Diritto Pubblico Comparato ed Europeo

Sommario

1. Controllo parlamentare e rappresentanza politica. – 2. Democrazia post-parlamentare, parlamentarismo senza Parlamento e governance. – 3. Crisi delle istituzioni parlamentari o tramonto della mediazione rappresentativa?

Abstract

Some observers maintain that parliamentary institutions have increasing difficulty in addressing and dealing with the growing complexity, highly technical character and rapid developments in modern societies. Deficits in representation, in knowledge and competence, in engagement or commitment effectively erode the authority and status of parliamentary institutions. According to these observers, the future of Parliaments would necessarily consist of controlling and holding accountable the plural subjects of governance. The concept of a “post-parliamentary parliamentarism” based on parliamentary chartering does not consider, however, that the weakening of the role of Parliament is the direct consequence of the fact that elected assemblies have lost their central position in the representative system. As a result there has been a a weakening of parliamentary control because even this function is based on the representative centrality of parliamentary institutions.Moreover, it does not seem possible to maintain that the representative centrality of parliamentary institutions is independent from the type of functions exercised and it does not seem possible to think that the content and the strength of these functions could change without consequences on this centrality.