The Role of Governments in Legislative Agenda Setting

Bjørn Erik Rasch, Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Oslo. He has written numerous articles on parliaments, and has published nine books (in Norwegian). The most recent one studies parliamentary government and constitutional reforms (Kampen om regjeringsmakten, Fagbokforlaget 2004). His English language articles have appeared journals as Legislative Studies Quarterly, Public Choice, European Journal of Political Economy and Scandinavian Political Studies. Rasch was member of a Constitutional Commission appointed by the Norwegian parliament in late 2003 to review and modernize the Court of Impeachment. He also was member of a committee who designed a new electoral system for the Sami Parliament in Northern Norway. From 2005 Rasch has headed and coordinated the study programs in political science at the University of Oslo.

With a strong comparative framework, this book examines fourteen countries with parliamentary or semi-presidential systems of government to provide a detailed investigation into the mechanisms by which governments determine the agendas of their parliaments.

1. Governments and Legislative Agenda Setting: An Introduction George Tsebelis and Bjørn Erik Rasch 2. Germany: Limited Government Agenda Control and Strong Minority Rights Christoph Hönnige and Ulrich Sieberer 3. France: Systematic Institutional Advantage of Government Sylvain Brouard 4. Italy: Government Alternation and Legislative Agenda Setting Francesco Zucchini 5. United Kingdom: Extreme Dominance by the Executive... Most of the Time Mads Qvortrup 6. Hungary: Changing Government Advantages-Challenging a Dominant Executive Gabriella Ilonszki and Krisztina Jáger 7. Netherlands: Legislative Agenda Setting and the Politics of Strategic Lock-Ins Arco Timmermans 8. Switzerland: Agenda-Setting Power of Government in a Separation-of-Powers Framework Daniel Schwarz, André Bächtiger and Georg Lutz 9. Greece: Government as the Dominant Player Aris Alexopoulos 10 Spain: Majoritarian Choices, Disciplined Party Government and Compliant Legislature Natalia Ajenjo and Ignatio Molina 11. Portugal: Active and Influential Parliament Eugenia da Conceição-Heldt 12. Russia: The Executive in a Leading Role Iulia Shevchenko and Grigorii Golosov 13. Agenda Control and Veto Rights to Opposition Parties Robert Klemmensen 14. Norway: Institutionally Weak Governments and Parliamentary Voting on Bills Bjørn Erik Rasch 15. Japan: Decades of Partisan Advantages Impending Cabinet's Agenda Setting Power Silke Riemann 16.Conclusion Bjørn Erik Rasch and George Tsebelis