession
• Poorer nations show less stability and
regimes have less experience at surviving
succession crises

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© 2014 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.
 The Cabinet
• In many political systems, Cabinet is most important
collective decision-making body
• Powerful in parliamentary systems
• Selection
• Presidential systems:
• presidential prerogative with legislative approval
• president can dismiss Cabinet members
• Parliamentary systems:
• depends on result of parliamentary elections and
composition of Parliament
• majority single-party cabinet
• coalition cabinet

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© 2014 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.
 Functions of the Chief Executive
• Most important structure in policymaking
• Executive initiates new policies.
• May have role in adoption of policies
• Typically has veto powers
• Oversees policy implementation
• Affects trust and confidence in political system
• Central role in communication: explaining and
building support for policies
• Improving performance in various sectors of
society and economy

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© 2014 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.
 The Bureaucracy
• Structure of the Bureaucracy
• Large organizations in charge of
implementing public policy
• Size has increased in recent decades
• Civil Service
• Functions of the Bureaucracy
• Implementing and enforcing laws and
regulations
• May articulate and aggregate interests
• Adjudication
• Involved in communication
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 Bureaucracy and Performance
• Features of Bureaucracies
• Decision making based on fixed jurisdictions, rules
and regulations
• Formal and specialized education requirements
• Hierarchical command structure: information flows up
and decisions down
• Decisions are made on basis of SOPs, extensive
written records
• Officials hold career positions, appointed and
promoted on merit, protection against political
interference

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 Bureaucracy and Performance
• Positive features: competence, consistency, fairness
• Liabilities: rule-bound, inflexible, insensitive
• Control of bureaucracies in democratic countries:
• political executive
• centralized budgeting
• administrative reorganization
• assemblies and courts
• Limited control in authoritarian systems
• bureaucratic inefficiency and inertia

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