5 ms·

I don't know of any EU country in which ministers are elected as ministers. Many are elected as MPs and then appointed ministers, but this is typically not a re

I don't know of any EU country in which ministers are elected as ministers. Many are elected as MPs and then appointed ministers, but this is typically not a requirement, and you can easily have unelected ministers. Even if 100% of all ministers were always elected as MPs, you couldn't just argue "was elected for position X, must therefore automatically be considered democratically legitimized for position Y".

deleted 6y ago
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YeGoblynQueenne 6y ago
>> Many are elected as MPs and then appointed ministers, but this is typically not a requirement, and you can easily have unelected ministers. OK, I don't know that. Is that the case in EU countries? If so, which ones? Anyway I didn't say that ministers are elected as ministers, but to my knowledge for someone to be appointed a minister they must be elected into parliament. Again, if that's not the case please explain.
- tom_mellior 6y ago
  > Anyway I didn't say that ministers are elected as ministers, but to my knowledge for someone to be appointed a minister they must be elected into parliament. That might be the case in certain countries, for example, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cabinet_of_the_United_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cabinet_of_the_United_Kingdom says: "In the United Kingdom's parliamentary system, the executive is not separate from the legislature, since Cabinet members are drawn from Parliament." It's not the case in other countries. Recent examples from Italy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monti_Cabinet https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monti_Cabinet and Austria: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bierlein_government https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bierlein_government. Admittedly these are interim governments formed entirely from non-politicians, so a special case. But there are also examples of individual non-party people being ministers in "normal" governments. Again Austria: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kern_government https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kern_government (the "Independent"s were never MPs). Of course this is rare, since usually there is an expectation of party members to get the posts.
  - YeGoblynQueenne 6y ago
    Are you sure this is the case, about the Austrian Independents? It's not very clear from the wikipedia articles on the persons and on the institutions. In any case, it looks like the Austrian ministers are figurheads without real political power, or so I gather from the relevant artice on wikipedia: Austrian presidents gladly accept that their role is that of figureheads. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_of_Austria https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_of_Austria But I may not be reading all this carefully enough. Still, this seems to be something ... peculiar to Austria?
    - tom_mellior 6y ago
      You misread "president" as "minister" and ignored the fact that (at least) Italy often has expert cabinets, and this whole discussion is pointless anyway since at most what we would be able to establish is that the EU Commission's democratic legitimacy, if any, is through three levels of indirection, which is not a lot of legitimacy.
      - YeGoblynQueenne 6y ago
        I did indeed misread "president" as "minister", but I don't agree with you that "indirection" (i.e. appointment of officials by elected officials) is "not a lot of legitimacy". It may not be "a lot of directness", but I'm not concerned about this any more than I'm concerned that, e.g. police officers or judges are appointed, rather than elected (certainly in the places I've lived). Edit: I don't agree that there is as much indirection as you say, either. You brought up two examples of interim governments where ministers were not elected. You haven't given any examples where this happens in er, ordinary? governments and I don't believe there are any in the EU. But I'm happy to be corrected if I'm wrong.

deleted 6y ago

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YeGoblynQueenne 6y ago

>> Many are elected as MPs and then appointed ministers, but this is typically not a requirement, and you can easily have unelected ministers. OK, I don't know that. Is that the case in EU countries? If so, which ones? Anyway I didn't say that ministers are elected as ministers, but to my knowledge for someone to be appointed a minister they must be elected into parliament. Again, if that's not the case please explain.

tom_mellior 6y ago
> Anyway I didn't say that ministers are elected as ministers, but to my knowledge for someone to be appointed a minister they must be elected into parliament. That might be the case in certain countries, for example, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cabinet_of_the_United_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cabinet_of_the_United_Kingdom says: "In the United Kingdom's parliamentary system, the executive is not separate from the legislature, since Cabinet members are drawn from Parliament." It's not the case in other countries. Recent examples from Italy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monti_Cabinet https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monti_Cabinet and Austria: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bierlein_government https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bierlein_government. Admittedly these are interim governments formed entirely from non-politicians, so a special case. But there are also examples of individual non-party people being ministers in "normal" governments. Again Austria: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kern_government https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kern_government (the "Independent"s were never MPs). Of course this is rare, since usually there is an expectation of party members to get the posts.
- YeGoblynQueenne 6y ago
  Are you sure this is the case, about the Austrian Independents? It's not very clear from the wikipedia articles on the persons and on the institutions. In any case, it looks like the Austrian ministers are figurheads without real political power, or so I gather from the relevant artice on wikipedia: Austrian presidents gladly accept that their role is that of figureheads. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_of_Austria https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_of_Austria But I may not be reading all this carefully enough. Still, this seems to be something ... peculiar to Austria?
  - tom_mellior 6y ago
    You misread "president" as "minister" and ignored the fact that (at least) Italy often has expert cabinets, and this whole discussion is pointless anyway since at most what we would be able to establish is that the EU Commission's democratic legitimacy, if any, is through three levels of indirection, which is not a lot of legitimacy.
    - YeGoblynQueenne 6y ago
      I did indeed misread "president" as "minister", but I don't agree with you that "indirection" (i.e. appointment of officials by elected officials) is "not a lot of legitimacy". It may not be "a lot of directness", but I'm not concerned about this any more than I'm concerned that, e.g. police officers or judges are appointed, rather than elected (certainly in the places I've lived). Edit: I don't agree that there is as much indirection as you say, either. You brought up two examples of interim governments where ministers were not elected. You haven't given any examples where this happens in er, ordinary? governments and I don't believe there are any in the EU. But I'm happy to be corrected if I'm wrong.