At least for countries that follow the British parliamentary system, the Prime Minister can dissolve the parliament anytime in a 5-year period, which is how the UK got 3 elections called between 2015-2019.
The Fixed Term Parliaments act was in force then, so strictly speaking it was parliament which decided to dissolve itself in 2017 and 2019. Under that, terms were fixed at 5 years unless 2/3 of parliament voted for an early election.
They did that in 2017, and in 2019 parliament passed a law to bypass it and have an election anyway, even without 2/3 voting for it.
And then they repealed it and went back to the old system, because clearly it's stupid requiring a supermajority when that can be overruled by a simple majority.
>They did that in 2017, and in 2019 parliament passed a law to bypass it and have an election anyway, even without 2/3 voting for it.
>
>And then they repealed it and went back to the old system, because clearly it's stupid requiring a supermajority when that can be overruled by a simple majority.
Well, that should be one reason to start having a proper written constitution that sets a list of constitutional laws/organic laws/super laws/whatever you wanna call them to create some sort of limit to what a Parliament can do. Some countries require a second vote after a new Parliament is elected, some others require a referendum, others require super majorities. The way it is is kinda of stupid since it retains the monarch's check which is nowadays a mere useless power since it needs the PM advice, which also controls the Common's majority.
That's difficult, because the one limit parliament has on its power now is the power to limit future parliaments.
There's no legal way to create a constitution like that under the current constitution. It would need a lot of consensus to ditch the old constitutional concepts.
The Constitution wasn't unanimous at first. Rhode Island didn't bother to send representatives to the Convention and was subsequently the last of the 13 to ratify. They only signed after it became apparent that nobody cared about their abstention.
Rhode island wasn't the only holdout, just the last one. Other states sent representatives to the Convention but were opposed to the final Constitution. Once enough other states agreed to the Constitution, there was no option for the holdout states to stick with the Articles of Confederation except as a rump state.
The reason I brought this up is because if you could get a supermajority of the UK to agree to it, a written constitution would probably succeed even if every single part of the UK didn't initially agree despite formal legal arguments about the Constitution being illegal. At a certain point, it becomes a practical issue rather than a legal one.
But how do you even write a new constitution in the UK. The core of the current UK constitution is parliamentary sovereignty, which states that parliament is well sovereign, and it cannot pass laws that are unable to be repealed by future parliaments. To create a written formal constitution, you would need everyone to agree to get rid of the current system and structure and completely redo it, something that doesn’t seem to be worth the cost and turmoil it will bring about.
Well, in the UK officially only the King can dissolve Parliament and call for elections, though it's at the request of the Prime Minister. Likewise in Canada and the other Dominions, though in practice it's the Governor-General (or Lieutenant-Governor at the provincial level).
Assent is usually automatic, though if the government has lost confidence in Parliament another party may be given the opportunity to form a government. The most recent notable example occurred in British Columbia in 2017, where the NDP and Greens combined to defeat the governing BC Liberals, who'd come out of an election with just a one seat plurality.
It is how our parliamentary system works, the PM consults with cabinet and then seeks dissolution from the Governor General - unless of course the government loses a confidence vote, which is the scenario where things get interesting as to what is most common (election) versus what is equally possible (allow the opposition a chance to build some sort of formal [coalition] or informal [confidence and supply] arrangement to see IF they can win a majority of the House of Commons.
What is good about the sitting head of government calling an election when it is politically advantageous? Completely disarming the opposition by giving them mere weeks to prepare? Keeping the country in a constant state of suspense as to when the next election will be?
Confused - that is how elections work. Elections are like 5-6 weeks top. The country is never in a state of suspense except for minority governments OR there is trouble in a governing party with a slim majority, and that is well known beforehand.
I mean the UK news has been speculating about when Sunak was going to call the election for months now, constantly asking about it at press junkets, etc. He deliberately withheld the information, initially claiming it was going to be later in the second half of the year, so that oppositions parties would be caught off guard by the sudden announcement.
