Homework 1

1. Prime Ministers tend to be more powerful than Presidents because they have the legislative and executive power fused together. As an example, Turkey has a parliamentary system so it has Prime Minister and Chief-of-State (President.) In parliamentary systems Prime Minister’s tend to have more power because their powers come from two different branches (legislative and executive) so they can get policies and other regulations done without any gridlock. In contrast the Chief-of-State (President) just has veto power and ceremonial duties. In the case of Turkey, Tayyip Erdogan came to power in 2002 and he was the Prime Minister until this summer now with the help of his previous omnibus bills; he is now the Chief-of-State (President). Throughout the time in office he has passed lots of consolidated bills that have done both good things and bad things. In addition to its affects, all those bills have led Erdogan to rule the country by himself by acquiring the judicial power, legislative power and executive power. Due to his unlimited power as well the support from his own people that he has gained when he first came to office. In contrast, Obama is less powerful compared to Erdogan. It is a fact that, Obama is the most powerful leader in the world however, when it comes to comparing the two leaders in terms of being influential in politics Presidents tend to less powerful than Prime Ministers. Presidents have lots of checks and balances from the legislative and judicial branch therefore they tend to have gridlock when they are trying to pass a policy or a law. For instances, Obama is facing difficulties in getting his own agenda through Congress and ultimately to public because the opposition party stops any proposed policies from getting discussed or even being considered.

2. Parliamentary style of government is better than Presidential style of government because it is more efficient in preventing a dictatorship or a totalitarian rule however it is true that Presidents enjoy more checks and balances than Parliamentary systems. Parliamentary systems have built-in mechanisms that allow removing a lousy leader and this removal can take place in three legal ways: vote of no confidence; 2) removal by the party; 3) removal by the Head-of-State. The vote of no confidence can be taken anytime when something is put into effect or when a government decision is made. To remove the Prime Minister by vote of no confidence there needs to be less than 50% of support. So this keeps the Prime Minister in check because he/she will consider keeping the position. Prime Minister’s main check is the people rather than any branches unlike Presidents. Whereas in the presidential system the President enjoys more checks and balances and this leads to gridlock. The Congress and the Supreme Court are