Cohabitation (government)
Encyclopedia : C : CO : COH : Cohabitation (government)
Cohabitation in government occurs in semi-presidential systems, such as France's system, when the President and the Prime Minister come from different political parties. Adherents say that it prevents the stagnation of "split majorities" that can occur in presidential systems, a concern especially relevant to the French in light of the instability and political paralysis of previous French Republics. Critics argue that it can also result in massive political tension in times of crisis, as seen in Sri Lanka during the later months of 2003.
Cohabitation in practice
France
History
Cohabitation was a product of the French Fifth Republic. This constitution brought together a potent President position with manifold executive powers, and a strong parliament with a Prime Minister. The president's task was primarily to end deadlock and act decisively to avoid the stagnation prevalent under the French Fourth Republic; the Prime Minister, similarly, was to "direct the work of government", providing a strong leadership to the legislative branch and to help overcome partisan squabbles.Since 1962, Presidents are selected by popular vote, replacing an electoral college. This switch gave Presidents, when they are not cohabiting, more power than they might have had under the original constitution, as they are seen as the figurehead of the nation and a unifying agent. Of course, the majority party of the Assembly has power as well, but conflict arose between the two when they were of opposing factions. The Prime Minister is not popularly elected; instead, he is appointed by the President, although the Assembly retains the right of censure over his choice.
As of 2004, when the Presidential elections were increased in frequency from every seven years to every five years, cohabitation will probably much rarer, as "split ticket" voting over the course of two years, whilst rare, is projected to be very uncommon when the elections take place in the same year. (Data indicates that split ticket voting in the past often takes the form of a protest vote; for obvious reasons voters will very seldom vote for a President and then vote against his interests on the same day by electing Assembly members who will not appoint his choice of Prime Minister.)
Cohabitation in practice
There have been only a few periods of cohabitation, but each is notable for illustrating the oscillation of powers between the President and Prime Minister.
When General de Gaulle founded the French Fifth Republic, he never envisaged that the people would elect two leaders from different political backgrounds to run the country at the same time. Despite being previously thought of as ‘improbable’, the constitutional possibility of cohabitation became reality in 1986, when the right won the legislative elections, the socialist François Mitterrand being President of the Republic.
He was forced to nominate as a Prime Minister Jacques Chirac, the leader of the winning party. This lasted for 2 years until 1988 when the newly-reelected François Mitterrand called for new legislative elections that were won by a left majority.
For the next five years, the French government and assembly were from the same political background until 1993 when President Mitterrand was forced to appoint his opposition leader Edouard Balladur to the post of Prime Minister. Balladur maintained this post through the cohabitation until May 18, 1995.
At this time, right leader Jacques Chirac from the RPR succeeded Mitterrand as President and since the majority in the National assembly was from his side, he was able to appoint his fellow RPR member Alain Juppé as his Prime Minster.
Cohendet (2005, p.4) explains that In both cases, the cohabitation took place during the last two years of the Presidential mandate.
After both the 1981 and 1988 elections, the newly-elected President dissolved Parliament in order to secure a friendly parliamentary majority. In both cases, the citizens elected members of Parliament of the same political side as the President.
In 1997 however, Chirac’s decision to dissolve parliament for an early legislative election backfired and socialist Lionel Jospin became Prime Minister. This third term of cohabitation lasted five years until 2002.
The theory of cohabitation is not limited to France, as a coexistence between the head of state and its parliamentary majority is possible in any country, for example between the Queen of the United Kingdom and the British Prime Minister. As the PM is elected by the people, it is their right to run the country as a democracy allows this, but differing opinions between the two leaders is possible.
In France, there is an imbalance of power between the President and the Assembly. A President can dissolve the Assembly at any time, but the assembly can not touch the President. Even if the assembly throws the government out of office, the President remains in place (as in 1962).
The French Fifth Republic usually operates under a Presidential system, but when in cohabitation, this changes to a Parliamentary system, giving more power to the Prime Minister, and limiting the President to the control of foreign policy and defence.
Throughout the cohabitation between Mitterrand and Chirac, the President focused on his foreign duties and allowed Chirac to control internal affairs. Since Mitterrand was distanced from these policies, Chirac began to reverse many of Mitterrand’s reforms by lowering taxes and privatising many national enterprises. During this time, Chirac set out to ridicule Mitterrand in his master plan to win the next Presidential election.
This is a common problem during cohabitation, where each leader wants their own policies to be carried out so that the public are positive towards their strategies and will be elected when the time comes.
Because each party is in competition, there is little room for progression since the friction between both sides hold each other back. Chirac called this a state of ‘Paralysis’, and found it particularly difficult to arrange campaign activities for the National Assembly.
Whilst leaders of the same political spectrum help each other in decision making when in power simultaneously, cohabitation leads to a decline in national authority and fighting makes the country look insecure from a global perspective.
The inefficiency in Government agencies as a result of having no collaboration between government and assembly leads to a deterioration of the social order and a persistently high unemployment rate.
When Socialist leader Lionel Jospin assumed the position of Prime Minister, Chirac’s political influence was constrained and he had no say over certain major reforms being instituted by the left-wing majority. This included the 1998 legislation to shorten the working week from 39 to 35 hours, which came into effect in 2000.
In campaign activities for the National Assembly, Chirac repeatedly talked about the disadvantages of power-sharing "cohabitation," saying that only by winning a definite majority in parliament could his government effectively carry through right-wing policies and realize his promises made during the presidential election campaign. (People’s Daily Online, 2002)
It has been recognised by the government that periods of cohabitation restrict the country’s economic progression and the stability of society, with the ‘left-wing government and a right-wing president virtually cancelling each other out.’ (Shiloh, T, 2002) In order to minimise the possibility of cohabitation in the future, Presidential elections were increased in 2004 from every seven years to every five years.
Although originally believed to be improbable, France has been governed under a cohabitation of leaders for almost half of the time (9 years) during the past 20 years. It is apparent that the French people would rather see two parties share the power, than one party be free to do as they like.
Sri Lanka
Sri Lankan politics for several years witnessed a bitter struggle between the President and the Prime Minister, belonging to different parties and elected separately, over the negotiations with the LTTE to resolve the longstanding ethnic conflict.
Bibliography
- http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/3256649.stm
- Raymond, G (2000) The President: Still a ‘Republican Monarch’? in Raymond, G (ed) Structures of Power in Modern France, Macmillan Press, Basingstoke
- Sartori, G (1997) Comparative Constitutional Engineering, 2nd Ed., Macmillan Press, Basingstoke
- Elgie, R (2003) Political Institutions in Contemporary France, OUP, Oxford
- Knapp, A and Wright, V (2001) The Government and Politics of France, 4th Ed., Routledge, London
http://www.elysee.fr [Last accessed 16.02.06] http://www.premier-ministre.gouv.fr [Last accessed 17.02.06] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cohabitation_government 29 [Last accessed 17.02.06]
Cohendet, M. (2005) ‘The French Cohabitation, A Useful Experiment?’ CEFC:China
People’s Daily Online, (2002) ‘France Bids Farewell to Right-Left 'Cohabitation’. Monday, June 17, 2002, http://english.people.com.cn/200206/17/eng20020617_98010.shtml [Last accessed 16.02.06]
Shiloh, T. (2002) ‘Muted reaction as France heads right’. Monday, June 10, 2002, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/2036951.stm [Last accessed 15.02.06]
From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.