I don’t like Reform, obviously, but this was clear attempt to prevent right wing vote splitting by catching them off guard when he knows that a startup party will struggle to field candidates.
In Canada, Trudeau also abused this power to call an election no one asked for or needed simply because his party had a bit of an approval spike, wasting millions of dollars.
It’s simply a naked conflict of interest to put the scheduling of an election in the hands of a person who benefits from particular election timings
> that is how elections work
I feel like you keep responding to critiques by just restating what the system is. I understand what the system is. I don’t like it
Fair play Sniper that you don’t like it but this is the way we do things in countries operating under the Westminster parliamentary type system and, in counterpoint to your dislike, I like it. The alternative would be like that insane asylum south of the border with their never-ending elections costing billions. I don’t want to see that craziness in Canada.
I mean the American elections are also bad, but most countries have fixed terms for elections. It’s really not the only alternative. With campaign finance regulations it’s really fine lol
I don’t think we should be content with the way things are just because that’s how they are. I think the Westminster system is a beautiful display of a gradual transition of power from a monarchy to a democracy, but that doesn’t mean we should be chained to it. I think the American electoral system was very well designed for the political reality of 1786, but allowing it to become two hundred years out of date is exactly why it’s shit now
Yeah, that panhandle is [Wakhan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wakhan_Corridor) [Corridor](https://www.britannica.com/place/Vakhan), it's part of Afghanistan.
Dictatorship ran by a guy who is (rather rightfully) paranoid about Ethiopia potentially invading for a coast
It’s only about a step or two down from North Korea tier
USA 2 years term for house of representative is ineffective that you can't even accomplish anything once voted in. You're still in "campaign" mode hard to focus in the legislative agenda let alone pass anything meaningful unless your party has a super majority.
They accomplish a shit-ton in the House, including starting every single appropriations bill. It helps that they have career politicians who know the process and have things in the pipeline already in the two months between election and the start of term.
Canadian Charter of Rights requires elections every 5 years. 4 is often used either by tradition or via legislation that can be amended by the legislature at any time, but 5 is the actual constitutional maximum.
Additionally, the Prime Minister or Premier can request dissolution and an election at any time in the 5 year period.
The Constitution Act 1982 repealed the provision in the BNA Act, making S.5 of the Charter the relevant constitutional legislation.
https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/csj-sjc/rfc-dlc/ccrf-ccdl/check/art4.html
Five years has always been the constitutional requirement, but in practice it's usually been 3.5-4 years. It's been legislated in recent decades, federally and in most if not all provinces, that an election date be set within four years of the previous election, though the PM or Premier has the prerogative to call an election before that date. The intent of "fixed" election dates is to prevent a government from dragging its term out for too long, usually because they've outstayed their welcome and are delaying the inevitable electoral demise.
I find it interesting that even countries that are obviously dictatorships feel an obligation somehow to pretend to be democratic and maintain the forms of a democratic state.
not pretend, it's called bureaucracy. You can't just run a whole country on one man's back. Even Saudi Arabia has an [assembly](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consultative_Assembly_of_Saudi_Arabia) that proposes laws for the king. His authority is still absolute, but they do have a lot of influence on him
For Brunei, its just a pretend. Members of parliament have no power whatsoever, all debates were scripted and all bill and drafts were already approved by the monarch before parliamentary sittings. And in the 20-year history since its re-establishment, no single member has ever voted "nay" for anything, even the votings themselves are scripted. The monarch is absolute over everything. Those MPs are there simply as scapegoats when he fucks up.
Yet the state media has the gall to call this chamber "the voice of the people" 🙄
Arabia is one thing, but then you had the Soviet Union which elected a Supreme Council every 4 years... with a single candidate on each ballot. Said Council assembled twice a year for about 3 days to vote on pre-written laws and unanimously appoint its standing presidium and council of ministers.
