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VU Research Portal VU Research Portal The institutional dynamics of consensus and conflict Vergunst, N.P. 2004 document version Publisher's PDF, also known as Version of record Link to publication in VU Research Portal citation for published version (APA) Vergunst, N. P. (2004). The institutional dynamics of consensus and conflict: Consensus democracy, corporatism and socio-economic policy-making and performance in twenty developed democracies (1965-1998). Eigen Beheer. General rights Copyright and moral rights for the publications made accessible in the public portal are retained by the authors and/or other copyright owners and it is a condition of accessing publications that users recognise and abide by the legal requirements associated with these rights. • Users may download and print one copy of any publication from the public portal for the purpose of private study or research. • You may not further distribute the material or use it for any profit-making activity or commercial gain • You may freely distribute the URL identifying the publication in the public portal ? Take down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim. E-mail address: [email protected] Download date: 27. Sep. 2021 The institutional dynamics of consensus and confl ict Reading committee: prof.dr. K. Armingeon prof.dr. F.G. Castles prof.dr. C.J. van Kersbergen prof.dr. J. Kleinnijenhuis prof.dr. P. Mair Picture on cover: Second Chamber, The Hague by Piet Den Blanken/ Hollandse Hoogte Cover design: Jean-Pierre Damen & NV Lay-out: NV Copyright owned by the author: Noël P. Vergunst Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam Department of Political Science De Boelelaan 1081c 1081 HV Amsterdam The Netherlands phone +31 20 4446902 fax +31 20 4446820 email [email protected] data used in this disseration can be found at www.vergunst.com more information about the department at www.politicalscience.nl VRIJE UNIVERSITEIT The institutional dynamics of consensus and confl ict Consensus democracy, corporatism and socio-economic policy-making and performance in twenty developed democracies (1965-1998) ACADEMISCH PROEFSCHRIFT ter verkrijging van de graad van doctor aan de Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, op gezag van de rector magnifi cus prof.dr. T. Sminia, in het openbaar te verdedigen ten overstaan van de promotiecommissie van de faculteit der Sociale Wetenschappen op donderdag 29 januari 2004 om 13.45 uur in de aula van de universiteit, De Boelelaan 1105 door Noël Pascal Vergunst geboren te Heerlen promotor: prof.dr. J.E. Keman copromotor: dr. P.J.M. Pennings Contents Contents Acknowledgements xiii PART I RESEARCH QUESTION, METHOD & THEORY 1 1 INTRODUCTION 3 1.1 The impact of consensus democracy and corporatism 3 1.2 Politics between consensus and confl ict 6 1.3 The study of political institutions 7 1.4 Research question 11 1.5 Methods, research design & data 14 1.6 Two phases of socio-economic problem-solving 18 1.7 Hypotheses 19 1.8 Plan of the book 20 PART II COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS 23 2 CONSENSUS DEMOCRACY 25 2.1 Introduction 25 2.2 The development of consociational theory 25 2.3 Lijphart’s consensus versus majoritarian model of democracy 31 2.4 Assessment of Lijphart’s perationalisation of consensus democracy 40 2.5 Defi nition and operationalisation of consensus democracy 42 2.6 Conclusions 53 3 CORPORATISM 55 3.1 Introduction 55 3.2 The development of corporatist theory 55 3.3 Concepts and scales of corporatism 59 3.4 Defi nition and measurement of corporatism 69 3.5 Conclusions 73 4 LINKAGES BETWEEN CONSENSUS DEMOCRACY AND CORPORATISM 75 4.1 Introduction 75 4.2 Conceptual model 76 4.3 Linkages between consensus democracy and corporatism 77 4.4 Contextual variables 83 4.5 Conclusions 88 v The institutional dynamics of consensus and confl ict 5 THE IMPACT OF CONSENSUS DEMOCRACY AND CORPORATISM ON SOCIO-ECONOMIC POLICY-MAKING AND PERFORMANCE 91 5.1 Introduction 91 5.2 Institutions and performance 91 5.3 Theoretical framework and hypotheses 97 5.4 Empirical fi ndings 101 5.5 Conclusions 114 PART III ANALYSIS OF THE CASES 117 6 SELECTION OF THE CASES 119 6.1 Introduction 119 6.2 Comparative patterns 120 6.3 The method of selection 123 6.4 The four selected cases 124 6.5 Conclusions 126 7 THE NETHERLANDS. FROM DISEASE TO MIRACLE? 