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Collaborative research involving scholars in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and throughout Australia suggests a vibrant upper house improves accountability of governments.
Dr Nicholas Aroney, from UQ’s TC Beirne School of Law, worked with Dr Scott Prasser of the University of the Sunshine Coast and J.R. Nethercote of The Menzies Research Institute, to publish their findings in a book titled, Restraining Elective Dictatorship: The Upper House Solution.
Developing from a major national conference held in Brisbane in 2006 which examined the need for an upper house in Queensland, the published research proposes that modern democracies are dominated by tight party discipline and an increasingly politicised public service, resulting in a kind of ‘elective dictatorship’.
They argue that a potential solution to ‘elective dictatorship’ is the operation of a vibrant upper house as a means of improving accountability and acting as a break on executive government dominance.
The book contains chapters on the upper houses in the United Kingdom, USA and Canada, as well as those in several of the Australian States. The book also discusses the need for an upper house in Queensland.
Dr Aroney has a further book, The Constitution of a Federal Commonwealth: The Making and Meaning of the Australian Constitution, due to be released by Cambridge University Press in May this year.
Media Enquiries to: Dr Nicholas Aroney (phone 3365 3053 or email n.aroney@law.uq.edu.au).
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