Cabinet Ministers Research Articles

Comparing the roles of secondary schools and universities in the formation of British cabinet ministers, 1922–2022

AbstractThe role played by the education system in the creation and reproduction of governing elites, and its countervailing potential to create a more meritocratic and egalitarian society, has been a topic of enduring concern. However, these debates have been rendered opaque by an inability to directly compare elite formation systems both within and between countries. To resolve this problem, we employ elite formation quantitative indices to compare the roles of the secondary school and higher education systems, of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, in the formation of its political elite—cabinet ministers—between 1922 and 2022. Our findings show that the universities educating cabinet ministers have been more elite and influential than the secondary schools, but not more exclusive. Additionally, while only a small number of universities and schools supplied more than one cabinet minister over the century, a very small number of universities and schools supplied a great many.

Acting on three arenas: A multidimensional approach to understanding ministerial turnover

AbstractUnderstanding why cabinet ministers are terminated early is still underexplored. Most existing studies focus on performance on one arena. We argue that ministers operate in many different arenas and to fully understand the complex nature of ministerial termination we need to consider ministers' performance in several arenas and their relation to one another. We focus ministers' performance in three arenas; the public/electoral, the parliamentary and the cabinet. We test our argument on over 40 years of ministerial turnover in Denmark. Our results show that ministers' performance in all three arenas each have an effect on ministerial turnover (mostly the parliamentary). Moreover, adding interaction terms in our statistical models between ministers' performance in these different arenas affect the impact hereof on ministerial turnover. Our findings show the need to engage more with the competing arenas in which ministers perform to increase our understanding of ministerial turnover.

Japan: Political Developments and Data in 2023

AbstractJapan's ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) continued to slide in public opinion polls in 2023, with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida's approval ratings never recovering from the scandal over the party's association with the controversial Unification Church that was exposed in the previous year. Kishida survived an assassination attempt in April, and the LDP's subsequent strong performance in by‐elections helped to temporarily stabilise his leadership. However, the party faced a fresh scandal in November, when a police investigation into the misreporting and mishandling of ‘slush fund’ money by the LDP's major factions led to the removal of four senior Cabinet ministers and an even sharper decline in support for the Kishida administration. Rising consumer prices, due in part to a weakening of the Yen, were also a major concern throughout 2023, with inflation for the full year reaching 3.1 per cent, its highest level since 1981.

The Length of Service of Cabinet Ministers in Chile's Presidential Democracy, 1990–2022

Cabinet shuffles in multiparty democracies do not equally affect all posts as they are caused by changes in the composition of government coalitions and by shifting political conditions. With data from the 340 individual cabinet appointments in Chile's presidential system in seven presidential terms (1990–2022), we find that the type of cabinet position and prior experience as cabinet ministers impact the length of service, but party members do not last longer than independents and neither do ministers with technocratic credentials. Ministers in low‐prestige positions are less likely to being sacked. As cabinet stability is associated with the delivery of public policies, studying the determinants of longer cabinet positions helps identify factors that contribute to governability and good governance.

O parlamentar José Bernardino Batista Pereira D'Almeida

In this article, the partial political trajectory of José Bernardino Batista Pereira d'Almeida is recovered. As the sole representative of the Province of Espírito Santo in the first two legislatures of the Imperial Chamber of Deputies, in 1828 he was part of the ministerial cabinet formed by Dom Pedro I at the end of 1827, with the appointment of deputies who partially opposed his government to occupy key positions. A figure of the moderate liberal camp, highly active in the Chamber until his appointment to the Ministry, he was later practically ignored in imperial political records and only recently has his name been revisited by historiography. The objective is thus to contribute to the reconstruction of his thinking, aiming to deepen understanding of the political history of that period.

Where do French cabinet ministers come from? Towards representation and democracy

Where do French cabinet ministers come from? Towards representation and democracy

Interrogating regional territorial representation in post-democratic Spain

ABSTRACT In this article, we examine the function of territorial representation by national cabinet ministers in multi-ethnic democracies. In particular, we observe whether ministers from regions with a specific identity shape a distinctive sense of representation in the national executive, and whether this depends on how political parties and the party system articulate it. Borrowing from Pitkin’s four dimensions of political representation, we investigate the recruitment and role of ministers from the three distinct Spanish regions of the Basque Country, Catalonia and Galicia. This paper stresses that these ministers have played a distinctly territorial representative role in the national cabinet quite unlike that of ministers from other Spanish regions. Nevertheless, it is worth noting the poorest performance of Catalan ministers in relation to their Basque and Galician counterparts in terms of descriptive representation, levels of partisanship, survival rates and appointment to certain portfolios.

