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Between Programmatic Interests and Party Politics: The German Bundesrat in the Legislative Process

2008; Routledge; Volume: 17; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/09644000802300288

1743-8993

Martin Brunner, Marc Debus,

Abstract Legislation in Germany is dominated by three central actors: government, Bundestag (first chamber), and Bundesrat (second chamber). While the role of the Bundesrat as initiator of laws is disregarded in most research on legislation in Germany, it will be at the centre of this article, which analyses the factors determining the success of Bundesrat bills. We focus on the question whether the actors' policy positions or party strategic considerations are decisive for, first, the success of a bill inside the Bundesrat and, second, in the whole legislative process. Policy positions of the parties at the federal and the state level are extracted from party manifestos using the wordscores method. Our results show that programmatic positions are relevant to win a majority in the Bundesrat. However, the overall success depends more on whether the initiator belongs to the government or opposition camp at the federal level. Notes T. König and T. Bräuninger, ‘Wie wichtig sind die Länder fu¨r die Politik der Bundesregierung bei Einspruchs- und Zustimmungsgesetzen?’, Zeitschrift fu¨r Parlamentsfragen 28/4 (1997), pp.605–28; T. König and T. Bräuninger, Gesetzgebung im Föderalismus (Speyer: Speyrer Forschungsberichte 237, 2005); W. Reutter, ‘Struktur und Dauer der Gesetzgebungsverfahren des Bundes’, Zeitschrift fu¨r Parlamentsfragen 38/2 (2007), pp.299–315. K. von Beyme, Der Gesetzgeber. Der Bundestag als Entscheidungszentrum (Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1997); W. Ismayr, Der deutsche Bundestag (Opladen: Leske und Budrich, 2000). See König und Bräuninger, Gesetzgebung im Föderalismus; P. Manow and S. Burkhart, ‘Legislative Self-Restraint Under Divided Government In Germany, 1976–2002’, Legislative Studies Quarterly 32/1 (2007), pp.167–91. David R. Mayhew, Divided We Govern (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1991). G. 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König, ‘The Checks and Balances of Party Federalism: German Federal Government in a Divided Legislature’, European Journal of Political Research 36/2 (1999), pp.207–34; T. König, ‘Bicameralism and Party Politics in Germany: An Empirical Social Choice Analysis’, Political Studies 49/3 (2001), pp.411–37; T. Bräuninger and Steffen Ganghof, ‘Parteienwettbewerb im Zweikammersystem’, in S. Ganghof and P. Manow (eds.), Mechanismen der Politik. Strategische Interaktion im deutschen Regierungssystem (Frankfurt/New York: Campus, 2005), pp.149–81. See Heinz Laufer and Ursula Mu¨nch, Das föderative System der Bundesrepublik Deutschland (Mu¨nchen: Bayerische Landeszentrale fu¨r politische Bildung, 1997); U. Eith, ‘Der deutsche Bundesrat zwischen Bundesstaatlichkeit und Parteienwettbewerb’, in G. Riescher, S. Ruß and C.M. Haas (eds.), Zweite Kammern (Mu¨nchen/Wien: Oldenbourg, 2000), pp.77–96; R. Sturm, ‘Die Länder in der deutschen und europäischen Mehrebenenpolitik’, in H. Schneider and H.