Obstruction in parliaments: a cross-national perspective

ABSTRACT

In legislative institutions, disruptions to the agenda and delays in processing legislation can have a significant impact on the ability of legislative majorities to realise success. Few previous studies have systematically examined parliamentary obstruction in non-U.S. settings. In this article, I investigate the extent to which obstruction occurs in parliaments around the world. The evidence, drawn from a 2016 survey of members of the Association of Secretaries General of Parliaments (ASGP) and supplemented with documentary evidence and interviews with parliamentary clerks and members of parliament in several countries demonstrates that obstructive behaviour occurs in a variety of types of national legislatures and across different political systems and institutional settings.

KEYWORDS:

• Obstruction
• filibuster
• parliaments
• delay

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

ORCID

Lauren C. Bell http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5557-1685

Notes on contributor

Lauren C. Bell is Professor of Political Science and Dean of Academic Affairs at Randolph-Macon College.

Notes

1. There are also forms of obstruction that violate a chamber’s formal rules. For example, a former chamber leader in Japan’s House of Representatives described a circumstance in which a member of a committee sat in the committee room for a full month while a dozen or more committee members blocked the door to prevent entry (interview by the author, 5 December 2015). Although such violations are indeed obstructive, they do not conform to the definition of obstruction explained above and are therefore beyond the scope of this study, since they violate the rules of procedure and are most properly considered disruptive conduct rather than parliamentary obstruction.

2. Interview by the author with a Canadian parliamentary clerk, 17 May 2016.

3. Although, obstruction per se is not a significant part of many analyses focused on the role of minority parties – see, for example, Norton, 2008; Kaiser 2008.

4. Interview by the author with a Canadian parliamentary clerk, 17 May 2016.

5. A few additional recent efforts have taken place in this direction. For example, the European Consortium on Political Research held a 2012 symposium that brought together scholars from multiple countries to consider issues related to minority rights. (See: https://ecpr.eu/Events/PanelDetails.aspx?PanelID=6&EventID=6).

6. The ASGP has existed since 1939 as a ‘consultative body’ of the IPU. The ASGP’s mission includes the study of ‘the law, procedure, practice and working methods of different Parliaments and to propose measures for improving those methods and for securing cooperation between the services of different Parliaments’ (ASGP website, 2017).

7. In response to an e-mail inquiry by the author on 17 May 2016, an assistant to the ASGP Secretariat noted: ‘I am not aware of any further work done on this topic, nor will the association commission reports into any particular subjects. We are entirely dependent on the contributions of our members at Parliaments worldwide’ (D. Moeller, personal communication, May 17, 2016).

8. A copy of the updated survey is available upon request. The survey was approved for distribution by Randolph-Macon College’s Institutional Review Board (IRB) on 26 June 2016.

9. Of course, Bücker had a chance to discuss the survey results directly with respondents at a meeting of ASGP, prior to the ASGP releasing its report. Thus, he would have been able to ask such questions directly in the process of drafting the report.

10. In nearly all cases where a survey invitation was returned as undeliverable, there were other members of ASGP from the same country whose survey invitations were delivered.

11. The country-level response rate is included because some countries (for example, the UK and France) have as many as five members of ASGP due to the nature of their staffing structures. It should be noted that not all respondents answered all questions—response rates for individual questions vary and are reported where appropriate.

12. Interview with the author, 17 May 2016.

13. I do not discuss multiple points of order, lengthy interpellations of ministers, repeated committee hearings, or lengthy voting procedures because they were not raised in narrative comments by any respondent to the 2016 survey, even in cases in which respondents cited these forms as occurring within their system.

14. Colloquially, this is known as the ‘spying strangers’ provision, since the motion was phrased ‘that strangers do now withdraw’ (Rogers & Walters, 2015, p. 256).

15. Tyler (2015).

16. Ibid.

17. Interview with the author, 9 December 2015.

18. Interview by the author. 7 September 2015.