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One Small Step for Technology, One Giant Leap for the Commons

By Louise Thompson

House of Commons Speaker John Bercow suggested in a speech last week that it “wouldn’t be so heretical” to consider whether Commons votes might in the future be taken with the help of modern technology. Housed in the nineteenth century building is an increasingly techy Parliament and a digitally aware cohort of MPs. In the last few years alone we have seen MPs tweeting directly from the chamber, parliamentary papers delivered to Members’ iPads and speeches given from tablets rather than handwritten notes.  Electronic voting then seems quite a natural progression.

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Citizens working with lawmakers to make parliaments more open: a few examples from Brazil

By Cristiano Ferri Faria

In June 2013 the streets of Brazilian cities were taken over with protests by millions of citizens. It started as an outcry against the rise of public transportation fares. Then, many other issues came out including demands for better education and health systems. In short, citizens cried out for higher quality in public services as a whole.

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The four year itch

Please note that this blog piece was originally published in the Revolts blog on 03 June 2014, and is available here.

By Philip Cowley

We’ve been producing end-of-session reports on the behaviour of government MPs at Westminster for almost a decade.  This morning we’ve launched the report on the 2013-14 session, entitled The four year itch (and which is free to download).  It contains plenty to concern the party whips.

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Age and the politics of presence

Please note that this blog piece was originally published on the ILC-UK Blog on 25 March 2014.

By Philip Cowley

All the mainstream British political parties are – to varying degrees – now signed up to the underlying principle that political institutions should broadly reflect the social characteristics of the people they represent.  David Cameron’s very first speech as party leader in 2005 contained the claim that ‘We will change the way we look’. Ed Miliband has made several speeches on the same theme.  The idea that what Anne Phillips called ‘the politics of presence’ is important is now a widely, if not wholly, accepted part of political discourse in the UK.

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Studies of the Scottish Parliament and Constitutional Change: once favoured, now forgotten?

By Paul Cairney

The Scottish Parliament is an important focus for academic study, not least because most of the early work has produced broad brush strokes. There is still an important role for in-depth, case study based, research on particular bills, time periods, and periods of minority/ majority or single-party/ coalition rule. There is much work to be done to compare the Scottish Parliament with others, from the current focus on comparisons with Westminster and, at times, Nordic parliaments, to the well-established broader work on classifying legislatures. In each case, the new Scottish experience has something to add to ‘Westminster family’ discussions, comparisons based on similar size or functions, and studies of non-majority rule. There are also important but small literatures on the role of the Scottish Parliament as a hub for deliberative and participative democracies, and on microcosmic representation and its effect on parliamentary practices.

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Welcome to the Parliaments and Legislatures Blog

Our blog aims to promote the study and understanding of parliaments and related issues. We welcome contributions from UK and international academics or research students within the field of legislative studies and related areas. We also accept submissions from outside academia, including parliamentary practitioners, charities and other organizations working with parliament.

We accept two types of blog; short blogs discussing topical issues and longer blogs which provide an overview of a particular Parliament. All submissions should be free from unnecessary jargon and suitable for a wide audience.

If you are interested in writing for the blog please see our submission guidelines here.