What's in a name? Semi-parliamentarism and Australian Commonwealth executive-legislative relations

Abstract

The concept of semi-parliamentarianism provides a parsimonious classificatory description of Australian politics as it is really practiced. This concept encapsulates the tension in Australia's executive-legislative relations: balancing the government's requirement to maintain confidence only within the House of Representatives and the fact of the Senate's equally legitimate powers. In this way, semi-parliamentarianism pin-points the distinction between the Australian and other parliamentary systems. This has implications for the practice of real-world politics because political actors conceptualise and fulfil their roles differently in each chamber. Further, the paper argues that the concept of semi-parliamentarianism reveals why a powerful upper chamber with equal legitimacy transforms politics into a form that is no longer recognisably parliamentary. Finally, the concept of semi-parliamentarism may facilitate a more comprehensive integration of Australian executive-legislative relations into international debates.