127 7.1 Introduction 127 7.2 Political system 128 7.3 Organised interests 134 7.4 Socio-economic policy and performance in the Netherlands 136 7.5 Actors, institutions and socio-economic performance 140 7.6 Socio-economic problem-solving 142 7.7 Conclusions 145 8 NEW ZEALAND: REVOLUTION AND EXPERIMENT 147 8.1 Introduction 147 8.2 Political system and party government 148 8.3 Organised interests 153 8.4 Socio-economic performance in New Zealand 156 8.5 Actors, institutions and socio-economic performance 158 8.6 Socio-economic problem-solving 161 8.7 Conclusions 162 vi Contents 9 PORTUGAL: DEMOCRATIC TRANSITION AND EUROPEAN INTEGRATION 165 9.1 Introduction 165 9.2 The political system and party government 165 9.3 Organised interests 171 9.4 The development of socio-economic policy in Portugal 173 9.5 Actors, institutions and socio-economic performance 176 9.6 Socio-economic problem-solving 180 9.7 Conclusions 181 10 SWEDEN: FROM MODEL TO MUDDLING 183 10.1 Introduction 183 10.2 The political system and party government 184 10.3 Organised interests 188 10.4 The rise and fall of the Swedish model 190 10.5 Actors, institutions and socio-economic performance 192 10.6 Socio-economic problem-solving 195 10.7 Conclusions 196 11 Conclusions 199 11.1 Goal of this study 199 11.2 Comparative fi ndings 199 11.3 Case analysis 204 11.4 The institutional dynamics of consensus and confl ict and socio- economic problem-solving in twenty developed democracies 210 Appendix A Code book variables 215 Appendix B Election results cases 217 Appendix C Comparative tables 221 Dutch summary 237 References 245 vii The institutional dynamics of consensus and confl ict List of tables Table 2.1 Lijphart’s typology of democratic regimes 28 Table 2.2 Lijphart’s features of consociationalism and consensus democracy 32 Table 2.3 Lijphart’s indicators of consensus versus majoritarian democracy 33 Table 2.4 Factor analysis of recalculated indicators of Lijphart’s consensus democracy (1965-98) 38 Table 2.5 Scores on type of government, reduction of proportionality, electoral system and government dominance 47 Table 2.6 Bivariate correlations between the fi ve indicators of consensus democracy 49 Table 2.7 Index of consensus democracy in basic statistics (1965-98) 50 Table 2.8 Factor analysis on indicators of consensus democracy 53 Table 3.1 Ranking of 18 OECD-countries according to different corporatism-scales 62 Table 3.2 Correlation coeffi cients between eight static corporatism scales 65 Table 3.3 Dynamic corporatism scales 66 Table 3.4 Index of corporatism (mean scores 1965-98) 71 Table 4.1 Four categories of consensus democracy and corporatism 81 Table 4.2 Correlations between indicators and indexes of consensus democracy and corporatism (1965-98) 82 Table 4.3 Contextual variables (mean per category 1965-98) 86 Table 4.4 Correlations between institutional and contextual variables (based on averages 1965-98) 87 Table 5.1 Hypotheses of the impact of institutions on performance 101 Table 5.2 Correlation coeffi cients between institutional and socio-economic variables 106 Table 5.3 Regression models of the impact on infl ation (Consumer price index) 109 Table 5.4 Regression models of the impact on unemployment 110 Table 5.5 Regression models of the impact on misery index 111 Table 5.6 Regression models of the impact on performance 112 Table 5.7 Regression models GDP per capita (in 1000 constant US Dollars) 113 Table 5.8 Regression models of the impact on social expenditures 113 Table 6.1 Changes in misery and performance index 123 Table 7.1 Rules of Dutch politics 130 Table 7.2 Coalition governments in the Netherlands (1965-98) 133 Table 8.1 Composition of governments in New Zealand (1963-99) 152 Table 9.1 Coalition governments in Portugal (1976-99) 168 Table 10.1 Coalition governments in Sweden (1964-98) 186 Table C.1 Recalculated scores on the fi rst dimension of Lijphart’s consensus democracy (1965-98) 221 viii List of tables Table C.2 Recalculated scores on the second dimension of Lijphart’s consensus democracy (1965-98) 222 Table C.3 Scores on index of consensus democracy 223 Table C.4 Scores on index of corporatism 224 Table C.5 Contextual variables (mean per category) 225 ix The institutional dynamics of consensus and confl ict List of fi gures Figure 1.1 General model of political decision-making 9 Figure 1.2 Conceptual model 16 Figure 2.1 Two-dimensional map of twenty countries on two dimensions of Lijphart’s consensus democracy (1965-98) 36 Figure 2.2 Average scores of twenty countries on the two dimensions of Lijphart’s consensus democracy (1965-98) 37 Figure 2.3 Variation on the index of consensus democracy across twenty countries over time (1965-98) 51 Figure 2.4 Index of consensus democracy in two time periods (1965-81 versus 1982-98) 52 Figure 3.1 Eight static corporatism scales of eighteen countries 64 Figure 4.1 Model of political decision-making and policy concertation among organised interests 76 Figure 4.2 Consensus democracy and corporatism in twenty countries (1965-98) 79 Figure 5.1 Socio-economic indicators per category 102 Figure 5.2 Performance index by category 104 Figure 7.1 Development of index of consensus democracy through time, 1965-98 132 Figure 7.2 Development
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