PROMOTING ADMINISTRATIVE JUSTICE FOR PRESIDENTIAL PARDONS IN SOUTH AFRICA

The President’s power to grant pardons, remit fines, penalties or forfeitures and the nature of the accountability for the exercise of such power remains unclear. The question of accountability relates to whether the President has a constitutional obligation to disclose the reasons for his decision. The nature of the power is broadly formulated and should undergo reform to enhance the attendant accountability. Over the years, there were debates on whether the granting of pardons constitutes administrative action in terms of the Promotion of Administrative Justice Act (PAJA). Because it is a power that potentially has an adverse effect on rights enshrined in the Bill of Rights, it is submitted that it should be construed in terms of PAJA. Similarly, the role of Parliament in exercising oversight over the process is unclear and inadequate. The article submits that the President should exercise the power together with the relevant Cabinet Minister, and subject to legislative endorsement.

THE REPRESENTATION OF INDONESIAN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE IN MEDIA: A CRITICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS

Mr. Prabowo Subianto is often regarded as a controversial figure, both in his military and political career. This research aims to find out Mr. Prabowo Subianto’s representation in one of The New York Times articles entitled “Indonesian General Accused of Kidnapping Is Named Defense Minister”, which was written by Richard C. Paddock in 2019. The article mainly discusses the controversial issue regarding Mr. Joko Widodo’s, the re-elected President of Indonesia, decision to appoint Mr. Subianto, his rival in the presidential election, to be one of his cabinet ministers. In analyzing the topic, van Dijk’s Critical Discourse Analysis, is utilized. Despite the fact that in van Dijk’s CDA there are three levels of analysis, namely the macro, meso, and micro levels, this paper is limited to the micro level only, as this focuses more on unveiling a more specific and detailed portrayal of Mr. Subianto’s representation in the newspaper article. In the microstructure analysis, three linguistics tools are employed, namely actor description, level of description, and rhetoric. The research applies the descriptive qualitative method as well as the library research method. The findings consistently show the negative representation of Mr. Subianto in the macrostructure, microstructure and superstructure analyses.

MR. PRABOWO SUBIANTO’S REPRESENTATION IN THE NEW YORK TIMES ARTICLE “INDONESIAN GENERAL ACCUSED OF KIDNAPPING IS NAMED DEFENSE MINISTER”

Mr. Prabowo Subianto is often regarded as a controversial figure, both in his military and political career. This research aims to find out Mr. Prabowo Subianto’s representation in one of The New York Times articles entitled “Indonesian General Accused of Kidnapping Is Named Defense Minister”, which was written by Richard C. Paddock in 2019. The article mainly discusses the controversial issue regarding Mr. Joko Widodo, the re-elected President of Indonesia, decision to appoint Mr. Subianto, his rival in the presidential election, to be one of his cabinet ministers. In analyzing the topic, van Dijk’s Critical Discourse Analysis is utilized. Even though in van Dijk’s CDA there are three levels of analysis, namely the macro, meso, and micro levels, this paper is limited to the micro level only, as this focuses more on unveiling a more specific and detailed portrayal of Mr. Subianto’s representation in the newspaper article. In the microstructure analysis, three linguistics tools are employed, namely actor description, level of description, and rhetoric. The research applies the descriptive qualitative method as well as the library research method. The findings consistently show the negative representation of Mr. Subianto in the macrostructure, microstructure, and superstructure analyses.

When a “Feminist” Government Tackles Gender-Based Violence: A WPR Approach to the Speeches of Canadian Cabinet Ministers (2015–2019)

Abstract Ending gender-based violence was a central promise of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's self-declared feminist government. Executive speeches about gender-based violence provide clues about what types of feminist ideas undergird the 42nd Parliament. Was carceral feminism advanced, by focusing on punishment? Or neoliberalized feminist ideas, by focusing on the market? Or social justice feminist ideas, by focusing on systemic change? Applying the concept of governance feminism and using Bacchi's WPR approach, this article investigates how gender-based violence is problematized in English- and French-language House of Commons debates in the 42nd Parliament by the cabinet. The speeches problematize gender-based violence as preventable and caused by systemic issues, but this transformational discourse is undermined by a focus on strengthening carceral responses and limiting human potential to economic productivity. Feminist ideas about gender-based violence were adopted, relying on carceral and neoliberalized feminist ideas. The Trudeau Liberals’ campaign for change was discursively undermined.

The patterns of political career movements of Nigerian cabinet ministers, 1999–2017

ABSTRACT This article examines the patterns of political career movements in the Nigerian federal system using the sample of federal cabinet ministers from 1999 to 2017. The result shows that most Nigerian ministers are politically inexperienced, with a large proportion of party-affiliated technocrats among them. For politically experienced ministers, the dominant pattern of career movements is a unidirectional one leading from the state to the federal level, while any movement back is rare. We argue that, among other things, this pattern is an outcome of the federal character principle stated in the Nigerian constitution, according to which the cabinet has to include a minister from each of the current 36 states. This requirement leads to disruption of political careers and hinders politicians from moving across territorial levels.