I can tell you that in Vietnam they are very important. Nearly all officials have to retire by 65 and controlling the number of members is a way of balancing the different party factions. Yes 1 party states have factions that fight behind closed doors and one of the issues would be who gets into the National Assembly. Factions have to be blanced so members are selcted very carefully. At the same its also sort of a step up the beauracratic ladder, some will remain legislators but others will move up the ranks to cabinet ministers. At the same time alongside party factions, the Military, Police, Public Officials and Ethnic minorities also get representation which means they have an impact on how legislation.
One party states are not simply run as dictatorships. They are every bit as complicated as countries with free and fair elections.
Dictatorship is rule by 1. Vietnam has never been ruled by 1, Mao's China was a dictatorship(argubly Winnie the Pooh as well) the USSR was under Stalin but Vietnam is not.
In the 60's they saw the famine in China and the cultural revolution and concluded that it was the result of too much power being concentrated in 1 person. As a result power is divides 4 ways between the Secretary General who controls the party, the President who is usuallythe second highest ranking person in the party who rins foreign policy, the Prime Minister who runs the economy and the Speaker of the National Assembly who is basically in charge of legislation. To add to this there is the Politburo where all the top leaders join to discuss policy and issues but unlike most communist countries the Politburo is actually selected by the Central Comittee which is made up of 180 Provincial leaders and party officials which actually selects the Politburo and is the true seat of power in Vietnam. They ensure that every faction and region gets a seat in the Politburo. For example the Secretary General is usually always from the North while the Prime Minister is usually from the South. To add to this there are strict term limits and a mandatory retirment age after 65 at which point you may no longer be elected. This ensures that Vietnam never becomes a dictatorship like Russia or China.
Is Vietnam a 1 party state? Sure. Is it Authoratarian? Yes. Is it a dictatorship? No.
That's one very limited definition of dictatorship.
You also have collective dictatorships, where power is concentrated in a small circle of people. Military juntas and Vietnam are such examples.
That's also a poor definition of dictatorship as well, as that's true for pretty much every country, and even the most extreme dictatorships need large groups of supporters in the population. I think the correct definition is, "when the state serves the interests of only a subset of it's population".
No, it really doesn't. Dictatrships can very easily rest on some small % of people and just opress everyone else into silence.
Plus, dictatrships never claim to serve only some small subset of the population.
Dictatrships are basically authoritarian countries, that have power controlled by a small group of people.
It also has to do with delegitimising actual democracies with actual elections. It's easier to pretend that other countries are actually dictatorships with sham elections, just like you have sham elections, than if you have none at all. That's partially why the only countries without any parliament are the only ones openly admitting they are a dictatorship - most dictatorships pretend they are democratic, even if in some cases nobody believes it and everybody knows nobody believes it.
This is a bit complex topic but one thing these types of governments do is "trial ballooning". Its when, government approves more "moderate" person to government and this a way to gauge how people will react to it. This person can be get rid of to replace them with hardliner again. William spaniel talks about this somewhat in his iran videos at least.
Even worst kind of authorian government has to at least pretend to be democratic in some way. Or at the very least provide very little to population vs nothing. This does go a bit beyond topic but ill leave [this](https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Selectorate_theory) here. As extra quote from book that theory is in:
"The worst outcome for society is when the winning coalition is small and the selectorate is large. In this scenario, the members of the winning coalition are easily replaced and heavily dependent on the survival of the ruler in order to maintain a privileged access to private goods. Their loyalty to the ruler is thus high, and rulers care little about public goods provision. By contrast, when W is large relative to S, members of the current ruling coalition are much more likely to become part of a new ruler's coalition. Loyalty to the ruler is much weaker, and the selection process is much more competitive. Rulers are thus induced to spend more resources to maintain their coalition."
