So there’s been a bit of an extra helping of “divided government” pseudoanalysis going on here lately. I don’t have much time at the moment to do a whole post but I just wanted to throw out a question to everyone:
- If divided government is so demonstrably awesome, why do all the other rich first world countries have parliamentary systems that prevent such a thing from occurring?
- On a related note, why are there no other rich countries in the world that share our presidential form of government?
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(THE GRAPEVINE
(a) is easy to answer--parliamentary systems encourage coalition governments, which are divided among themselves. The UK's Tories and Liberal Democrats working out their differences should be a familiar recent example; this happens more often in other parliamentary governments (The UK is known for coalition governments being unusually rare).
I fully expect the 'divded' Lib-Tory coalition to govern better than the majority Tory or Labour governments have.
I also think Germany is well off with its CDU and FD coalition. I mean look at its legislature's composition:
<img src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_O6yyBo1yA_o/SrifZqqJoEI/AAAAAAAAAIM/K7a6Mja6FVA/s1600/germany1.PNG">
That looks pretty 'divided' to me--just a different style of division, given that it's parliamentary.
(b) Has several answers but one of the simplest is that we were the first successful democracy. Before the US's success, most of the world didn't think representational democracy was all that great.
Then, because our Constitution requires a 3/4ths hypermajority to amend, we became largely stuck with how we originally pioneered things.
A difficult to amend Constitution has pros and cons, so don't think it's all bad. For at least the first 100 years of US history, I think it was a big pro. The disadvantages built up over time, as political theory evolved and we couldn't fix things such as, say, redrawing state lines every 50 years in a way that makes demographic sense.
a very thorough response. i've always been fascinated with the question of why only third world countries decide to go with a presidential system.
p.s. as to your response to (a) above, the requirement for a coalition government of parties with highly divergent viewpoints happens VERY infrequently in parliamentary systems.
My knee jerk answer is their societies are more primitive so they think (perhaps with some truth) that they have more need for a strong man at the helm.
The cult of the US presidency has, I think, shown itself to be a disadvantage in peacetime. During the World Wars and Cold War, I think one can argue there were advantages.
Ultimately your coalition/divided gvt. is only as good as the people in it. I see nothing wrong with the theory that a divided government or a coalition government can work to effectively deal with a nation's problems, but I think this assumes both party's are responsible actors trying to forge compromise. If one party feels it's in their best interest simply to posture and blame the other side and not try to find comprise (and sorting through the weeds of legislative negotiations is far too much for the vast majority of voters to discern) problem solving is deferred and people become more cynical about politics and government. This narrative of course works to the advantage of people who simply don't want government to work, so given that one of the party's in this grand coalition of divided government has that as their ideological goal — I'm skeptical of anything good coming from it.
you make a good point. a lot of what makes our system work is some measure of good faith on both sides. how do you make a senate work when one side is operating completely in bad faith? take for example the complete obstruction of dozens of appointees to federal judgeships? with crippling case backlogs, this shameful state of events is denying justice to countless people and business around the country.
In general, divided government is better. I think my 'pseudoanalysis' was compelling enough on this point, though as a libertarian I'm understandably biased (to me a congress that passed no new legislation in the 2008-2010 term and just renewed the status quo--no stimulus, no health care bill-- wouldn't have necessarily been a bad thing on net.) Progressives, of course, would much rather the government work, where 'work' means 'enacting programs we like and support'. If 'work' were to start meaning 'paring down Social Security and Medicare while ramping up defense and security spending', they'd of course be less enthused.
To the particular point of whether Republicans will begin to abandon their opposition nihilism and become more interested in governance once they control the House…..I'm not sure. Their current rhetoric is as bizarre to me as anyone else. Looking to history, Republicans accomplished very good things under the last Democratic president. But there was also a lot of Lewinsky theater. Will we get something similar once they gavel in January? I can't predict how they'll behave. All I know is that, looking at recent history as well as going back to the 40s, divided government has been a boon that correlates with good outcomes.
wow, you certainly are taking a lot of things on faith. haven't you learned the sage lesson from bruce bartlett that not all ideologies are appropriate to apply all the time, regardless of the circumstances? in modern american history, we have never been faced with a party that is so perfectly committed to obstruction for obstruction's sake. this isn't just idle chatter -- the evidence lies all around you. dozens more judicial nominees left unconfirmed due to principle-free obstruction. dozens of high level executive officials left unconfirmed for the same reasons. the highest level of filibuster use in the history of the country. etc.
if you have faith that republicans are going to become good faith stewards of government once they're out of the opposition, you're just ignoring facts.
p.s. the idea that "congress that passed no new legislation in the 2008-2010 term and just renewed the status quo--no stimulus, no health care bill-- wouldn't have necessarily been a bad thing on net" is so simplistic, so childish and so manichean as to defy serious rebuttal. there are thousands of unsexy, unnewsworthy things that congress is called upon to address on a constant basis — such as investigating ethics violations, confirming presidential appointees to high office and federal judgeships, responding quickly to natural and manmade disasters, etc.
i just cannot believe that your political nihilism would go so far as to reduce all of congress to simple monkeys pulling levers to maintain the status quo. BUT, if you aren't that irrational and simpleminded, then you necessarily require both parties to be acting in good faith in order to get all the unsexy, unnewsworthy shit DONE.
and if you think that republicans are going to let ANY shit get done if they take over the house, I have a bridge to sell you in death valley.
