This book examines the complex challenges confronting modern democratic systems. Amid rising political fragmentation, polarization, societal diversity, democratic backsliding, technological advances, economic stagnation, and environmental crises, it explores the nuances of democratic governance and how representative institutions can strengthen their resilience. It provides new insights into traditional models of democratic delegation through a series of studies on how legislative bodies function and interact with the executive, especially during government formation. Later chapters focus on minority representation, analyzing conditions that promote political inclusion for women, migrants, and LGBT individuals, particularly in legislative institutions. The final section discusses the radical right's growth and addresses how political systems confront environmental issues, connecting themes of representation and sustainability. This book honors Thomas Saalfeld, a prominent scholar in legislative politics, government formation, and minority representation.
This volume is highly relevant for scholars and students interested in comparative politics, political representation, legislative behaviour, and European politics more broadly.
This book examines the complex challenges confronting modern democratic systems.
Part I: Delegation Models of Representation
Chapter
1. Constitutional Rigidity Matters: A Veto Players Approach?
George Tsebelis
Chapter
2. From selection to oversight? Parliament and government relations
in France and Norway over more than a century.
Olivier Rozenberg
Chapter
3. The European Parliament as a Principal: The evolution of
inter-institutional oversight in the European Union.
Amie Kreppel and Murad Gafarov
Chapter
4. Legislative Assemblies and Legislative Roles.
Kaare Strom and Shane Martin
Chapter
5. The Confidence Relationship between Parliament and Government.
Reuven Y. Hazan and Gaya S. Sigavi
Chapter
6. Elite loyalty, legislative productivity or constituency service:
Where lies the reward in intra-party competition in Ghana?
Martin Acheampong
Chapter
7. Parliamentary Norms a tool of the party group leaders?
Stefanie Bailer
Chapter
8. The Renaissance of Roll-Calls Votes in Austrias Second Republic.
Marcelo Jenny and Wolfgang C. Muller
Chapter
9. Aspects of Artificial Intelligence in Parliamentary Governance.
Fotios Fitsilis
Part II: Government Formation, Duration, and Termination
Chapter
10. The Vote of Confidence and Executive Bargaining Power on
environmental protection.
Petra Schleiter and Georgina Evans
Chapter
11. Polarization as a challenge to parliamentary governance.
Hanna Back and Royce Carroll
Chapter
12. Portfolio Design in Germany: How coalition governments (re-)shape
ministerial jurisdictions and what this tells us about coalition politics.
Ulrich Sieberer and David Schmuck
Chapter
13. Can legislative speech unveil conflict between coalition parties?
An empirical illustration based on two examples in the German Bundestag.
Henning Bergmann, Lucas Geese, Carsten Schwemmer and Christian Koß
Chapter
14. It is possible because I have already seen it How Sub-National
Coalitions Affect Voters Expectations about Government Compositions on the
National Level.
Daniel Hohmann and Maria Thurk
Chapter
15. The electoral consequences of coalition bargaining.
Heike Kluver and Svenja Krauss
Chapter
16. Parliamentary Institutions and Portfolio Allocation in Coalition
Governments.
Bjorn Erik Rasch, Bjorn Mo Forum and Cristina Bucur
Part III: Minority representation
Chapter
17. Who wants descriptive representation, and why?
Claudia Landwehr and Armin Schafer
Chapter
18. Career facilitators, springboards and allies: Examining what
factors foster the careers of politicians of immigrant ancestry.
Laura Morales, Carles Pamies, and Claire Vincent-Mory
Chapter
19. Out and Loud? LGBT Representation in the Parliamentary Arena.
Javier Martinez-Canto, Jorge M. Fernandes and Edgar Chicurel
Chapter
20. Who likes descriptive representation, why, and with what
implications? The Beliefs of Parliamentary Candidates in German Election
Campaigns.
Thomas Zittel
Chapter
21. Patterns behind the termination of careers of immigrant-origin
MPs in the German Bundestag.
Andreas M. Wust and Henning Bergmann
Chapter
22. Deracialised inclusion: from explaining ethnic minorities
under-representation to explaining the new descriptive representation.
Maria Sobolewska
Chapter
23. Diverse Candidates Diverse Positions? Party Line Conformity in
Campaign Positions by Female and Immigrant Origin Candidates for the German
Bundestag.
Lukas Hohendorf, Micaela Grosmann and Julia Schulte-Cloos
Chapter
24. Does protest affect MP roll-call votes in Germany?
Danieal Bischof
Part IV: Democratic Anxieties
Chapter
25. Permanent crises, the politics of the Merkel governments and the
rise of right-wing populism in Germany.
Reimut Zohlnhofer
Chapter
26. The potential of extremist voters in Germany.
Sebastian Jungkunz and Marc Helbling
Chapter
27. Legislative conflict dimensions on environmental protection.
Tamaki Ohmura and David Willumsen
Chapter
28. Conflicts about the German Energiewende as a threat for
democracy?
Simon Fink
Jorge M. Fernandes is a Ramon y Cajal Fellow at the Institute of Public Goods and Policies, CSIC, Madrid. He holds a PhD in Social and Political Sciences from the European University Institute (2013). After graduation, Jorge moved to Bamberg, where he worked under the unabridged mentorship of Thomas Saalfeld. In 2017, Jorge took a position as Research Fellow at the Institute of Social Sciences, University of Lisbon. His research interests include representation, electoral systems, political parties, legislatures, and coalitions. His work has appeared in journals such as Journal of Politics, British Journal of Political Science, Comparative Political Studies, European Journal of Political Research, Journal of European Public Policy, and Legislative Studies Quarterly, among many others. He is the co-editor of The Politics of Legislative Debates (Oxford University Press, 2021) and The Oxford Handbook of Portuguese Politics (Oxford University Press, 2023). He has held visiting positions at UC San Diego, Center for European Studies, Harvard University, and Robert Schuman Centre (EUI). From 2025, Jorge is the PI of the ERC Consolidator Grant "SEE: Representation in Proportional Electoral Systems.
Javier Martínez-Cantó is a Cesar Nombela Research Fellow at the Institute of Public Goods and Policies, CSIC, Madrid. He holds a doctorate in political science from the University of Bamberg (2021), which he developed under the outstanding supervision of Thomas Saalfeld. He has also worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Konstanz, IBEI, and the University of Salamanca. During the 20232024 academic year, Javier was the inaugural Ramon Arences Fellow at Harvard Universitys Center for European Studies. His research interests include political parties, legislative behaviour, political representation, political competition, and federalism. His work has appeared in journals such as Comparative Political Studies, Journal of European Public Policy, Legislative Studies Quarterly, Party Politics, among many others. He has held short-term visiting positions at Princeton University (2018) and the University of Vienna (2022).
