ABSTRACT
Chapter 5, as with the previous chapter, connects the institutional and ideational dimensions in keeping with the analytical framework, here in order to assess the parameters of democratic government and their bounded evolution. The governmental dimension of horizontal, democratic division of powers is of particular concern. It is also here that the framework of coupling helps capture tensions and frictions between branches of government, and their complex development over time between the separation of powers and checks and balances on the one hand, and the dynamics of majoritarian, winner-takes-all, two-party dominant competition across the polity on the other hand, which taken together appear to be reinforcing fragmentation.