Approaching Equality? Media Treatment of Male and Female Members of Presidential Cabinets in a Cross-Country Comparison

Abstract Generalizability of extant findings about media treatment of women in politics is uncertain because most research examines candidates for the legislature or heads of government, and little work moves beyond Anglo-American countries. We examine six presidential cabinets in Costa Rica, Uruguay, and the United States, which provide differing levels of women’s incorporation into government. These cases permit us to test hypotheses arguing that differences in media treatment of men and women cabinet ministers will decrease as women’s inclusion in government expands, and that media treatment of women is more critical when women head departments associated with masculine gender stereotypes. Results show that greater incorporation of women into government is associated with fewer gendered differences in media coverage, tone of minister coverage is more favorable for women who hold masculine stereotyped portfolios, and that the media does present qualifications of women cabinet ministers.

Cocoa and compliance: How exemptions made mass expulsion in Ghana

ABSTRACT ‘Mass expulsion’ was rarely so ‘mass’ in its application. It was often enforced through exceptions as much as the rule, through the ad-hoc actions of individual citizens and migrants, as much as by the executive branches of independence-era governments. On November 18, 1969, Kofi Abrefa Busia, the newly elected Prime Minister of Ghana, issued the Aliens Compliance Order, requiring all undocumented immigrants, those without valid residence permits, to leave the nation within fourteen days. Since mass expulsion orders are enacted by decrees such as Busia’s, they are overwhelmingly analyzed as tool of executive authority. But this analytical glossing lends too much authority to the state’s executive branch, overlooking the role of West African peoples’ thoughts, expressions, and interpretations in the process of mass expulsion. Petitions for exemptions to the expulsion order in Ghana’s cocoa industry, the nation’s leading export crop, reveal how various segments of the Ghanaian government (cabinet ministers, union leaders, and members of regional security councils) and society (Ghanaian chiefs, farm owners, and alien laborers) pried open the Order’s contradictions to shape both the targets of expulsion and the ad-hoc means by which it was carried out. Mass expulsion was a relational process; not a singular event but an iterative renegotiation of political mobilities. This article turns our attention, more broadly, to how diverse members of African societies at independence shaped ‘state’ policies as well as the meaning and measure of African citizenship.

THE CABINET OF MINISTERS AS A SUBJECT OF THE LAW-MAKING PROCESS: PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS IN LEGISLATION

This article talks about the powers of the Cabinet of Ministers in the field of lawmaking and its role in legislation, analyzes the definitions of legislative activity, explains the powers of the Cabinet of Ministers, its connection with other legislative processes. Manufacturing of objects and its features. It is substantiated that the law-making activity of the central collegial executive body occupies a special place in the national legal system, based on the position and legal status of this entity in the system of state bodies. In addition, the author’s definitions of such concepts as legislative activity and legislative activity of the Cabinet of Ministers are given, various aspects of resolutions and orders of the Cabinet of Ministers of the Republic of Uzbekistan are shown. It is concluded that although the resolutions of the Cabinet of Ministers are not aimed at establishing, amending or repealing a new legal norm, they determine the official regulation of one or another type of social relations by the state. In addition to the above, based on an analysis of the norms of the Law of the Republic of Uzbekistan “On Regulatory Legal Acts”, “On the Cabinet of Ministers of the Republic of Uzbekistan”, proposals have been put forward to introduce relevant norms into Articles 36 and 37 of the Law “On the Cabinet of Ministers of the Republic of Uzbekistan” and into the “Regulations of the Cabinet Ministers of the Republic of Uzbekistan".

Presidential Nominations from Active Cabinet Ministers: A Delicate Balance between the Interpretation of Constitutional Court Decisions and Political Interests

The Constitutional Court’s Decision number 68/PUU-XX/2022 has sparked substantial debate among various societal factions. The controversy stems from the interpretation that the ruling potentially enables ministers to misuse their authority and exploit state resources for electoral advantages while running for President or Vice President, without necessitating resignation from their current position. This study seeks to discern the ramifications of the Constitutional Court's decision number 68/PUU-XX/2022 on the roles and authorities of ministers within a presidential government structure, and to scrutinize the decision from an Islamic law/siyasah perspective. This investigation adopts a descriptive qualitative approach, grounded in library research. The normative juridical methodology is employed, focusing on decision number 68/PUU-XX/2022. The study concludes that within the context of siyasah sharia, the decision could compel the nation’s leader (the President) to promulgate legal regulations that violate the principle of fairness between high-ranking and ordinary officials. However, the President risks being deemed unconstitutional if derivative regulations stemming from the decision are not enacted. Power abuse by state officials (ministers), partly driven by conflict of interest, is a critical concern. From the perspective of Islamic law/siyasah, the decision’s implications could potentially harm society and the government.

