Accountability and Quasi-Government: The Role of Parliamentary Questions
While much concern has been expressed about the accountability of quasi‐government there has been little empirical research on the subject. Similarly, the literature lacks a thorough assessment of the contribution of parliamentary questions to holding governmental institutions accountable. In this paper part of this gap in the literature is closed by measuring the extent to which a wide range of executive non‐departmental public bodies (ENDPBs) are held accountable by the use of questions tabled in the House of Commons. Questions asked to ministers in the Foreign Office and the Department for Education and Employment about ENDPBs they sponsor are assessed. A similar exercise is conducted on the agencies in these two departments and the results compared. In general, the partisan political atmosphere of the Commons, the apathy of many MPs, the size of the ENDPB sector and the rules governing questions mean that their contribution to the accountability of these bodies is relatively small. In particular, many...
Which role for Belgian Parliaments in EU affairs? The case of Brexit in a Europhile country
Long considered as losers of the integration process, national parliaments have now come back. Since the Lisbon Treaty (Auel and Christiansen 2015, Fromage 2015) but also with the economic and financial crisis, national parliaments have tried, with varying degrees, to play a more important role in EU affairs (Auel and Hoing 2014, Auel et al. 2015). There has been a burgeoning literature to understand how, to what extent and under which conditions national parliaments can affect EU politics and policies (Benz 2004, Cooper 2012, Fasone 2014, Raunio 2009, Sprungk 2013). On the basis of this body of work, the aim of this paper is to concentrate on one key issue: Brexit and how it is discussed in Belgian parliaments. Brexit has triggered an existential crisis for the EU and has led to new debates on the future of Europe. In the past, Belgium always tried to be at the forefront of those debates and pushed for federal ideas at the EU level.
Arab Uprisings and the Outstanding Return to Democracy: Tunisia as a Model
In the wake of the Middle Eastern crises, the Tunisian case in focus has been doted as a unique phenomenon being that it was the Genesis of the revolution that ultimately spread across the Middle East like wild fire, but has eventually heralded a new dawn as democracy has incidentally returned to the Empire. This literature therefore looks closely at the extent to which the ‘DignityRevolution’ has been instrumental in the Middle East uprisings, which have brought an end to dynastic autocracies. The literature zeros in on the Tunisian uprising which has attracted global concerns, sympathy and has sparked interests in the international arena. The literature finds that the people hold colossal prospect in the uprising and its resultant effect, as it paved the way for the revolutionist to generate, gather and disseminate information on the condition of the entire region to the international community. The people in this context were of utmost importance and played a very crucial role in the creation of awareness, mobilization of protesters and utmost determining the direction of the uprising and also ensuring a speedy return to democratic rule. The paper submits that the role of the people in ensuring that the ruins of the uprising is not left littering around and democracy restored is highly commendable and should be a model for all other Arab countries involved in the revolution.