Comparing government agendas: executive speeches in the Netherlands, United Kingdom and Denmark
Comparing government agendas: executive speeches in the Netherlands, United Kingdom and Denmark
At the beginning of each parliamentary session, almost all European governments give a speech in which they present the government’s policy priorities and legislative agenda for the year ahead. Despite the body of literature on governments in European parliamentary democracies, systematic research on these executive policy agendas is surprisingly limited. In this article the authors study the executive policy agendas—measured through the policy content of annual government speeches—over the past 50 years in three Western European countries: the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and Denmark. Contrary to the expectations derived from the well-established “politics matters” approach, the analyses show that elections and change in partisan color have little effect on the executive issue agendas, except to a limited extent for the United Kingdom. In contrast, the authors demonstrate empirically how the policy agenda of governments responds to changes in public problems, and this affects how political parties define these problems as political issues. In other words, policy responsibility that follows from having government power seems much more important for governments’ issue agendas than the partisan and institutional characteristics of governments.
executive speeches, issue agendas, elections, politics matters
973-1000
Mortensen, Peter Bjerre
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Green-Pedersen, Christoffer
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Breeman, Gerard
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Chaqués-Bonafont, Laura
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Jennings, Will
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John, Peter
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Palau, Anna M.
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Timmermans, Arco
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28 August 2011
Mortensen, Peter Bjerre
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Green-Pedersen, Christoffer
f81e3f67-65bf-471c-b13d-62c9283af40a
Breeman, Gerard
ae006939-cfde-48c9-873b-e0f6bd0a0ba1
Chaqués-Bonafont, Laura
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Jennings, Will
2ab3f11c-eb7f-44c6-9ef2-3180c1a954f7
John, Peter
fd080737-2b23-44ff-bc56-c7f9c2293de4
Palau, Anna M.
abb22512-770a-4438-9ce0-770ca5f8895a
Timmermans, Arco
7e11b412-c2d4-4eba-ba37-7b6dbe576b5b
Mortensen, Peter Bjerre, Green-Pedersen, Christoffer, Breeman, Gerard, Chaqués-Bonafont, Laura, Jennings, Will, John, Peter, Palau, Anna M. and Timmermans, Arco
(2011)
Comparing government agendas: executive speeches in the Netherlands, United Kingdom and Denmark.
Comparative Political Studies, 44 (8), .
(doi:10.1177/0010414011405162).
Abstract
At the beginning of each parliamentary session, almost all European governments give a speech in which they present the government’s policy priorities and legislative agenda for the year ahead. Despite the body of literature on governments in European parliamentary democracies, systematic research on these executive policy agendas is surprisingly limited. In this article the authors study the executive policy agendas—measured through the policy content of annual government speeches—over the past 50 years in three Western European countries: the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and Denmark. Contrary to the expectations derived from the well-established “politics matters” approach, the analyses show that elections and change in partisan color have little effect on the executive issue agendas, except to a limited extent for the United Kingdom. In contrast, the authors demonstrate empirically how the policy agenda of governments responds to changes in public problems, and this affects how political parties define these problems as political issues. In other words, policy responsibility that follows from having government power seems much more important for governments’ issue agendas than the partisan and institutional characteristics of governments.
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Published date: 28 August 2011
Keywords:
executive speeches, issue agendas, elections, politics matters
Organisations:
Politics & International Relations
Identifiers
Local EPrints ID: 336603
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/336603
ISSN: 0010-4140
PURE UUID: 561bb71c-6d5c-4ca8-97e8-443e648bcf1e
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Date deposited: 30 Mar 2012 10:51
Last modified: 15 Mar 2024 03:42
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Contributors
Author:
Peter Bjerre Mortensen
Author:
Christoffer Green-Pedersen
Author:
Gerard Breeman
Author:
Laura Chaqués-Bonafont
Author:
Peter John
Author:
Anna M. Palau
Author:
Arco Timmermans
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