Why Legislatures Organise: Inter-Parliamentary Activism in Federal Systems and its Consequences

Abstract

Intensifying intergovernmental cooperation creates problems for legislatures. They are rarely involved in the policy-formulation process and are often confronted with ‘take it or leave it decisions’. This paper assesses the conditions under which sub-national parliaments in federal systems try to counteract the growing executive dominance in intergovernmental relations (IGR) through collective, inter-parliamentary activism and evaluates its effects. Inter-parliamentary activism is triggered by institutionally separated branches not bridged by party ties emphasising parliaments' institutional interests, interests otherwise easily muted by the divide between parliamentary majority supporting the government and its opposition. Accordingly, in the presidential US, state legislatures pursue their interests separately from their executives. In the Swiss cantons, where executives and parliaments are institutionally separate but differences are moderated through party ties, we also observe inter-parliamentary activism but in a less forceful manner. In the parliamentary Canadian provinces inter-parliamentary activism is unheard of. In all three cases, sub-national parliaments face trade-offs between moderating executive dominance by parliamentary involvement, assuring the efficiency of intergovernmental cooperation and fighting federal intrusion in areas of state competence. Ironically, the independent representation of state legislatures in American IGR weakens the states as a level of government since no intergovernmental body can effectively act on their behalf to counter centralisation.