The Concept of Semi-Presidentialism of the Fifth Republic - Essay Example

How useful is the concept of ’semi-presidentialism’ for understanding the political regime of the Fifth Republic? How useful is the concept of ’semi-presidentialism’ for understanding the political regime of the Fifth Republic? In order to understand how France’s Fifth Republic fits into the spectrum of semi-presidential regimes, we must first determine what exactly constitutes said form of government. According to French politician Maurice Duverger, A political regime is considered as semi-presidential if the constitution which established it combines three elements: (1) the president of the republic is elected by universal suffrage; (2) he possesses quite considerable powers; (3) he has opposite him, however, a prime minister and ministers who possess executive and governmental power and can stay in office only if the parliament does not show its opposition to them (Duverger, 1980:166 cited in Elgie:2009). The first aspect worth analyzing is to what extent France meets Duverger’s first criteria: a president elected by universal suffrage. In 1962, the then French president Charles de Gaulle passed a constitutional amendment altering the presidential election from parliamentary to universal suffrage (Curtis 2004). This meant that the president of the republic would be elected by the population, and therefore had to become a strong and appealing individual leader. At the time, this benefited De Gaulle since he epitomized charismatic leadership and desired a system were the president wielded the majority of government power and responsibility. Universal suffrage gave constitutional power to the president, as he, by virtue of being elected by majority vote, now possessed similar legitimacy to that of a majority in the Assembly. Thus, 1962 marked the beginning of a shift of power from the Assembly to the President, and is even considered by Robert Elgie to be the point that established the Fifth Republic as a semi-presidential regime.  The second criteria of Duverger’s definition of semi-presidential regime is that “(2) he possesses quite considerable powers” (Duverger, 1980:166 cited in Elgie:2009). Scholars such as Robert Elgie criticized Duverger for being too vague in his definition of semi-presidential regimes. For instance, Duverger underscores the fact that the president must possess considerable powers, but never expounds on this idea in order to establish what is deemed to be considerable. Reading further on Duverger’s other work such as A NEW POLITICAL SYSTEM MODEL: SEMI-PRESIDENTIAL GOVERNMENT (1980), Duverger defined the considerable powers saying that French Fifth Republic as “A country with an all-powerful presidency” (Duverger 1980:170). He justified this proposition by citing Article 16 which states that “the institutions of the Republic, the independence of the nation, the integrity of its territory or the fulfilment of its international commitments are seriously and directly threatened and if the normal operation of the constitutional Public Powers is interrupted” (Duverger 1980:170). In effect, Duverger is stating that Article 16 of the French Constitution allows the President of the Fifth Republic to become a quasi- dictator when the necessary conditions sets in making him a very powerful President. He further explained such considerable power by citing that the President of the Fifth Republic can also make decisions without the counter-signature of the prime minister and the agreement of the parliament except in four cases which are “(1) to dissolve the national Assembly, with no further dissolution possible within the same year; (2) to refer to the constitutional Council laws or international commitments which he judges to be opposed to the constitution; (3) to appoint three members and the president of the constitutional Council, on the expiry of the term of office of their predecessors; (4) to address messages to parliament” (Duverger 1980:170). The president can also refuse to sign the ordinances and decrees discussed by the Council of Ministers and can make decrees on his own having executive and statutory power. Duverger’s last criteria that the President “has opposite him, however, a prime minister and ministers who possess executive and governmental power and can stay in office only if the parliament does not show its opposition to them” is present in France’s Fifth Republic through the various terms of Presidents such as Chirac serving as Prime Minister during the term of President Mitterand. These three criteria of semi presidentialism as stated by Duverger is satisfied by France. First, French President is voted into office through universal suffrage. Second, President has a considerable power which Duverger has expounded on his work on A New Political System Model: Semi-Presidential Government (2008). Finally, there exists a Prime Minister that is acceptable both to the President and the legislature implying a duality of the executive in the French Fifth Republic. Elgie