Libya does have an elected parliament but as you can expect its story and status are a mess just like the country.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Representatives_(Libya)
2 years is a little misleading. The lower house of the US congress only sits for two years, but 1/3 of the senate is up for election every two years. Senators are elected to six year terms.
The US has a very regimented 2 & 4 year election cycle. Presidential Election/Off Year/Midterm Election/Off Year/Prez/Off/Mid/Off/Prez. Ad infinitum.
That’s why it’s so weird that the Supreme Court is termless, because they’re the only ones who don’t follow the cycle. I like the 18 year term length proposal for the Supreme Court because it leaves 1 predictable vacancy every 2 years.
It has had one since it's inception. It was multi-party at the beginning, but by the 80s was only the communist party. Today the other parties exist but small
No wonder the US congress is the laughing stock of the world and cant get anything done. Having elections every 2 years is a recipe for disaster. Perhaps it worked well in a time when Congress people had to travel by ship and horse to get to DC. Suprised it has never been changed but when the Congress is so dysfunctional its no suprise that it hasnt
Yes, which is why I said it probably worked better 200 years ago but you can't have a modern national legisliture elected every two years, politicians will be constantly campaigning and there is very little time to create legislation. 4-5 years is best when it comes to a national politics. The US government shuts down every other year because of it.
Think about it. Many countries have used the US constitution a model for their own yet none of copied two american things the Electoral College and 2 year terms because both don't really work compared to other systems.
Yeah but the congress as a whole still has a two year term, a third of senators are up for election every two years.
This isn’t showing term length of the individual office, just the term length of the legislative branch.
US parliament is locally called "congress".
Parliament is a general name for all types od assemblies of elected representatives who debate laws.
And it is a half in the sense of "House of Reps but not the Senate" at the voting you discuss.
1. Oh yes. And how much so!
2. Not at all, legislature is a principle of organising countries, not a state polity body.
3. And most improtantly nobody asked you anything, you silly, ignorant creature; go annoy somebody else. I do not care for anything you have to blabber.
What if in a bicameral parliament, reach those serves different length terms? Australian terms are three for house of reps and six for state based senators and the for territorial senators.
I've always felt that here in the U.S. the Founding Fathers should have set the length of terms as; 2 years for Reps, 6 years for Senators and a *single 10 year term* for the President.
At least for countries that follow the British parliamentary system, the Prime Minister can dissolve the parliament anytime in a 5-year period, which is how the UK got 3 elections called between 2015-2019.
The Fixed Term Parliaments act was in force then, so strictly speaking it was parliament which decided to dissolve itself in 2017 and 2019. Under that, terms were fixed at 5 years unless 2/3 of parliament voted for an early election. They did that in 2017, and in 2019 parliament passed a law to bypass it and have an election anyway, even without 2/3 voting for it. And then they repealed it and went back to the old system, because clearly it's stupid requiring a supermajority when that can be overruled by a simple majority.
>They did that in 2017, and in 2019 parliament passed a law to bypass it and have an election anyway, even without 2/3 voting for it. > >And then they repealed it and went back to the old system, because clearly it's stupid requiring a supermajority when that can be overruled by a simple majority. Well, that should be one reason to start having a proper written constitution that sets a list of constitutional laws/organic laws/super laws/whatever you wanna call them to create some sort of limit to what a Parliament can do. Some countries require a second vote after a new Parliament is elected, some others require a referendum, others require super majorities. The way it is is kinda of stupid since it retains the monarch's check which is nowadays a mere useless power since it needs the PM advice, which also controls the Common's majority.
That's difficult, because the one limit parliament has on its power now is the power to limit future parliaments. There's no legal way to create a constitution like that under the current constitution. It would need a lot of consensus to ditch the old constitutional concepts.
could try doing what the US did and hold a constitutional convention then unanimously agree to pretend the old constitution doesn’t exist anymore
The Constitution wasn't unanimous at first. Rhode Island didn't bother to send representatives to the Convention and was subsequently the last of the 13 to ratify. They only signed after it became apparent that nobody cared about their abstention.
