Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

The Perils of Presidentialism

1990; Johns Hopkins University Press; Volume: 1; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1353/jod.2005.0026

1086-3214

Juan J. Linz,

Southeast Asian Sociopolitical Studies

Indonesia, the Philippines, South Korea, and Taiwan all have presidential systems, and in recent years have experienced many of the ills attributed to presidentialism by critics like Juan Linz, such as weak legitimacy, rigid terms, deadlock with the legislature, and efforts to impeach unpopular presidents. This article concludes that while Asian presidentialism manifests some of the problems of other presidential systems, it is not an institution in crisis as each country has used its democratic institutions, and particularly constitutional courts, to resolve these problems. Indeed, presidential systems better reflect underlying structural shifts in politics and are more likely to promote rapid political change than parliamentary ones.