Talk:Semi-presidential republic

Definitions and scale

1. The definition of semi-presidentialism has often been contested. For clarity, it would be useful to distinguish between "executive powers" and "moderating powers". Executive powers are those which concern the day-to-day management of the State, the determination and implementation of executive and administrative policy, and foreign relations. Examples would include appointing and dismissing Cabinet members, negotiating treaties, declaring war etc. Moderating powers are those which stand above and outside day-to-day management, as a check against the executive and legislature, and a means of resolving deadlocks etc. Examples would include dissolving Parliament, appealing to the people by referendum, and appointing "non-political" officials such as central bankers.

2. It helps if we come up with a six-point scale, ranging from Hyper-Presidentialism at one end to pure Parliamentarism at the other.

(1) Hyper-Presidential System: President has executive authority, Prime Minister is weak and dependent upon President's support. President also has moderating powers, enabling the President to dominate the political process. Example: Russia

(2) Pure Presidential System: President has executive authority, no separate Prime Minister. Moderating powers are non-existent or shared with the legislature and courts. Example: USA.

(3) Semi-Presidential System (Strong Presidency): President has significant leadership role in the setting and implementation of executive policy, but must share executive powers and delegate day-to-day decision making to a Prime Minister responsible to the legislature. President has significant choice of Prime Minister, but may be constrained by hostile Parliamentary majorities. The President also has some significant moderating powers. When the President has a majority in Parliament, and can therefore appoint a Prime Minister of his/her own choosing, this can resemble hyper-Presidentialism; at other times, it can resemble Semi-Presidential System (Moderating Presidency). Example: France.

(4) Semi-Presidential System (Moderating Presidency): President does not take part in executive policy setting or implementation - these powers belong to the Prime Minister who is responsible to Parliament; but the President does have significant moderating powers, in order to form coalitions, resolve deadlocks, protect the Constituion, veto or call referenda on legislation, dissolve parliaments etc. Example: Finland.

(5) Parliamentary System (Figurehead Presidency): The President has no executive power and little moderating of his/her own: the President is mainly a figurehead and is expected to act only on the Prime Minister's advice. Thus the Prime Minister and Cabinet have both executive and moderating powers. In some, narrowly defined, circumstances, the President may nevertheless exercise a marginal influence: e.g. refusing to dissolve Parliament on the advice of a Prime Minister who has lost a vote of confidence. Example: Ireland.

(6) Pure Parliamentary System: The Head of State (Monarch or President) has no personal influence over the political system and is merely decorative. Example: United Kingdom.

Hope this helps.

86.138.139.41 19:18, 7 February 2007 (UTC)Elliot86.138.139.41 19:18, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Which came first, the French or the Finn?

2. The article states that the Finnish system was based on the French, when in fact the Constitution of Finland pre-dates that of the French Fifth Republic, which established the semi-presidential system in France, by several decades.

Changes made

Edited this page in two ways.

1. I added "popularly elected" to the reference to semi-presidential systems featuring a president who is more than a figurehead. It is standard (though not universal) among political scientists to confine the term "semi-presidential" to systems where the president is popularly elected.

2. I deleted some countries from the list of examples of semi-presidentialism. The ones I deleted lack popularly elected presidents (Germany, post WWII, which is almost universally classified as parliamentary, and Pakistan and Lebanon, where the president is not elected). I also deleted Egypt because the PM is hardly relevant in a system that is in fact a presidential authoritarian system, not a democracy (or even semi-democracy, like Pakistan). One could make a strong case for deleting Finland after constitutional reforms in 2000 deprived the president of almost all his authority, but I left it in.

New discussion.

Finland should not be classified as Semi-Presidential today. The definition of Semi-Presidentialism is also dependent on the presidential authorities. I evaluate the authorities of the president from two perspectives, i) the formal independent powers of the president such as veto-authority over legislation or right to dissolve the parliament, ii) The executive power of the president, which is defined mainly by, whether the president participate(influence) in the governments executive work, and the authority to appoint or dismiss ministers of the cabinet. Finland of today does not have a presidency with major authority in these matters, prior to 1988 the finnish presidency had a larger degree of authority. On the other hand the president was then elected from a electoral collegium and not directly by the people, still I consider the finnish system more semi-presidential then. Today´s finnish system is what I define as Uni-Presidential: "Directly elected with limited authority. Besides Finland countries like Slovakia, Austria and Ireland are defined as such by me. I do not remove Finland from the Semi-Presidential-list on Wikkipedia at this point.

