Prime Minister Discretion and Government Behavior

Abstract

In this dissertation, I examine prime ministerial discretion over cabinet adjustments. Whereas some prime ministers have total institutional discretion over the cabinet ministries that exist (and which policies any minister may control), other prime ministers must instead gain approval from someone else. However, scholars have typically overlooked the institutions behind cabinet adjustments. In this dissertation, I therefore first present an original, broadly cross-national accounting of prime minister discretion across 39 countries between 1945 and 2020. My data indicate that explicit prime ministerial control of all areas of the cabinet is less common than supposed. I additionally demonstrate, using appropriate quantitative modeling, that the level of institutionally granted discretion predicts important political phenomena. Specifically, using logistic regression, I find that countries with prime ministerial discretion experience more frequent cabinet adjustments. I also use survival analysis to find that increased discretion predicts shorter times of cabinet bargaining. These studies provide a strong foundation for future inquiry that will help to increase understanding of Government design.