Presidential legislative initiatives under semi-presidentialism: What accounts for their success and failure?

Abstract

Few presidents in Europe have the power to propose legislation directly to Parliament. Accordingly, presidential legal initiatives in Europe are not very well researched or understood. This paper seeks to address this research gap by providing an analysis of presidential legal initiatives in Lithuania. We have assembled a dataset of all the presidential legal initiatives proposed in Lithuania since 1993. Using this dataset, we find that factors in the political environment significantly affect the success of presidential legislative initiatives. Additionally, we find that the success of these initiatives partly depends on policy content, as initiatives in foreign and defense policy, on average, tend to be more successful. Lastly, non-partisan presidents in Lithuania become more successful over time; our results suggest a consolidation of consultation mechanisms between the presidents and the legislature.