Max

I would like to make a few remarks about semi-presidentialism in France. First, unlike the US President, the President of the French Republic cannot veto legislation; he/she may however send a bill (only once) back to Parliament for reconsideration, or refer any bill to the Constitutional Council for review of constitutionality, or call a popular referendum on any law. Second, the French President can in theory dissolve the National Assembly (provided that he doesn't do that in two consecutive years), but the constitution of the fifth republic requires that he/she first consults the prime minister and the presiding officers of the National Assembly and the Senate. I guess that, in the end, a system of government becomes semi-presidential or semi-parliamentary not so much based on the text of the constitution itself, but rather on political conditions and unwritten conventions. In France, the unofficial convention seems to be that, even in periods of "cohabitation", the President is given a special role in directing foreign and defense policy and representing France in international forums, whereas the prime minister and the council are in charge of the daily running of the government, including the budget, following up legislation in parliament, etc...

The principal definition of Semi-Presidentialism is besides a directly elected president, also a government originated from and /or responsible to the parliament. The presidential powers could as well exceed the traditional powers of a Semi-Presidential system such as Russia or other CIS-countries. Political systems of this sort has shown a presidential function combined with a semi-presidential form. By this I mean that the government however responsible to the parliament is closely related to the president and does not by originate from the parliament. The government is more often composed of extra-parliamentarian individualos without party affiliation.

Max

Hence As Finland by a Uni-Presidential system, is located between the Semi-Presidential and the Parliamentarian system, Russia and Georgia is located between the Presidential and Semi-Presidential system

Max

a s-p system differs from a parliamentary system in that it has a popularly president, not from a presidential system [which includes a popularly elected president] so i changed the terms. 132.230.21.162 09:16, 19 January 2006 (UTC)tstbild

It makes no sense

It makes no sense why Finland is classified as a semi-presidential country if countries like Bulgaria, Ireland and Slovakia are not. Since the presidential authority are very much the same in these countries, and considerably weaker than in the french system, the named countries should either be classified as parliamentarian,Semi-presidential or as something in between. Besides that Portugal and Poland shows systems where the president is not participant in the executive like the french, on the other hand the presidents individual authorities exceeds the weaker finnisg, slovakian etc, and resembles more to the french. This creates a variety of semi-presidential systems that should be examined. If one include Russia or Ukraine the differences of the weaker and stronger semi-presidential systems appears too grat to be united under a single definition. Just like a parliamentarian system should requie democratic legitimacy so should the semi-presidential in my point of view. Algeria, Eegypt and Pakistan are not democratic enough to be classified as semi-presidential. Should we let Pakistan and Egypt in this system, there are numerous other countries that should also be included.

Max

Learn to use the discussion format: two dashes - and four tildes ~ after the comment, replies marked with a colon :. But, Finland has a semi-presidential system, because the president does have real powers, and is responsible for the foreign policy. The president is not merely an useless figurehead like in a parliamentarism. --Vuo 12:34, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

I don't know if Finland is a semi-presidential republic, but in List of European Union member states by political system it is classified as a parliamentary one. I think we should try to resolve this contradiction by discussing also with the authors of that article. --fudo 12:51, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

division of responsibilities in France

For example, in France the president is responsible for foreign policy and the prime minister for domestic policy.

This is kind of true as a general rule, but not really. In cohabitation, it is the prime minister who gets to pick the minister of foreign affairs, and this minister is part of the prime minister's coalition. Védrine reported to Jospin as much as he did to Chirac; same deal with Juppé to Balladur and Mitterrand. john k 23:31, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

map seems OR

While this map seems OK to me, the map currently in the article seems suspiciously OR. Thoughts welcome at Image talk:Form of government.png#map seems OR? --Irpen 03:19, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Slight wikification and update

I wikified and found refs for this article, but am not an expert. I would suggest the next political scientist who reads this please update the article. See the Wikipedia manual of style and Wikipedia:Tutorial. Pointing out problems on the talk page of an article which clearly no one is working on will not help anyone. Please contribute by fixing the articles in your area of expertise, and doing so in accordance with Wikipedia's Style, Verifiability, and Neutral Point of View guidelines. Thank you. T L Miles (talk) 01:58, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

elected separately

This term is obscure. Of their nature, presidents and prime ministers will be elected separately because the two jobs are distinct. Does it, perhaps, mean that they are not elected at the same time?

Kosovo

Why is Kosovo shown on the map, and Abkhazia and South Ossetia are not? —Preceding unsigned comment added by ZvonimirIvanovic (talk • contribs) 23:14, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

Massive deletions

WGee's pointless deletions: [1] Also, the comparison with a presidential system was also removed for no reason. --Vuo (talk) 13:58, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

list?

Both the parliamentary system and presidential system articles list countries that use those systems, why doesn't this article? 76.66.195.159 (talk) 17:24, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

That's a good idea. But it might be hard to do. The reason is because, until about 15-20 years ago, France was pretty much the only country that fit in this category. But since the fall of European Communism, many others, notably Poland, have become Semi-Prezes. I could compile a list myself, based upon my knowledge, but that would violate WP:OR. We need some source to get this in here. Unschool 20:06, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Move

This system is only used in civil government, not in politics (eg religiuos politics, ...) as a whole