Question (30)
Suppose that you are one of the constitutional experts in a newly established democracy, the Underwood Republic. In five days, the constitutional convention will be held to set up the institutional governance structure of the republic. Because of your expertise, you are requested to submit your recommendations for good
governance to the convention before its opening. You have information that there are four social groups with roughly equal weights in the convention, that is, Left Group, Center-Left Group, Center-Right Group, and Right Group. In completing your proposal, the convention instructs you to respond to the following queries:
(a) For the republic’s new electoral rule, which one do you think is better between majoritarian and proportional ones and why?
(b) For the republic’s new constitutional design, which one do you think is better between presidential and parliamentary ones and why?
(c) Once you choose a set of institutional governance for the republic, what would be the predictable consequences on political parties and the party system?
(d) Once governance systems in the republic are established based on your responses to (a), (b), and (c), what would be the democratic trade-offs?