Technocrat or partisan cabinet ministers: Does it make a difference? Evidence from an endorsement experiment with the bureaucracy

AbstractThis article analyses how high‐level bureaucrats evaluate the leadership of technocrat and partisan cabinet ministers in different roles of policymaking. The argument is that bureaucrats perceive ministers with policy expertise to have a central role in policymaking, especially in policy‐directing tasks. Despite their essential contribution to coalition formation, ministers with political experience are negatively evaluated in all policymaking roles. The article presents evidence based on an endorsement experiment conducted with the high‐level bureaucracy in Brazil. The results show that ministers with policy experience receive positive evaluations from the bureaucracy in policy formulation and implementation roles but not to carry out political coordination activities with the presidency or the legislature. Ministers with a partisan profile receive negative evaluations in all tasks of the policy process. Exploring the mechanism, we show that the negative assessment of ministers with a partisan profile is maintained even when the profile of the bureaucrat is considered. These results show the negative attitudes of high‐level bureaucrats towards partisan ministers in contexts of substantial patronage and corruption and contribute to the debate on ministerial appointments and their implications for policymaking.

Representational Counterbalancing: The Case of Cabinet Ministers and Parliamentary Secretaries in Canada

ABSTRACT This paper argues that when heads of government appoint politicians to government teams, they focus on a particular range of the appointees’ representational attributes and construct selection pools for other team positions with an eye toward counterbalancing the appointees’ salient representational attributes. Previous research has investigated horizontal counterbalancing, which takes place within teams whose members have roughly equal status (e.g., cabinets). This paper suggests that there is additional value to be gained by examining vertical counterbalancing, which occurs when selectors appoint subordinates whose attributes counterbalance those of their superiors. Empirically, the paper spotlights teams of federal cabinet ministers and parliamentary secretaries in Canada from 1963-2021. It demonstrates that prime ministers have used parliamentary secretary appointments to counterbalance—in order—the provincial/territorial, linguistic, gender, and ethnic attributes of the ministers they serve. It shows that caucus characteristics, partisanship, and (to some extent) prime ministers’ personal identities condition their counterbalancing behaviours.

‚I will not be a mere wreath layer!‘ Analysis of the presidential refusal to appoint cabinet ministers in the Czech Republic

‚I will not be a mere wreath layer!‘ Analysis of the presidential refusal to appoint cabinet ministers in the Czech Republic

“A Territory of Threat”: The Banning of the Herrnhut Communities in Livonia and Local Society in 1743

This article analyses the decree issued by Empress Elizaveta Petrovna on April 16, 1743, the first in the Russian Empire and targeting the Herrnhut Brethren Community. It has been mentioned in historiography but quoted from secondary sources and interpreted as a decree directed against the missionaries, even though J. Eckardt (1876) and, recently, O. Teigeler (2006) put it in the context of the history of the Herrnhut communities in Livonia. The author analyses the content and implementation of the decree of 1743 in the context of the development of the Herrnhut communities in Livonia, including the island of Ösel, in the 1720s–1730s. The documents of the investigative case against the Herrnhut communities preserved in the fund of the Secret Chancellery (RGADA) and partly copied in the investigation dossier compiled by the College of Justice for Livonia, Estland, and Finland and kept in the fund of the College of Foreign Affairs in AVPRI, reveal that by 1743, the St Petersburg authorities did not consider the sermon of the Herrnhut to threaten them or Orthodoxy, nor did they have any idea of the doctrine itself. First, the decree ordered that Countess von Zinzendorf be caught, as the purpose of her stay in St Petersburg in 1743 was unclear. Further, the decree of 1743 was not intended against the few missionaries settled in St Petersburg who were striving to reach Asia through the Russian Empire. The correspondence between Chancellor A. P. Bestuzhev-Rumin and I. A. Cherkasov, Cabinet Minister of Empress Elizaveta Petrovna, reveals that the action taken on the community in 1743 was largely prompted by the foreign policy circumstances. The main threat to the central government was the commissions set up a year earlier by local noble elected bodies, i. e. the Landtags and the Ober-Consistory, to investigate the activities of the Herrnhut communities in Livonia. The activities of the Baltic nobility carried out independently of the imperial centre aroused the gravest suspicions because its specific rights and privileges, though confirmed by the Peace of Nystadt, were kept vague for the St Petersburg authorities by the 1740s. The local nobility, dramatically involved in the activities of the Herrnhut communities in the 1720s–1740s, found themselves in a difficult position, torn between their adherence to the doctrine and the need to remain loyal to the St Petersburg authorities, fulfilling the requirements of the personal decree of 1743.