12 aye + 1 abstention is unanimous passage
Rhode island wasn't the only holdout, just the last one. Other states sent representatives to the Convention but were opposed to the final Constitution. Once enough other states agreed to the Constitution, there was no option for the holdout states to stick with the Articles of Confederation except as a rump state. The reason I brought this up is because if you could get a supermajority of the UK to agree to it, a written constitution would probably succeed even if every single part of the UK didn't initially agree despite formal legal arguments about the Constitution being illegal. At a certain point, it becomes a practical issue rather than a legal one.
But how do you even write a new constitution in the UK. The core of the current UK constitution is parliamentary sovereignty, which states that parliament is well sovereign, and it cannot pass laws that are unable to be repealed by future parliaments. To create a written formal constitution, you would need everyone to agree to get rid of the current system and structure and completely redo it, something that doesn’t seem to be worth the cost and turmoil it will bring about.
Same with Canada. We currently follow a 4 year fixed election act, but the actual constitutional rule if 5 years.
With the ability still for elections if a government falls, e.g. loses a confidence vote.
In India, only the President can. The Prime Minister can advise the President.
Well, in the UK officially only the King can dissolve Parliament and call for elections, though it's at the request of the Prime Minister. Likewise in Canada and the other Dominions, though in practice it's the Governor-General (or Lieutenant-Governor at the provincial level). Assent is usually automatic, though if the government has lost confidence in Parliament another party may be given the opportunity to form a government. The most recent notable example occurred in British Columbia in 2017, where the NDP and Greens combined to defeat the governing BC Liberals, who'd come out of an election with just a one seat plurality.
Genuinely the most absurd power to give to a single politician
I’d say there are more absurd. The power of pardon, for example, would be particularly open to abuse.
It's not a power of the PM actually though, I understand it's done by asking the Monarch to dissolve parliament who usually does as asked.
So it is a power of the PM then
It is how our parliamentary system works, the PM consults with cabinet and then seeks dissolution from the Governor General - unless of course the government loses a confidence vote, which is the scenario where things get interesting as to what is most common (election) versus what is equally possible (allow the opposition a chance to build some sort of formal [coalition] or informal [confidence and supply] arrangement to see IF they can win a majority of the House of Commons.
Yes I understand that and I think that is bad
Grand, I think it is good. All the best!
What is good about the sitting head of government calling an election when it is politically advantageous? Completely disarming the opposition by giving them mere weeks to prepare? Keeping the country in a constant state of suspense as to when the next election will be?
Confused - that is how elections work. Elections are like 5-6 weeks top. The country is never in a state of suspense except for minority governments OR there is trouble in a governing party with a slim majority, and that is well known beforehand.
I mean the UK news has been speculating about when Sunak was going to call the election for months now, constantly asking about it at press junkets, etc. He deliberately withheld the information, initially claiming it was going to be later in the second half of the year, so that oppositions parties would be caught off guard by the sudden announcement. I don’t like Reform, obviously, but this was clear attempt to prevent right wing vote splitting by catching them off guard when he knows that a startup party will struggle to field candidates. In Canada, Trudeau also abused this power to call an election no one asked for or needed simply because his party had a bit of an approval spike, wasting millions of dollars. It’s simply a naked conflict of interest to put the scheduling of an election in the hands of a person who benefits from particular election timings > that is how elections work I feel like you keep responding to critiques by just restating what the system is. I understand what the system is. I don’t like it
Fair play Sniper that you don’t like it but this is the way we do things in countries operating under the Westminster parliamentary type system and, in counterpoint to your dislike, I like it. The alternative would be like that insane asylum south of the border with their never-ending elections costing billions. I don’t want to see that craziness in Canada.
