The Perils of Presidentialism Debate

In 1990 the political scientist Juan Linz published 'The Perils of Presidentialism', arguing that presidential systems are more prone to democratic breakdown than parliamentary ones. Linz pointed to dual legitimacy, where president and legislature both claim a popular mandate; rigid fixed terms that make crises hard to resolve; and a winner-takes-all logic that raises the stakes of elections. He noted that many presidential democracies in Latin America had collapsed into military rule. Critics responded.

Scott Mainwaring and Matthew Shugart argued that the details matter, such as the president's powers and the party system. José Antonio Cheibub argued in 2007 that presidential democracies failed more often mainly because they were frequently established in countries with a history of military rule, not because of presidentialism itself. The debate shows how hard it is to separate the effects of institutions from the conditions in which they operate.