-G. Wehling (eds), Landespolitik in Deutschland. Grundlagen, Strukturen. Arbeitsfelder (Wiesbaden: VS Verlag fu¨r Sozialwissenschaften, 2006), pp.23–49. See e.g. Josef Schmid, Die CDU. Organisationsstrukturen, Politiken und Funktionsweisen einer Partei im Föderalismus (Opladen: Leske und Budrich, 1990); H. Schneider, ‘Parteien in der Landespolitik’, in O.W. Gabriel, O. Niedermayer and R. Stöss (eds.), Parteiendemokratie in Deutschland (Bonn: Bundeszentrale fu¨r politische Bildung, 2001), pp.385–405; T. Bräuninger and M. Debus, ‘Der Einfluss von Koalitionsaussagen, programmatischen Standpunkten und der Bundespolitik auf die Regierungsbildung in den deutschen Ländern’, Politische Vierteljahresschrift 49/2 (2008), pp.283–312; M. Debus, ‘Party Competition and Government Formation in Multi-Level Settings: Evidence from Germany’, Government & Opposition 43/4 (2008), pp.505–38 Laufer and Mu¨nch, Das föderative System der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, pp.64–7; U. Mu¨nch, ‘Vom Gestaltungsföderalismus zum Beteiligungsföderalismus’, in H.-G. Wehling (ed.), Die deutschen Länder. Geschichte, Wirtschaft, Politik (Opladen: Leske und Budrich), pp.329–45; Schmidt, Das politische System Deutschlands, pp.202–3. Laufer and Mu¨nch, Das föderative System der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, p.125. See Deutscher Bundestag, ‘Gesetzentwurf der Fraktionen der CDU/CSU und SPD: Entwurf eines Gesetzes zur Änderung des Grundgesetzes (Artikel 22, 23, 33, 52, 72, 73, 74, 74a, 75, 84, 85, 87c, 91a, 91b, 93, 98, 104a, 104b, 105, 107, 109, 125a, 125b, 125c, 143c)’ (Berlin: Deutscher Bundestag, Drucksache 16/813); Schmidt, Das politische System Deutschlands, pp.202–7, 218. See König and Bräuninger, ‘Wie wichtig sind die Länder fu¨r die Politik der Bundesregierung bei Einspruchs- und Zustimmungsgesetzen?’; Bräuninger and König, ‘The Checks and Balances of Party Federalism’. See Lehmbruch, Parteienwettbewerb im Bundesstaat; Scharpf, ‘Die Politikverflechtungs-Falle’; W. Reutter, ‘Regieren nach der Föderalismusreform’, Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte 44/50 (2006), pp.12–17. See R. Zohlnhöfer, ‘Die große Steuerreform 1998/99: Ein Lehrstu¨ck fu¨r Politikentwicklung bei Parteienwettbewerb im Bundesstaat’, Zeitschrift fu¨r Parlamentsfragen 30/2 (1999), pp.326–45. States governed by parties that form the federal government are called ‘G-Länder’, whereas states with partisan composition of government not congruent to the one of the federal level are called ‘M-Länder’. See K. Stu¨we, ‘Konflikt und Konsens im Bundesrat’, Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte 42/50–51 (2004), pp.25–32. Ibid., p.25. König and Bräuninger, Gesetzgebung im Föderalismus, pp.62–70. Bräuninger and König, ‘The Checks and Balances of Party Federalism’; Ian Budge, Hans-Dieter Klingemann, Andrea Volkens, Judith Bara and Eric Tanenbaum (eds.), Mapping Policy Preferences. Estimates for Parties, Electors and Governments 1945–1998 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001). Dinkel, ‘Der Zusammenhang zwischen Bundes- und Landtagswahlergebnissen’; Jeffery and Hough, ‘The Electoral Cycle and Multi-Level Voting in Germany’; Burkhart, ‘Parteipolitikverflechtung’. See e.g. K. Rohe, Wahlen und Wählertraditionen (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1992); M. Flick and A. Vatter, ‘Bestimmungsgru¨nde der Parteienvielfalt in den deutschen Bundesländern’, Politische Vierteljahresschrift 48/1 (2007), pp.44–65. F.U. Pappi, ‘The West German Party System’, in S. Bartolini and P. Mair (eds.), Party Politics in Contemporary Western Europe (London: Cass, 1984), pp.7–26. J. Schmid, Die CDU. Organisationsstrukturen, Politiken und Funktionsweisen einer Partei im Föderalismus (Opladen: Leske und Budrich, 1990), pp.75–90. See Bräuninger and Debus, ‘Der Einfluss von Koalitionsaussagen’; T. Bräuninger and M. Debus, ‘Parteienwettbewerb in den deutschen Bundesländern' (unpublished book manuscript, Konstanz/Mannheim). See e.g. T. Bräuninger and S. Ganghof, ‘Parteienwettbewerb im Zweikammersystem’, in S. Ganghof and P. Manow (eds.), Mechanismen der Politik. Strategische