THE REPUBLIC OF MACEDONIA, CONSOCIATIONAL (CONSENSUAL) ENOUGH?

An evaluation of the Macedonian political system through Lijphart’s ten criteria for distinguishing majoritarian from consensus model of democracy

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to show whether the Republic of
Macedonia can be experienced as real consensual (consociational)
democracy, if we consider Lijphart’s ten criteria (established in 1999).
The subject of the analysis will be the performance of the Macedonian
political system from 1991 to 2001, when certain consociational
practices were still nurtured through Macedonian political pragmatism,
rather than through systematically guaranteed solutions, which became
crystallized in the Macedonian political system and constitutional order
in 2001 after the signing of the Ohrid Framework Agreement. This
analysis will consider issues on the executive sharing of power in the
grand coalition government, the executive-legislative balance of power,
the multiparty system, proportional representation, interest groups, and
the decentralized structure of government, bicameralism, constitutional
rigidity, and judicial revisionism and Central Bank independence.