Almost everyone agrees that the time-tested model in which three branches of government – legislative, executive, and judicial – check and balance each other is probably best.
But how to arrange relations between them is a matter of some controversy. The US has done well with a president-centered system, in which the executive appoints the government. But British democracy evolved, without a written constitution, according to a model in which ministers must be elected members of parliament.
Struggling Arab democrats might note that many European countries emerging from authoritarianism – including Germany, Italy, Portugal, and Spain – opted for parliamentary supremacy to forestall emergence of a single strong leader.
Many Russian legal scholars now criticize former President Boris Yeltsin, who in 1993 crushed a challenge from his elected parliament and then wrote a new constitution that vested great power in the Kremlin.
Without changing a word, his successor, Vladimir Putin, instituted a far more authoritarian regime. “If I could change one thing in the text that we wrote, it would be to give parliament far more immunity” from the executive, says Constitution author Mr. Alexeyev. “I would make that immutable, not subject to amendments.”
