Communist successor parties and government survival in Central Eastern Europe

This article analyses coalition survival in eleven post‐Communist, Central and Eastern European democracies. Survival analysis demonstrates that Communist Successor Parties (CSPs) are central to understanding government dissolution processes in post‐communism. Coalitions spanning the ‘regime divide’ between CSPs and parties not affiliated with the ancien regime last longer than governments that do not. Regime divide governments also are more likely to fall during periods of positive economic performance, while other governments fall during periods of negative economic performance. The reason lies in parties’ incentives to prolong their regime divide coalition with the CSP, especially in the face of adverse conditions.     

Fiscal transparency puzzle and electoral institutions: applying a 3Ds approach for tracking the action cycle in Egypt

This article aims at contributing to the discussion on the fiscal transparency puzzle. The authors challenge the idea that fiscal disclosure can directly increase fiscal accountability. Using an original data set at the level of individual members of parliament (MPs) in the Egyptian parliament, constructed from content analysis of budgetary discussions during the period 2000–10, it is shown that political incentives determined by a majoritarian electoral system curbed the willingness to check government fiscal behaviour, even among opposition MPs. This is because MPs still favoured pork-barrel behaviour to boost their re-election chances. Moreover, fiscal data disclosed could not be communicated to voters and the opposition showed a relatively higher avoidance against fiscal disclosure. The authors conclude that the electoral system is a dominant factor in shaping the final effect of transparency given its influence on the structure of political incentives.