summed it up as ‘finely balanced constitutional dyarchy’ (Elgie 1999:77 cited in Clift:2008:384) where ‘a popularly elected fixed-term president exists alongside a prime minister responsible to parliament’ (2001:107 cited in Clift 2008:384). Duverger’s criteria of semi-presidentialism however was not able to account important aspects of French Fifth Republic. One of which is the principle of cohabitation which is a peculiar aspect of French semi-presidentialism. Cohabitation happens when the President and the Prime Minister comes from different political party. Typically, this happens when majority of the National Assembly is composed of the opposing party whereby the President is forced to appoint a Prime Minister from the other party. Having said this, cohabitation in essence is a conflicted co-existence where both parties are compelled to cooperate to keep the government going. This is consistent with Sartori’s theory of coalition potential during ideological polarization (Nwokora and Pelizzo 2013) which in the case of France’s Fifth Republic, differing political parties where they have to work together despite party differences (Mainwaring 1998). During a cohabitation, the Prime Minister has the responsibility of the domestic affairs while the President is engaged with foreign policy and national defence. As expected, issues will arise due to the differing party and ideological affiliations which could make cooperation difficult on issues that the opposing parties have different opinions. During extreme situation, the President has the power to dissolve the National Assembly (not more than once a year) while the National Assembly can have a vote of no-confidence of the President’s choice of Prime Minister. These nuances in French’s Fifth Republic is not captured by Duverger’s definition of semi-presidentialism. Duverger’s definition of semi-presidentialism is only limited on universal suffrage, considerable power of president and the duality of executive which France has all satisfied. This definition however was not able to capture the nuances of cohabitation and how power is shared and the possible issues that may rise during that time. This definition may also shed more understanding in other semi-presidential system in Europe such as Russia and Portugal where cohabitation is not prominent in their political system but not in France’s Fifth Republic where cohabitation is part of its political life. It is also noteworthy to mention that in France’s version of Fifth republic, the President exercises a broad power of the executive which is excessive compared to other democracies in Europe (Shugart 2005). Duverger was able to delineate the extent of the power of France’s President but it failed to explain why France’s President in the Fifth Republic holds so much power except to trace back to the Fifth Republic’s framer General Charles de Gaulle’s interpretation of the constitution of the power of the President as “the indivisible authority of the State is entrusted completely to the president by the people who elected him, that there existed no other authority, either ministerial, civil, military or judiciary which has not been conferred and was not being maintained by him, and finally that it was his duty to adapt the supreme domain, which is his alone, to fit in with those, the control of which he delegates to others” (Duverger 1980:171). Duverger’s definition also did not answer the question why France still continues to adapt semi-presidentialism which is key to the understanding the political regime of the Fifth Republic and therefore Duverger’s definition of semi-presidentialism only provided nominal understanding about the political regime of France’s Fifth Republic. Bibliography Clift, B. (2008) The Fifth Republic at Fifty: The Changing Face of French Politics and Political Economy. Modern & Contemporary France 16(4) pp. 383–398 Elgie, R. (1999) The Politics of Semi-Presidentialism, in Elgie, R., Elgie, R. (ed.)Semi-Presidentialism in Europe. New York: Oxford University Press, USA, pp. 1 21. Elgie, R. (2009) Duverger, Semi-presidentialism and the Supposed French Archetype,West European Politics. London: Routledge, 32(2), pp. 248 267 Curtis, Michael. "CHARLES DE GAULLE AND RAYMOND ARON." Society 41, no. 4 (May 2004): 13. MasterFILE Premier, EBSCOhost (accessed November 23, 2014). Duverger, M. (2008). A New Political System Model: Semi-Presidential Government. European Journal of Political Research, 165-187. Shugart, M. S. (2005) Semi-Presidential Systems: Dual Executive And Mixed Authority Patterns,French Politics. Palgrave Macmillan Ltd, 3(3), pp. 323 351. Nwokora, Z., & Pelizzo, R. (2013). Sartori Reconsidered: Toward a New Predominant Party System. Political Studies, N/a-N/a Mainwaring, Scott (1998). RETHINKING PARTY SYSTEMS THEORY IN THE THIRD WAVE OF DEMOCRATIZATION: The Importance of Party System Institutionalization. Working Paper #260 - October 1998. Retrieved from https://kellogg.nd.edu/publications/workingpapers/WPS/260.pdf [November 24, 2014) Read More