Interaktion im deutschen Regierungssystem (Frankfurt/New York: Campus, 2005), pp.149–81; W.B. Heller, ‘Making Policy Stick: Why the Government Gets What It Wants in Multiparty Parliaments’, American Journal of Political Science 45/4 (2001), pp.780–98; W.B. Heller, ‘Divided Politics: Bicameralism, Parties, and Policy in Democratic Legislatures’, Annual Review of Political Science 10 (2007), pp.245–69; J.D. Huber, Rationalizing Parliament: Legislative Institutions and Party Politics in France (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996); Tsebelis, ‘Decision Making in Political Systems’; Tsebelis, Veto Players. How Political Institutions Work. A. Downs, An Economic Theory of Democracy (New York: Harper, 1957). See M.J. Hinich and M.C. Munger, Analytical Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), pp.35–7. See e.g. T. Saalfeld, ‘Germany: Stable Parties, Chancellor Democracy, and the Art of Informal Settlement’, in W.C. Mu¨ller and K. Str⊘m (eds.), Coalition Governments in Western Europe (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), pp.32–85; W. Rudzio, ‘Koalitionen in Deutschland: Flexibilität informellen Regierens’, in S. Kropp, S.S. Schu¨ttemeyer and R. Sturm (eds.), Koalitionen in West- und Osteuropa (Opladen: Leske und Budrich, 2002), pp.41–67. Bräuninger and Debus, ‘Der Einfluss von Koalitionsaussagen’. The required information to code the dependent variables stems from an updated version of T. Bräuninger and T. König, ‘Regieren im Föderalismus’, final report to the federal ministry of education and research (May 2000), which is based in the online documentation of parliamentary activities (http://dip.bundestag.de/). This is also the source of the independent variables if not stated otherwise. The method is described in detail in M. Laver, K. Benoit, and J. Garry, ‘Extracting Policy Positions from Political Texts Using Words as Data’, American Political Science Review 97/2 (2003), pp.311–31. The first point is made e.g. by F. Pappi and S. Shikano, ‘Regierungsabwahl ohne Regierungsneuwahl?’, Politische Vierteljahresschrift 46/4 (2005), pp.513–26, the second point by M. Debus, ‘Annähern oder Distanzieren? Strategische Positionierung von FDP, VdU und FPÖ zwischen 1949 und 2002’, Österreichische Zeitschrift fu¨r Politikwissenschaft 34/4 (2005), pp.413–30. Laver et al., ‘Extracting Policy Positions from Political Texts Using Words as Data’, p.313. For expert surveys compare e.g. M. Laver and W. Hunt, Policy and Party Competition (New York: Routledge, 1992); J. Huber and R. Inglehart, ‘Expert Interpretations of Party Space and Party Locations in 42 Societies’, Party Politics 1/1 (1995), pp.73–111; K. Benoit and M. Laver, Party Policy in Modern Democracies (London: Routledge, 2006). The comparative manifesto project data by I. Budge et al., Mapping Policy Preferences. Estimates for Parties, Electors and Governments 1945–1998 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001) is used as basis to derive policy positions by Pappi and Shikano, ‘Regierungsabwahl ohne Regierungsneuwahl?’, p.515. Laver et al., ‘Extracting Policy Positions from Political Texts Using Words as Data’, pp.314. We do not refer to the standardisation method developed by Laver et al., ibid. We rather standardise the data in a way that the arithmetic mean and the standard deviation of the reference texts, i.e. the election manifestos of the federal parties in 1990 and 2002, are the same as for the election manifestos of the federal parties in 1994 and 1998. This results in no changes of the estimated party positions when including new programmatic documents in the analysis, as would be the case when applying the Laver, Benoit