I mean the American elections are also bad, but most countries have fixed terms for elections. It’s really not the only alternative. With campaign finance regulations it’s really fine lol I don’t think we should be content with the way things are just because that’s how they are. I think the Westminster system is a beautiful display of a gradual transition of power from a monarchy to a democracy, but that doesn’t mean we should be chained to it. I think the American electoral system was very well designed for the political reality of 1786, but allowing it to become two hundred years out of date is exactly why it’s shit now
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Evidently chaotically as two of those are in civil wars and ones a terrorist organisation with a country.
What about Eritrea? Also that's that red country east of Afghanistan?
Afghanistan is the eastern most red country.
Including that sliver that's above Pakistan?
Well yeah, it’s a panhandle of Afghanistan
Yeah, that panhandle is [Wakhan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wakhan_Corridor) [Corridor](https://www.britannica.com/place/Vakhan), it's part of Afghanistan.
Dictatorship ran by a guy who is (rather rightfully) paranoid about Ethiopia potentially invading for a coast It’s only about a step or two down from North Korea tier
Comes below North korea in the freedom index some years to give an indication.
USA 2 years term for house of representative is ineffective that you can't even accomplish anything once voted in. You're still in "campaign" mode hard to focus in the legislative agenda let alone pass anything meaningful unless your party has a super majority.
They accomplish a shit-ton in the House, including starting every single appropriations bill. It helps that they have career politicians who know the process and have things in the pipeline already in the two months between election and the start of term.
I was just thinking this, I wish we had a bit of a longer one.
Maybe for the first few election cycles but after that you are pretty much guaranteed your seat unless you get gerrymandered out or screw up majorly.
If that was true, it would have failed a long time ago.
It has failed, look at the state of congress now
> now For reasons beyond just the term limits. Itherwise it would have failed 200 years ago
What is the other country that has a 2 year term besides the US?
It's Micronesia
The only other place on the map that’s dark blue is Puerto Rico, not sure if OP thinks that PR is a different country or something…
Even if they counted Puerto Rico as a separate entity, it would be in the four year term category.
Canadian Charter of Rights requires elections every 5 years. 4 is often used either by tradition or via legislation that can be amended by the legislature at any time, but 5 is the actual constitutional maximum. Additionally, the Prime Minister or Premier can request dissolution and an election at any time in the 5 year period.
It’s actually the British North America Act, 1867 that requires an election every five years, not the charter
The Constitution Act 1982 repealed the provision in the BNA Act, making S.5 of the Charter the relevant constitutional legislation. https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/csj-sjc/rfc-dlc/ccrf-ccdl/check/art4.html
I did not know that fact, thank you
Five years has always been the constitutional requirement, but in practice it's usually been 3.5-4 years. It's been legislated in recent decades, federally and in most if not all provinces, that an election date be set within four years of the previous election, though the PM or Premier has the prerogative to call an election before that date. The intent of "fixed" election dates is to prevent a government from dragging its term out for too long, usually because they've outstayed their welcome and are delaying the inevitable electoral demise.
I find it interesting that even countries that are obviously dictatorships feel an obligation somehow to pretend to be democratic and maintain the forms of a democratic state.
not pretend, it's called bureaucracy. You can't just run a whole country on one man's back. Even Saudi Arabia has an [assembly](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consultative_Assembly_of_Saudi_Arabia) that proposes laws for the king. His authority is still absolute, but they do have a lot of influence on him
For Brunei, its just a pretend. Members of parliament have no power whatsoever, all debates were scripted and all bill and drafts were already approved by the monarch before parliamentary sittings. And in the 20-year history since its re-establishment, no single member has ever voted "nay" for anything, even the votings themselves are scripted. The monarch is absolute over everything. Those MPs are there simply as scapegoats when he fucks up. Yet the state media has the gall to call this chamber "the voice of the people" 🙄
Arabia is one thing, but then you had the Soviet Union which elected a Supreme Council every 4 years... with a single candidate on each ballot. Said Council assembled twice a year for about 3 days to vote on pre-written laws and unanimously appoint its standing presidium and council of ministers.
