This edited collection explores the perceptions and memories of parliamentarianism across Europe, examining the complex ideal of parliament since 1800. Parliament has become the key institution in modern democracy, and the chapters present the evolution of the ideal of parliamentary representation and government, and discuss the reception and value of parliament as an institution. It is considered both as a guiding concept, a Leitidee, as well as an ideal, an Idealtypus. The volume is split into three sections. The establishment of parliament in the nineteenth century and the transfer of parliamentary ideals, models and practices are described in the first section, based on the British and French models. The second part explores how the high expectations of parliamentary democracy in newly-established states after the First World War gradually started to subside into dissatisfaction. Finally, the last section attests to its resilience after the Second World War, demonstrating the strength of the ideal of parliament and its power to incorporate criticism. Examining the history of parliament through concepts and ideals, this book traces a transnational, European exchange of models, routines and discourse.

Parliamentary theory, practices, discourses, and institutions constitute a distinctively European contribution to modern politics. Taking a broad historical perspective, this cross-disciplinary, innovative, and rigorous collection locates the essence of parliamentarism in four key aspects—deliberation, representation, responsibility, and sovereignty—and explores the different ways in which they have been contested, reshaped, and implemented in a series of representative national and regional case studies. As one of the first comparative studies in conceptual history, this volume focuses on debates about the nature of parliament and parliamentarism within and across different European countries, representative institutions, and genres of political discourse.

As political polarisation undermines confidence in the shared values and established constitutional orders of many nations, it is imperative that we explore how parliaments are to stay relevant and accessible to the citizens whom they serve. The rise of modern democracies is thought to have found physical expression in the staged unity of the parliamentary seating plan. However, the built forms alone cannot give sufficient testimony to the exercise of power in political life. Parliament Buildings brings together architecture, history, art history, history of political thought, sociology, behavioural psychology, anthropology and political science to raise a host of challenging questions. How do parliament buildings give physical form to norms and practices, to behaviours, rituals, identities and imaginaries? How are their spatial forms influenced by the political cultures they accommodate? What kinds of histories, politics and morphologies do the diverse European parliaments share, and how do their political trajectories intersect? This volume offers an eclectic exploration of the complex nexus between architecture and politics in Europe. Including contributions from architects who have designed or remodelled four parliament buildings in Europe, it provides the first comparative, multi-disciplinary study of parliament buildings across Europe and across history. Praise for Parliament Buildings ‘In its totality, this is an invaluable book, both as a comprehensive review of the wider implications of architecture and building in culture and society, and as a specific resource in the understanding of one highly specialised, but profoundly significant building type.’ Dean Hawkes, Cardiff University and University of Cambridge ‘Symbols of history and of hope, theatres of struggle, cradles of consensus: parliamentary buildings, as these diverse essays show, both reflect our democracies and can help them function better.’ David Anderson, House of Lords ‘Parliament Buildings is a brilliant interdisciplinary exploration of a fascinating topic. Theoretically sophisticated, empirically rich and historically informed, it demonstrates the multiple ways in which politics and the built environment intersect, and sheds light on the symbolic and material practices central to contemporary representative politics.’ Duncan Bell, University of Cambridge

Parliaments are often seen as Western European and North American institutions and their establishment in other parts of the world as a derivative and mostly defective process. This book challenges such Eurocentric visions by retracing the evolution of modern institutions of collective decision-making in Eurasia. Breaching the divide between different area studies, the book provides nine case studies covering the area between the eastern edge of Asia and Eastern Europe, including the former Russian, Ottoman, Qing, and Japanese Empires as well as their successor states. In particular, it explores the appeals to concepts of parliamentarism, deliberative decision-making, and constitutionalism; historical practices related to parliamentarism; and political mythologies across Eurasia. It focuses on the historical and “reestablished” institutions of decision-making, which consciously hark back to indigenous traditions and adapt them to the changing circumstances in imperial and postimperial contexts. Thereby, the book explains how representative institutions were needed for the establishment of modernized empires or postimperial states but at the same time offered a connection to the past. The Open Access version of this book, available at http://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/e/9780367691271, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 licence.

Thanks to their economic and military strength, the European empires had achieved global supremacy by 1900, with large parts of the world under their dominance in the wake of colonial expansion. This situation fuelled ideas of Europe's permanent, almost natural global superiority, especially among the middle classes. However, as early as the First World War, such claims came under increasing pressure. This volume explains the role played by modern nationalism and anti-imperial movements, the competition between different political orders, changes in the economy and society, and the great ideas and utopias. Their interplay gave rise to enormously destructive forces in Europe. From the Boer and Balkan wars before 1914 to the Yugoslav wars of the 1990s and the Ukraine war since 2022, they have produced a continuum of violence. At the same time, the great promise of political participation and social security is one of the constants of Europe's history in the long twentieth century. Against this backdrop, modern societies emerged whose values had moved far away from the older models. Perceptions of the role of the sexes, families, and generations changed fundamentally. In addition, the major internal European migrations, together with the global immigration that became increasingly significant after 1945, ensured that the ethnic profile of European societies changed considerably. Europe in the Long Twentieth Century shows how, on the one hand, these different factors led to a Europeanisation of living and working conditions and, at the same time, how the political and economic integration of the countries of Europe progressed. On the other hand, it demonstrates how Europe's role in the global context changed fundamentally. As much as the geopolitical provincialisation of Europe continued unabated, Europeans were constantly searching for new ways to assert themselves throughout the long twentieth century. The search continues.

The Handbook provides a broad introduction to Swedish politics, and how Sweden's political system and policies have evolved over the past few decades.

This book examines the political parties which emerged on the territories of the former Ottoman, Qing, Russian, and Habsburg empires and not only took over government power but merged with government itself. It discusses how these parties, disillusioned with previous constitutional and parliamentary reforms, justified their takeovers with programs of controlled or supervised economic and social development, including acting as the mediators between the various social and ethnic groups in the respective territories. It pays special attention to nation-building through the party, to institutions (both constitutional and de facto), and to the global and comparative aspects of one-party regimes. It explores the origins of one-party regimes in China, Czechoslovakia, Korea, the Soviet Union, Turkey, Yugoslavia, and beyond, the roles of socialism and nationalism in the parties’ approaches to development and state-building, as well the pedagogical aspirations of the ruling elites. Hence, by revisiting the dynamics of the transition from the earlier imperial formations via constitutionalism to one-party governments, and by assessing the internal and external dynamics of one-party regimes after their establishment, the book more precisely locates this type of regime within the contemporary world’s political landscape. Moreover, it emphasises that one-party regimes thrived on both sides of the Cold War and in some of the non-aligned states, and that although some state socialist one-party regimes collapsed in 1989–1991, in other places historically dominant parties and new parties have continued to monopolize political power. The Open Access version of this book, available at http://www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.