and Garry transformation. For a more detailed discussion, see Bräuninger and Debus, Parteienwettbewerb in den deutschen Bundesländern. We only have the party manifestos for the state elections that have taken place since January 1990. The programmatic positions of state governments that were elected before then were estimated based on the positions extracted from the first documents available. Laver and Hunt, Policy and Party Competition; Benoit and Laver, Party Policy in Modern Democracies. For more details on the data see Bräuninger and Debus, Parteienwettbewerb in den deutschen Bundesländern. For a discussion on the advantages and disadvantages of the wordscores method compare K. Benoit and M. Laver, ‘Benchmarks for Text Analysis: A Response to Budge and Pennings’, Electoral Studies 26 (2007), pp.130–35; I. Budge and P. Pennings, ‘Do they Work? Validating Computerised Word Frequency Estimates against Policy Series’, Electoral Studies 26 (2007), pp.121–9; I. Budge and P. Pennings, ‘Missing the Message and Shooting the Messenger: Benoit and Laver's “Response”’, Electoral Studies 26 (2007), pp.136–41; L. Martin and G. Vanberg, ‘A Robust Transformation Procedure for Interpreting Political Text’, Political Analysis 16/1 (2008), pp.93–100. Compare D.A. Gross and L. Sigelman, ‘Comparing Party Systems: A Multidimensional Approach’, Comparative Politics 16/4 (1984), p.467 and T. Cusack, ‘Partisan Politics and Public Finance: Changes in Public Spending in the Industrialized Democracies’, Public Choice 91/3-4 (1997), p.381. Compare F. Castles and P. Mair, ‘Left–Right Political Scales: Some Expert Judgements’, European Journal of Political Research 12 (1984), pp.73-88.; Laver and Hunt, Policy and Party Competition; Huber and Inglehart, ‘Expert Interpretations of Party Space and Party Locations in 42 Societies’; Budge et al., Mapping Policy Preferences; Benoit and Laver, Party Policy in Modern Democracies; P. Warwick, Policy Horizons and Parliamentary Government (Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006). See e.g. Schmid, Die CDU; Rohe, Wahlen und Wählertraditionen; H.-G. Wehling, ‘Regionale politische Kultur in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland’, in H.-G. Wehling (ed.), Regionale politische Kultur (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1985), pp.7–14; H.-G. Wehling, ‘Politische Kultur’, in M. Eilfort (ed.), Parteien in Baden-Wu¨rttemberg (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 2004), pp.201–18; H.G. Wehling, ‘Föderalismus und politische Kultur in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland’, in H. Schneider and H.-G. Wehling (eds.), Landespolitik in Deutschland. Grundlagen – Strukturen – Arbeitsfelder (Wiesbaden: VS Verlag, 2006), pp.87–107; M. Eilfort, ‘Landes-Parteien: Anders, nicht verschieden’, in Schneider and Wehling (eds.), Landespolitik in Deutschland. Grundlagen – Strukturen – Arbeitsfelder, pp.207–24. In the graphical presentation and the description of the data we concentrate on the economic and the social policy dimensions only. This is because these dimensions represent the conflict lines that structure party competition in Germany at best. See e.g. Pappi, ‘The West German Party System’. Compare T. Schiller, ‘Der Hessische Landtag’, in S. Mielke and W. Reutter (eds.), Länderparlamentarismus in Deutschland. Geschichte – Struktur – Funktion (Wiesbaden: VS Verlag, 2006), pp.225–50 at p.229. For the calculation of the correctly classified cases the optimal cut-off point of p = 0.6 was used. This implicates a slight improvement over the naïve prediction that all bills fail, which would classify 73.62 per cent of the observations correctly.