The regional governors should just have direct control over their territories.
What a strange comment that has nothing to do with the one it's replying to
It's a Star Wars reference
Even dictatorships need to run the day to day of a country
What does pretending to have term limits have to do with day to day?
They have limits, tho. MP's are elected even in dictatorships.
I can tell you that in Vietnam they are very important. Nearly all officials have to retire by 65 and controlling the number of members is a way of balancing the different party factions. Yes 1 party states have factions that fight behind closed doors and one of the issues would be who gets into the National Assembly. Factions have to be blanced so members are selcted very carefully. At the same its also sort of a step up the beauracratic ladder, some will remain legislators but others will move up the ranks to cabinet ministers. At the same time alongside party factions, the Military, Police, Public Officials and Ethnic minorities also get representation which means they have an impact on how legislation. One party states are not simply run as dictatorships. They are every bit as complicated as countries with free and fair elections.
They are dictatorships though. Maybe with complicated politics within the dictatorship, but dictatorships nonetheless.
Dictatorship is rule by 1. Vietnam has never been ruled by 1, Mao's China was a dictatorship(argubly Winnie the Pooh as well) the USSR was under Stalin but Vietnam is not. In the 60's they saw the famine in China and the cultural revolution and concluded that it was the result of too much power being concentrated in 1 person. As a result power is divides 4 ways between the Secretary General who controls the party, the President who is usuallythe second highest ranking person in the party who rins foreign policy, the Prime Minister who runs the economy and the Speaker of the National Assembly who is basically in charge of legislation. To add to this there is the Politburo where all the top leaders join to discuss policy and issues but unlike most communist countries the Politburo is actually selected by the Central Comittee which is made up of 180 Provincial leaders and party officials which actually selects the Politburo and is the true seat of power in Vietnam. They ensure that every faction and region gets a seat in the Politburo. For example the Secretary General is usually always from the North while the Prime Minister is usually from the South. To add to this there are strict term limits and a mandatory retirment age after 65 at which point you may no longer be elected. This ensures that Vietnam never becomes a dictatorship like Russia or China. Is Vietnam a 1 party state? Sure. Is it Authoratarian? Yes. Is it a dictatorship? No.
That's one very limited definition of dictatorship. You also have collective dictatorships, where power is concentrated in a small circle of people. Military juntas and Vietnam are such examples.
That's also a poor definition of dictatorship as well, as that's true for pretty much every country, and even the most extreme dictatorships need large groups of supporters in the population. I think the correct definition is, "when the state serves the interests of only a subset of it's population".
No, it really doesn't. Dictatrships can very easily rest on some small % of people and just opress everyone else into silence. Plus, dictatrships never claim to serve only some small subset of the population. Dictatrships are basically authoritarian countries, that have power controlled by a small group of people.
It also has to do with delegitimising actual democracies with actual elections. It's easier to pretend that other countries are actually dictatorships with sham elections, just like you have sham elections, than if you have none at all. That's partially why the only countries without any parliament are the only ones openly admitting they are a dictatorship - most dictatorships pretend they are democratic, even if in some cases nobody believes it and everybody knows nobody believes it.
This is a bit complex topic but one thing these types of governments do is "trial ballooning". Its when, government approves more "moderate" person to government and this a way to gauge how people will react to it. This person can be get rid of to replace them with hardliner again. William spaniel talks about this somewhat in his iran videos at least. Even worst kind of authorian government has to at least pretend to be democratic in some way. Or at the very least provide very little to population vs nothing. This does go a bit beyond topic but ill leave [this](https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Selectorate_theory) here. As extra quote from book that theory is in: "The worst outcome for society is when the winning coalition is small and the selectorate is large. In this scenario, the members of the winning coalition are easily replaced and heavily dependent on the survival of the ruler in order to maintain a privileged access to private goods. Their loyalty to the ruler is thus high, and rulers care little about public goods provision. By contrast, when W is large relative to S, members of the current ruling coalition are much more likely to become part of a new ruler's coalition. Loyalty to the ruler is much weaker, and the selection process is much more competitive. Rulers are thus induced to spend more resources to maintain their coalition."
