Nikolaj Bijleveld, historian, is a staff member at the University of Groningen.Colin Grittner teaches Canadian history in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, and has held postdoctoral fellowships at the University of British Columbia and the University of New Brunswick.David E. Smith is a former president of the Canadian Political Science Association and the author of a number of books on the Canadian Parliament and on Canadian federalism.Wybren Verstegen is Associate Professor in Economic and Social History at Vrije University, Amsterdam.

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• Foreword Senates in the North Atlantic 1800-2000 (Karel Davids) Introduction: Senates in Crises (Nikolaj Bijleveld and Wybren Verstegen) Part One: The need for a senate (1800- 1905) 1. Réflexion in the Batavian Republic (The Netherlands) around 1800 (Joris Oddens) 2. Members of the Senate in the Southern Netherlands (Belgium) between restoration and revolution (1815-1831) (Els Witte) 3. Constitutional Conservatism, Anti-Democratic Ideology, and the Elective Principle in British North America’s Upper Legislative Houses, 1848-1867 (Colin Grittner) 4. The evolution of the Senate of Canada from its creation in 1867 until the present, the 150th anniversary of Confederation (David Smith) 5. The "Upper Chamber" of Norway in the 19th and 20th century (Eivind Smith) 6. The Swedish Senate 1867- 1921 (Torbjörn Nilsson) 7. A Liberal Upper Chamber. The Danish Landsting of 1849 (Flemming Juul Christiansen) 8. Rejecting the Upper Chamber: National Unity, Democratization and Imperial Rule in the Grand Duchy of Finland, 1860–1906 (Onni Pekonen) Part Two: Democracy, the people and the senate (1867-1930) 9. The Dutch Senate: a meritocracy? The critical remarks of Joannes Theoorus Buijs (1883) (Wybren Verstegen) 10. An aristocratic institution coping with democracy. (Self-) perceptions of the Belgian Senate, 1831-1893 (Marnix Beyen) 11. Marginalizing the Upper Chamber. Canada's Liberal Party, the Senate and Democratic Reform in 1920s Canada (Adam Coombs) 12. The Irish Senate 1912-1937 (John Dorney) Part Three: Senates revisited 13. Attempts to reform the Dutch Senate, especially in the 20th century (Bert van den Braak) 14. Vocational voices or puppets of the Lower House? Irish senators, 1938–1948 (Martin O'Donoghue) 15. Abolishing the Swedish Senate (20th century) ( Joakim Nergelius) 16. Unicameralism in Denmark since 1953 (Asbjørn Skjaeveland) 17. Precarious bicameralism? Senates in Ireland from the Late Middle Ages to the Present (Shane Martin and Muiris MacCartaigh) 18. The Representation of Minorities in the Canadian Senate (Linda Cardinal) Conclusions: the persistence of and new roles for an 'outmoded' and 'elitist' institute (Nikolaj Bijleveld and Wybren Verstegen)