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Portugal The Assembly of the Republic
According to the Portuguese constitution, the country's
unicameral parliament, the Assembly of the Republic, "is
the
representative assembly of all Portuguese citizens." The
constitution names the assembly as one of the country's
organs of
supreme authority and in Article 114 of the 1989 revised
constitution charges it to exercise its powers both
separately
and interdependently with the president, the government,
and the
courts.
The assembly's power derives from its power to dismiss
a
government through a vote of no confidence, to impeach the
president, to change the country's laws, and to amend the
constitution. In addition to these key powers, the
constitution
grants to the Assembly of the Republic extensive
legislative
powers and substantial control over the budget, the right
to
authorize the government to raise taxes and grant loans,
the
power to ratify treaties and other kinds of international
agreements, and the duty to approve or reject decisions by
the
president of the republic to declare war and make peace.
The
assembly also appoints many members of important state
institutions, such as ten of the thirteen members of the
Constitutional Court and seven of the sixteen members of
the
Higher Council of the Bench.
The constitution requires the assembly to quickly
review and
approve an incoming government's program. Parliamentary
rules
allow the assembly to call for committees of inquiry to
examine
the government's actions. Political opposition represented
in the
assembly has the power to review the cabinet's actions,
even
though it is unlikely that the actions can be reversed.
For
example, as few as ten members can request that the
assembly
ratify the government's decree-laws not belonging to the
cabinet's exclusive jurisdiction. As little as one-fifth
of the
assembly can call for a motion of censure, although an
absolute
majority of the assembly is required to sustain the
censure.
Party groups can also call for interpellations that
require
debates about specific government policies.
The assembly consisted at first of 250 members, but the
constitutional reforms of 1989 reduced its number to
between 230
and 235. Members were elected by popular vote for
legislative
terms of four years from the country's constituencies
(eighteen
in mainland Portugal, one each for the autonomous regions
of the
Azores (Açores in Portuguese) and Madeira, one for
Portuguese
living in Western Europe, and one for those living in the
rest of
the world). The number of voters registered in a
constituency
determined the number of its members in the assembly.
Constituencies varied greatly in size; as many as three
dozen
representatives came from the Lisbon district and as few
as three
from some inland districts. As of the early 1990s, the
autonomous
regions of the Azores and Madeira each sent five members
to the
assembly.
According to the constitution, members of the assembly
represent the entire country, not the constituency from
which
they are elected. This directive was reinforced in
practice by
the strong role of political parties in regard to members
of the
assembly. Party leadership, for example, determined in
which
areas candidates were to run for office, thus often
weakening
members' ties to their constituencies. Moreover, members
of the
assembly were expected to vote with their party and to
work
within parliamentary groups based on party membership.
Party
discipline was strong, and insubordinate members could be
coerced
through a variety of means. A further obstacle to members'
independence was that their bills first had to be
submitted to
the parliamentary groups, and it was these group leaders
who set
the assembly's agenda. The leader of the assembly, its
president,
was selected from the group leaders.
Assembly sessions were scheduled to run from
mid-October to
mid-June, but often extended beyond this period because of
uncompleted business. When the body was not in session, it
was
represented by its Standing Committee, headed by the
president of
the assembly and composed of assembly members chosen to
reflect
the larger body's political composition. The committee
monitored
the president and the government and could call for
meetings of
the entire assembly if necessary.
Much of the assembly's work was done in committees,
both
permanent and ad hoc. Committee membership was to reflect
the
assembly party makeup, and members were usually not
allowed to
serve on more than two committees. The committees examined
legislative proposals, most of which came from the
government
rather than from the assembly itself after a first reading
in the
assembly. Appropriate witnesses and expert testimony could
be
called; for certain types of legislation, labor
legislation for
example, concerned parties had to be heard. Once a
committee
approved a bill, the bill could receive a second reading
and a
plenary vote.
The Portuguese parliament did not enjoy much prestige
initially. Its efficacy was impeded by the absence of
adequate
resources and staff and the lack of an efficient
infrastructure
of committees and subcommittees. This institutional
inadequacy
buttressed the traditional lack of respect the Portuguese
felt
for their governing institutions. To the public, the
assembly
personified democracy's defects in that it was
inefficient,
quarrelsome, splintered, and patronage-dominated. Its
members
were frequently seen as putting partisan interests ahead
of the
interests of the nation or of using their parliamentary
positions
to enhance their private careers and fortunes. In
newspaper
editorials and cartoons, parliament was often portrayed as
buffoonish, silly, and irrelevant. Polls in 1978 and 1984
found
that the Portuguese saw parliament as less important than
the
president, the prime minister, or the cabinet. It was thus
not
surprising that at times Portuguese democracy seemed
insufficiently rooted. Yet, democracy had survived the
unstable
period after the revolution, and, despite all its
problems, many
Portuguese had come to see the Assembly of the Republic as
indispensable to its preservation. In addition, reforms of
the
parliament's organization and practices, as well as
increased
numbers of skilled and experienced staffers, improved the
body's
efficiency.
Data as of January 1993
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