Parliaments, not Presidents

By David Zhu

What we witnessed at the United States Capitol on January 6th was a sad and horrifying event at the very heart of the world’s oldest democracy. Yet it was also an event that could have only occurred in a system where one man holds so much celebrity status and executive power that he could amass millions to his conspiratorial cause.

It has often been said that, for all of its contributions to Western democracy, America’s worst export has been its system of presidential governance. 

Presidential democracy is a unique configuration indeed; it involves executive power separate from the legislature, the head of state simultaneously being the head of government, the president unable to be removed outside of the difficult process of impeachment. It is no wonder then, no country with such a system aside from the United States is as successful of a democracy – though even that is now in dispute – as the parliamentary democracies of former British colonies, or continental European nations. One has to only recall the countless presidential republics which either fell into corruption and political mire or degraded into a dictatorship all together. Both Latin America and Eastern Europe are littered with the skeletons of nations that tried their hand at the American way of government and came crashing down.

Hence, when the founders of our Australian Federation sat down to envisage a system of government they were wise to look to their British ancestors and not their American cousins from across the Atlantic. Empirically, parliamentary systems have been orders of magnitude more successful than their presidential counterparts. They are more stable, more peaceful, and more politically mild. 

But why is that so?

A mix of institutional and structural ingredients make presidential republics into the Molotov cocktails of democratic systems. 

Firstly, Presidents are both heads of state and heads of government. That means that they are both the human symbol of the strength and unity of the nation, but also the leader of a political party, tussling in the political mud to get real reform done. They must be beyond reproach, the figurehead to whom all respect is afforded, throwing out the first pitch at the baseball World Series, and yet – also must haggle and negotiate with politicians and interest groups to push through a very real agenda. That is a dangerous blend; it not only kneecaps their ability to compromise without looking beneath their office, but also renders it more difficult to criticise the president’s political decision without appearing disrespectful of that high office.

Parliamentary democracies, by contrast, separate out the living symbol of the nation from its political head. Our Governor-General is a figurehead who all Australians can admire and look up to, or seek comfort from in times of crisis, but our Prime Minister, Scott Morrison, is a very much political figure we do not have to bite our tongue when levelling criticism against. That makes the business of government appear more real and accessible, without all the pomp and grandeur of the White House.

Secondly, the process to remove a president is far too unwieldy. As us Australians have no doubt been accustomed to over the past decade or so, prime ministers can be removed by their own parties with the snap of a finger – but that mechanism can operate to satisfy more than just the selfish ambitions of power-hungry politicians. It can operate to bar stubborn fools and maniacs from dangerously holding onto power, with a simple majority vote. Moreover, removal of a prime minister is not a particularly high bar – it can be anything from incompetence to electoral concern – whereas the standard for impeaching a president, as nebulous as it is, seems to be far higher than simply being horrendous at their job. 

Thirdly, and perhaps most pertinently, a presidential system produces levels of gridlock simply unimaginable in a parliamentary democracy. By nature, the government of the day in Australia or the United Kingdom commands a majority of the lower house of the legislature. Executive policy priorities are therefore identical to the legislative priorities of the majority, and most government proposals are able to be passed without much struggle. 

But that is a feature of presidential systems, and not an oversight, you say; checks and balances reduce the power of the executive and keeps the threat of authoritarianism at bay. 

No, no, no. How it operates in theory is that a legislature from a different party checks the President’s unbridled power; how it operates in reality is that an obstructive legislature, as we have seen in America for decades, effectively grinds the business of governing to an absolute halt.

And when gridlock seizes the capital, people get angry; they become rightly furious at the fact that politicians in Washington are more concerned about bickering and scoring political points than coming together to solve real issues that impact millions of ordinary working class people. That’s not to say that it doesn’t happen in London, Canberra, Wellington, or any of the other seats of parliamentary democracies; it’s just there’s less of an excuse to not get things done when the government also commands a majority in the legislature. 

The cracks in the system of presidential democracy have been laid bare by Donald Trump. But its weak foundations were laid a long time ago, and had nothing to do with his demagogical time in high office. Indeed, it is to America’s credit that it has managed a (relatively, given recent events) uneventful 244 years of democratic existence, without military coups, dictators, or the collapse of the Republic. Not that it hasn’t come close, and so my point is that the events of January 6th might’ve been avoided altogether had the transfer of power in America only involved the uneventful dismissal and appointment of a new Prime Minister, instead of the grave and solemn process of transitioning to a new presidential administration.

Those events could not have happened here or anywhere else with Parliaments over Presidents because we do not worship our Prime Minister as the holder of a sacred office. Scott Morrison is ‘just another bloke’, able to be cast aside at any moment if the common welfare demands. 

There are many aspects of America’s soft power and cultural influence I gladly welcome and embrace. But their system of government is not one of them. 

Let us hope for less Presidents and Congresses, and more Prime Ministers and Parliaments.