Coalition Governments and Comparative Constitutional Design

Abstract

In this paper we present a structural approach to the study of government formation in multi party parliamentary democracies. The approach is based on the estimation of a stochastic bargaining model which we use to investigate the effects of specific institutional features of parliamentary democracy on the formation and dissolution of coalition governments. We illustrate our methodology by presenting the results of two (counterfactual) experiments of comparative constitutional design.

Keywords: Political Stability, Minority Coalitions, Government Formation, Government Dissolution, Bicameralism, Constitutions

JEL Classification: D72, H19, C73