Do The Right Thing. A comparison of politicians' incentives across constitutional systems

Michela Cella, Giovanna Iannantuoni () and Elena Manzoni

No 290, Working Papers from University of Milano-Bicocca, Department of Economics

Abstract: Constitutional structures shape politicians' behaviour and hence policy outcomes through the different incentive schemes at work. In this paper we analyse these mechanisms in parliamentary and presidential systems. Such a comparison is carried over by analysing how the two systems are able to select the efficient policy in presence of asymmetric information. The constitutional structures differ in that the policy proposal in parliamentary democracies is observable and confidence-dependent. The main findings suggest that the parliament responds to the incentive scheme better in presidential systems due to less uncertainty that legislators face over their term limit. However, the parliamentary system induces the executive to behave more efficiently due to selection and disciplining effeects.

Keywords: presidential system; parliamentary system; confidence vote; hierarchical accountability (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C72 D72 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 29
Date: 2015-01, Revised 2015-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cdm and nep-pol
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:mib:wpaper:290

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