The Routledge Handbook of Parliamentary Administrations

The Routledge Handbook of Parliamentary Administrations brings together an international, multidisciplinary group of contributors providing a systematic and comprehensive analysis of parliamentary administrations.

Including chapters on the administrations of national parliaments in every member state of the European Union, in most of the EU candidate countries and in key liberal democracies around the world, this book represents a uniquely broad-ranging resource. Each national system is treated in a consistent manner, with authors providing relevant facts, figures and critical analysis according to a common framework. Additionally, it provides coverage of transnational parliamentary administrations in different regions around the globe and includes a number of cross-cutting chapters, addressing key issues of relevance for a better understanding of parliamentary administrations such as the potential for politicisation, professionalisation, digitalisation or Europeanisation with the comparative analysis of different national experiences. This handbook will enable readers to better comprehend the role and influence of parliamentary administrations and in doing so will enhance our understanding of their importance for the effective functioning of representative democracy more generally.

The Routledge Handbook of Parliamentary Administrations constitutes a unique tool and prime reference for any researcher, scholar or practitioner working in the area of parliamentary and legislative studies, governance, democracy, public policy and administration, as well as more widely to European studies, general political science and comparative politics.

Chapters 1, 2 and 4 of this book are freely available as downloadable Open Access PDFs at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.

"Parliamentary administrations assure that legislatures? formal authority translates into de facto power. The editors provide unique insights on parliamentary administrations worldwide. Historical trajectories, institutional capabilities and current challenges are systematically compared. An overdue Public Administration complement to Parliamentary Studies."

Michael W. Bauer, European University Institute, Florence, Italy.

"A major contribution to an overlooked, but key element of the political system. This volume breaks new ground in the range of questions it addresses and the systematic analysis it undertakes. An impressive feature is that it extends beyond the ?usual suspects? in making its selection of cases."

Hussein Kassim, University of East Anglia, United Kingdom.

"This handbook highlights the central importance of administrative resources within democratic legislatures through a broad array of case studies and a careful selection of comparative thematic chapters. The volume provides a new and invaluable resource for comparative research on the quality, capacity and evolution of administrative organization in legislatures."

Amie Kreppel, Professor and Jean Monnet Chair, University of Florida, USA.