ABSTRACT
A key feature of parliaments is a built-in tension between the goals of party groups to collectively promote their ideologies and policies and the aspirations of individual members of parliament (MPs) for personal prominence and exposure (Heidar and Koole, 2000; Wauters et al., 2021). This chapter addresses the distinction between collegial and personal parliaments, by introducing a new analytical framework that differentiates between institutional arrangements that empower the parliamentary party group (PPG) and those that empower the individual MPs. The framework is composed of four dimensions: (1) control over resources, including allocation of budgets and staff; (2) parliamentary tools, such as oversight tools and legislation; (3) control over parliamentary positions; and (4) the party group status vis-à-vis the individual MP. We then utilize the framework by applying it to 30 national democratic parliaments, based on an expert survey. The results demonstrate that parliaments vary in their levels of collegialism and personalism, as well as internally, within their different dimensions. The study then seeks to validate the framework - using construct validity, it analyzes parliaments’ levels of personalism and collegialism and two other institutional variables: governmental system (parliamentary, semi-presidential, and presidential systems) and division of power (federal versus unitary systems).
