In 1974, when Harold Wilson formed the UK’s first minority government in 45 years, observers like Anthony King optimistically claimed that “[m]inority rule can work”. This challenges the oft-cited view of Strøm that minority governments are “counterintuitive phenomen[a] in the world of parliamentary democracy”. Today, minority governments constitute approximately one third of governments in established parliamentary democracies, globally. This ‘counterintuitive’ statistic raises the following questions: When can minority rule work? Under which conditions are minority cabinets effective? How have minority rule governments evolved over time? To answer these questions, I focus on three cases – Sweden, Norway, and Denmark – where minority cabinets are the predominant form of government. Ultimately, I argue that existing measures to assess the performance of …

What does the future of the European Union (EU) look like? Walking along the Rue de la Loi in the European Quarter in Brussels, the white and blue mural stating “The Future is Europe” by graffiti artist NovaDead sends a clear message. The bird in the right-hand corner stands for freedom and peace (referring to the values in Art. 2 of the Treaty on EU), the blue and yellow colours refer to the European flag, and the leaves recall the “green jungle” (a small forest of philodendrons) at the European Parliament in Strasbourg, which could also reflect the complex governance structure of the EU. But beyond this artistic and symbolic vision, what might the future of the EU look like …