Marco Improta - Böcker

This insightful book provides a systematic and comprehensive analysis of government stability across democracies. Marco Improta draws on an original multilevel longitudinal dataset to investigate the factors influencing cabinet survival and identify policy recommendations to address the challenges facing contemporary governments. Adopting a comparative approach and proposing a novel explanatory framework, chapters tackle key theoretical and methodological issues in government stability research. Improta’s findings highlight the destabilising role of certain cabinet types, as well as the impact of coalition agreements, the constructive vote of no-confidence, and parliamentary fragmentation. The book outlines promising avenues for future research, emphasising the need to consider the effects of instability on voter perceptions of democratic quality. Presenting a fresh perspective on political durability, this book is an essential read for students and academics in political science, comparative politics, public administration and management, and regulation and governance. Its practical recommendations also make this an invaluable resource for political advisors and policymakers.

This book investigates why government instability is particularly evident in Italy compared to other European political systems. It focuses on three main dimensions. Firstly, it examines the historical, institutional, and social roots of instability by providing insights into the sources of instability, from the country’s constitutional architecture to the lack of social and political cohesion produced by a difficult unification process. Secondly, leveraging an original multilevel dataset, the book performs an in-depth analysis of the nexus between instability and policymaking accountability, and a quantitative empirical analysis to identify factors increasing the risk of cabinet termination. Finally, the book provides scholars and pundits with empirically-based policy recommendations on how to solve the instability issue.