Wow, how far off the mark are you trying to be?
I do NOT have faith in politicians being good stewards or acting in good faith--such views seem to me naive and laughable.
There are some principled people out there like my senator Russ Feingold, whose view I can respect most of the time. But he's a rare breed, and I certainly don't see parties as a whole acting this way on net. They're politicians, for fuck's sake.
In general I only trust politicians to do what they perceive is in their own and in their party's interest. They engage in constituent service not out of 'good faith', but because that is how they get such high rates of incumbent re-election. I'm nothing but a realist in this regard.
Being the party of no has worked out very well for Republicans while in opposition, and of course they will persist in opposing the Democratic agenda--such should go without saying. Yet as I said in my last comment, the question of what they'll actually do once in power remains open. The political incentives will be lined up differently. If I had to bet, I'd expec the electorate to punish them for a government shutdown (the same way it punished Newt Gingritch for his, which most regard as a mistaken overplaying of his hand.)
Finally, regarding my parenthetical:
When I say something isn't necessarily so, it means a different possibility is open. But this counterfactual is way too complicated for me to evaluate--certainly too complex for this comment section--so I'm not even going to try.
My point is just that I don't know whether the major things Democrats did was better than nothing. You and most Democrats likely disagree, but I think this a view based in faith. If I myself can't wrap my head around the possible unintentded consequences of the action that was taken vis a vis the complicated counterfactual of doing no stimulus nor health care legislation at all, why should I expect you to have thought this through?
i am certainly guilty of healthy doses of naivete but when it comes to politicians sometimes "acting in good faith", the unfortunate reality is that our government needs politicians sometimes acting in good faith in order to function at a basic level of competence.
the filibuster's history illustrates this perfectly. no matter which party held control of the senate since its inception, it was always used sparingly and only for the biggest and most contentious issues.
I.E., politicians sometimes acted in GOOD FAITH (i.e., by not filibustering everything even though they could have), probably because they self-interestedly realized that someday the shoe would be on the other foot.
it is now used for nearly EVERYTHING of any consequence. one party is entirely committed to the idea that the other side is completely and wholly INVALID and incapable of governing unless they agree 100% with the minority party's views.
this is a perfect example of the unprecedented, wholesale abandonment of good faith by an entire wing of the political spectrum. in the context of the filibuster, it has literally never happened before.
i don't expect politicians to be pure saintly souls. but i do expect them to occasionally act in good faith, if for no other reason than our government requires good faith in order to function properly (see, e.g., the need to confirm federal judges, high government officials, etc.). if we want to go to a governmental system that doesn't require good faith, then we should ditch the presidency and go to a parliamentary system where, most of the time, the country is governed by one party at a time.
Routine use of the fiillibuster reflects the polarization of our politics, in part due to transparency measures like C-SPAN cameras, availability of voting records, the netroots, and huge influential lobbying organizations and PACs--which have changed political incentives.
The old way of doing things--Senators compromising behind closed doors instead of filibustering with their party--is no longer operative.
You can call all this an abandonment of good faith if you like, but I don't find it illuminating.
oh that's just hogwash and you know it. our system of government requires some basic measure of good faith and comity in order to function. this happens ALL THE TIME at the state level. even Alaska. at the federal level, comity and any measure of good faith has completely left the building from one side of the aisle.
if you don't realize the importance of comity and good faith to the operation of government then i guess there isn't much more for me to say on the topic
Is it hogwash to note that when you change a politician's incentives, you change the behavior of the politician? Really not a fan of realism, are we.
Go on painting the other side as bad faith monsters…. looky here, I found some like-minded company for you to have comity with:
<img src="http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/goldbergmoulitsas.jpg">
aww, a bit of diversion and false equivalence for the fun of it. as you're no doubt aware, i was talking about the occasional good faith and comity among elected leaders, not the chattering classes. but that wouldn't lend it self toward a cute jpg i guess.
Perhaps you should refer to the portion where I too spoke of politicians--or "elected leaders", to use your unfortunate lionization.
And perhaps you should reflect on yourself as being part of the chattering classes, demonizing opposing 'elected leaders' as bad faith monsters.
Or you can pretend I'm making some point about bad faith and lack of comity within the chattering classes (which I'm not) and cry false equivalence. Whatever works for you.