Bargaining and Bicameralism. Issue 1 (27th June 2017)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Parameswaran, Giri
• Is Part Of: Legislative studies quarterly. Volume 43:Issue 1(2018)
• Page Start: 101
• Page End: 139
• Publication Date: 2017-06-27
• Subjects: Legislative bodies -- Periodicals; Parlement; Procédure législative; Système parlementaire; Étude comparée (Descripteur de forme); Périodique électronique (Descripteur de forme); Ressource Internet (Descripteur de forme); 328
• DOI: 10.1111/lsq.12179
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0362-9805

Abstract

Abstract : In bicameral legislatures, the protection of small states often motivates the malapportionment of the upper house. Using a legislative bargaining model, I show that malapportionment may produce the opposite effect. Under unicameralism, same‐state legislators are shown to not inherently be coordinated to cooperate, diminishing the fear of a big‐state conspiracy. By contrast, under bicameralism, preference complementarities enable upper‐house legislators to effectively coordinate their state delegations, and this skews the expected allocation in favor of big states. Hence, unless bicameralism significantly increases their agenda power, small states will fare even worse under bicameralism whenever they are disadvantaged under unicameralism.