Publications

In their article, Franziska Carstensen and Suzanne S. Schüttemeyer emphasise that the Berlin House of Representatives is an extremely active state parliament. As a result of the recent reforms, it has developed into a professionalised full-time parliament, which is, however, facing representation challenges in the face of increased popular legislation procedures.

Does decision-making in parliamentary groups follow democratic standards? Oliver Kannenberg and Danny Schindler have investigated this question in an anthology on the Berlin House of Representatives.

How do local councillors define their political role - between citizen dialogue, administrative logic and digital participation approaches? The article by Kevin W. Settles and Nadin Fromm et al. in ZParl offers empirically sound insights and discusses challenges and reform perspectives.

Due to the early election of the German Bundestag, intra-party candidate selection also needed to be held earlier than planned. As Anastasia Pyschny, Maura Kratz and Sebastian Unsicker point out in the 17th IParl-Blickpunkt, this had consequences for the process of nominating candidates. In almost all parties, procedural changes were necessary in the internal party nomination process.

The recall of MPs during the election period, as permitted by the Recall of MPs Act in the UK, is seen by some as a democratic correction mechanism. However, it can also be used as an instrument to weaken the opposition, as Danny Schindler's case study on Zimbabwe shows.

Traditionally, governments in France can rely on stabl majorities in parliament. Since 2022, however, a minority government is in office. Damien Lecomte and Calixte Bloquet trace the institutional and political developments of the last 20 years to explain this new phenomenon. Although this new political situation has placed parliament more at the centre of politics, it has not contributed to a stronger consensus orientation in the Assemblée nationale.