Part I focuses on the constitutional organ of the Parliament, whether in its monocameral or bicameral form.
It does not intend to enrich the discussion on the origin of parliamentarism, its various forms and its relationship to the executive.
Parliaments exercise different functions in constitutional reality and are not confined to the function of controlling Government.
The British example of parliamentary Government controlling the Prime Minister and his cabinet is of outstanding importance for the evolution of parliamentary democracies around the world (House of Commons as “mother of all parliaments”).[17] However, the control function being mainly located in the question of confidence or no confidence (and inquisitorial instruments) does not include other essential functions of Parliament such as the elective function, the legislative function, the autonomous functions of selforganisation (Standing Orders) or quasi-judicial functions in specified cases (e.g. impeachment, loss of immunity of deputies). The usual differentiation between “monist” regimes (British Parliament and its descendants) and “dualist” regimes of parliamentarism where the role of the Head of State has a remarkable constitutional counterweight (e.g. dissolution of Parliament in semi-presidential regimes) in our context is not very productive.[18] The characterisation of the European parliamentary model as “constrained parliamentarism”[19] is not very helpful either because the function of control and accountability is not identical to parliamentary sovereignty which is traditionally attributed to the British Parliament.[20] It is not disputable that waves of democratisation in many countries following decolonisation in Asia and Africa have engendered parliamentarism by introducing parliaments in their constitutional (con)texts. However, older or more recently decolonised states are not necessarily “parliamentary regimes” in the traditional sense but often adhere to semi-presidential or presidential systems and form a specific category of parliamentary-presidential relationships.[21]Parliaments—apart from their control function, elective function, self-regulating function and quasi-judicial function[22]—mainly perform the legislative function in either form of political system.
The weight and role of parliaments in the different political forms of Government may vary considerably vis a vis the Government or President, however the legislative function is an additional factor to legitimise the executive.
This may also include authoritarian or dictatorial regimes where the parliament has a more supporting than controlling function. This may be due to parliamentary majorities in semi- presidential or presidential systems and the factual exercise of the political power. However, the core functions of parliament arise in any political system and thus may be legitimately separated from the status and function of other organs (Executive, Judiciary).The content that follows considers the aspects of external organisation (monocameral or bicameral parliaments), internal organisation (deputies, parliamentary groups, political parties as excursus: intermediate factors between state and society; the investigative organs (committees) and inquisitorial rights which have evolved since western parliamentary traditions spread over large parts of the world. The core function of legislation, including the right of initiative, subsequently follows whereas the elective and controlling function have been assigned to Part III (Government) which discusses the election, appointment, confidence vote and dismissal of Government by Parliament. It mainly concerns parliamentary regimes however others are periodically included.
References
Ackerman, B. (2000). The new separation of powers. Harvard Law Review, 113(3), 633-729. https://doi.org/10.2307/1342286
Bradley, A., & Pinelli, C. (2012). Parliamentarism. In A. Sajo & M. Rosenfeld (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of comparative constitutional law. Oxford University Press.
De Vergottini. (2019). Diritto costituzionale comparato (Decima edizione, interamente rivista). Wolters Kluwer.
Elgie, R., & Moestrup, S. (2007). Semi-presidentialism outside Europe: A comparative study. Routledge/Taylor & Francis Group. https://doi.org/10.4324/ 9780203954294
Goldsworthy, J. (1999). The souvereignty of Parliament. Clarendon Press. Weber, A. (2019). European constitutions compared. C.H. Beck.