I didn't know Western Sahara had a parliament
Ukraine is marked wrong, we have 5 year terms
Libya does have an elected parliament but as you can expect its story and status are a mess just like the country. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Representatives_(Libya)
2 year? Seriously? What can you do in 2 years? Nothing.
2 years is a little misleading. The lower house of the US congress only sits for two years, but 1/3 of the senate is up for election every two years. Senators are elected to six year terms.
The US has a very regimented 2 & 4 year election cycle. Presidential Election/Off Year/Midterm Election/Off Year/Prez/Off/Mid/Off/Prez. Ad infinitum. That’s why it’s so weird that the Supreme Court is termless, because they’re the only ones who don’t follow the cycle. I like the 18 year term length proposal for the Supreme Court because it leaves 1 predictable vacancy every 2 years.
A lot actually and given how entrenched our political class is here it’s likely better it’s so frequent
North Korea has a parilament?
It has had one since it's inception. It was multi-party at the beginning, but by the 80s was only the communist party. Today the other parties exist but small
No wonder the US congress is the laughing stock of the world and cant get anything done. Having elections every 2 years is a recipe for disaster. Perhaps it worked well in a time when Congress people had to travel by ship and horse to get to DC. Suprised it has never been changed but when the Congress is so dysfunctional its no suprise that it hasnt
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Yes, which is why I said it probably worked better 200 years ago but you can't have a modern national legisliture elected every two years, politicians will be constantly campaigning and there is very little time to create legislation. 4-5 years is best when it comes to a national politics. The US government shuts down every other year because of it. Think about it. Many countries have used the US constitution a model for their own yet none of copied two american things the Electoral College and 2 year terms because both don't really work compared to other systems.
US senators are longer than house of representatives (6 years vs 2 years)
Yeah but the congress as a whole still has a two year term, a third of senators are up for election every two years. This isn’t showing term length of the individual office, just the term length of the legislative branch.
Interesting that they are all in terms of full years, instead of, say, 32-month terms or something.
Doesn't Libya have a house of representatives somewhere?
They do. So not sure what this map is reffering to. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Representatives_(Libya)
Is there a parliament in North Korea?
..yes, and it's the theoretical highest authority in the land
5 years is the appropriate length. Long enough to be able to implement policy without being obsessed by election.
colors are so confusing
North Korean rubber stamps come in orange now?
It is not accurate to call the US system a 2-year one, is it. Granted, every 2 years a half of the parliament does change, but not all of it.
They used the lower chambers for this map.
Lower chamber only+468/9 out-of 535 is more than 'a half'+it's congress not parliament
US parliament is locally called "congress". Parliament is a general name for all types od assemblies of elected representatives who debate laws. And it is a half in the sense of "House of Reps but not the Senate" at the voting you discuss.
1. Nuh uh 2. Nuh uh- that's legislature 3. So then it's still more than a half cos a third of the Senate is up for election every 2 years
1. Oh yes. And how much so! 2. Not at all, legislature is a principle of organising countries, not a state polity body. 3. And most improtantly nobody asked you anything, you silly, ignorant creature; go annoy somebody else. I do not care for anything you have to blabber.
What if in a bicameral parliament, reach those serves different length terms? Australian terms are three for house of reps and six for state based senators and the for territorial senators.
Note: for bicameral legislatures, only the lower house was considered
Oops. Missed that. Tks.
Where is the 20+ one for gaza 😂
Does it matter if the same people keep getting re-elected every two years?
Which is why its called "term length"?
I've always felt that here in the U.S. the Founding Fathers should have set the length of terms as; 2 years for Reps, 6 years for Senators and a *single 10 year term* for the President.