PSA ParliamentsBy
The Irish Parliament, the Oireachtas (pronounced irr-okh-tuss), is a bicameral legislature consisting of a 166-seat directly elected Lower House, Dáil Éireann (pronounced dawl ay-run), and a 60-seat indirectly elected Upper House, Seanad Éireann (pronounced sha-nad ay-run).
By Andreas Ladner
The Swiss Parliament – or better the Federal Assembly – was installed in 1848 when the former confederation of 25 independent cantons became a federal nation state. The form and organization of the Parliament was one of the main points of discussion while drafting the Constitution. Those in favour of a strong nation state – the liberal and predominantly protestant cantons which won the short civil war (“Sonderbund War”) – wanted a National Assembly with a composition reflecting the prevailing population proportions of the cantons. This would have put the smaller predominantly conservative and catholic cantons at a considerable disadvantage. They wanted a revised form of the Federal Diet (the legislative and executive council of the Swiss confederacy prior to 1848) representing the cantons equally. This, however, would have prevented the Liberals who were in the majority and located in the larger cantons of the Central Lowlands from building a more centralized and unified nation state.
By Cristiane Brum Bernardes
The Brazilian National Congress is bicameral, composed of the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies. Both houses are located in the building known as Palace of National Congress, which is located in Brasília, the capital of Brazil.
By Tapio Raunio
Finland is by a wide margin the oldest semi-presidential country in Europe, with the semi-presidential form of government adopted in 1919, two years after the country became independent. However, recent constitutional reforms, enacted piecemeal since the late 1980s and culminating in the new unified constitution that entered into force in 2000, have quite radically altered the Finnish political system. In government formation the role of the president is now limited to formally appointing the prime minister and the cabinet chosen by parliament; moreover, the president cannot force the government to resign. Governments are thus now accountable to the Eduskunta and not to the president, as effectively was the case before. Overall, the president is almost completely excluded from the policy process in domestic matters. Turning to external relations, the government is responsible for EU affairs while foreign policy leadership is shared between the president and the government. Foreign and defense policy excluded, Finland is now effectively a parliamentary regime.
By Liam Allmark
Beginning in 2011, the inaugural session of Burma’s Pyidaungsu Hluttaw (Assembly of the Union) has been the country’s first experience of a functioning legislature for almost four decades. After General Ne Win’s 1962 coup d’état abolished the post-independence parliamentary system, legislative power was exercised by the military through a succession of internal structures, appointed councils and single-party bodies. Tentative moves towards restoring an elected assembly in 1990 were quickly aborted by the ruling regime when the opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) secured a resounding majority of the vote. Consequently many of those who won seats spent the following years in prison or exile.
By Alys Thomas and Stephen Boyce
The National Assembly for Wales has been in existence since 1999. However, its powers and constitution have undergone significant changes since then. Originally constituted as a single corporate body made up of both the legislature and executive, the Government of Wales Act 2006 effected a separation of powers, creating a separate executive made up of Welsh Ministers, and a legislature.
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Portugal has had a parliament since 1820, in various formats and political regimes. The current parliament, the Assembleia da República (AR), was introduced in 1976 following the fall of Salazar’s 48 years of authoritarian regime and the introduction of a democratic regime in 1974. The key characteristic of this parliament, even today, is the very strong role played by party as the key unit of representation. The Portuguese political system is a semi-presidential one, where the President of the Republic is directly elected by the people every five years and has veto powers. The government is officially nominated by the President, but in accordance with the views expressed in the elected parliament. The government and PM are politically responsible to parliament, an institution that plays therefore a key role in what has been called a triangular system.