IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/cog/poango/v9y2021i3p135-144.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Do Independent Fiscal Institutions Enhance Parliamentary Accountability in the Eurozone?

Author

Listed:
  • Cristina Fasone

    (Department of Political Science, LUISS University, Italy)

Abstract

Independent fiscal institutions (IFIs) have been established or reformed in all eurozone countries following the reform of economic governance. As they are expected to counter the deficit bias of the governments and the information asymmetry of the legislatures and the public over the management of the budget, IFIs may support or even strengthen parliamentary accountability. This hypothesis is tested with regard to three IFIs, the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council, the Italian Parliamentary Budget Office, and the Spanish Independent Authority for Fiscal Responsibility. Although the economic context in which the IFIs were created was similar in the three eurozone countries, as was their mandate, these institutions have a rather different institutional positioning, being within the Parliament, in Italy; within the Executive, in Spain; and a stand-alone body in Ireland. This is likely to influence the IFIs’ contribution to parliamentary accountability, we hypothesize that the closer the position of an IFI and its contacts to the parliament, the stronger is the scrutiny of the executive on budgetary policies. The analysis of parliamentary questions, hearings, and of the activation of the ‘comply or explain’ procedures shows that, overall, the IFIs’ potential role to enhance parliamentary accountability has remained underexploited by the three legislatures, with no significant differences as for the institutional positioning of the IFI.

Suggested Citation

  • Cristina Fasone, 2021. "Do Independent Fiscal Institutions Enhance Parliamentary Accountability in the Eurozone?," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 9(3), pages 135-144.
    • Handle: RePEc:cog:poango:v9:y:2021:i:3:p:135-144
    DOI: 10.17645/pag.v9i3.4244
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cogitatiopress.com/politicsandgovernance/article/view/4244
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.17645/pag.v9i3.4244?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Tobias Tesche, 2019. "‘The Troika is Dead, Long Live the Domestic Troikas?': The Diffusion of National Fiscal Councils in the European Union," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 57(6), pages 1211-1227, November.
    2. Tomasz P. Woźniakowski & Aleksandra Maatsch & Eric Miklin, 2021. "Rising to a Challenge? Ten Years of Parliamentary Accountability of the European Semester," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 9(3), pages 96-99.
    3. Bateman,Will, 2020. "Public Finance and Parliamentary Constitutionalism," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781108478113, January.
    4. Michal Horvath, 2018. "EU Independent Fiscal Institutions: An Assessment of Potential Effectiveness," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 56(3), pages 504-519, April.
    5. Maatsch, Aleksandra, 2017. "Effectiveness of the European semester: Explaining domestic consent and contestation," MPIfG Discussion Paper 17/6, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies.
    6. Robert Hagemann, 2011. "How Can Fiscal Councils Strengthen Fiscal Performance?," OECD Journal: Economic Studies, OECD Publishing, vol. 2011(1), pages 1-24.
    7. Tomasz P. Woźniakowski & Aleksandra Maatsch & Eric Miklin, 2021. "Rising to a Challenge? Ten Years of Parliamentary Accountability of the European Semester," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 9(3), pages 96-99.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Cristina Fasone, 2021. "Do Independent Fiscal Institutions Enhance Parliamentary Accountability in the Eurozone?," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 9(3), pages 135-144.
    2. Ivana Skazlic, 2021. "Routine or Rare Activity? A Quantitative Assessment of Parliamentary Scrutiny in the European Semester," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 9(3), pages 112-123.
    3. Tomasz P. Woźniakowski, 2021. "Accountability in EU Economic Governance: European Commissioners in Polish Parliament," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 9(3), pages 155-162.
    4. Jankovics, László, 2021. "Költségvetési tanácsok az EU-ban - ölebek, vérebek vagy őrkutyák? [Fiscal councils in the EU: lapdogs, watchdogs or bloodhounds?]," Közgazdasági Szemle (Economic Review - monthly of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences), Közgazdasági Szemle Alapítvány (Economic Review Foundation), vol. 0(3), pages 251-281.
    5. Ivana Skazlic, 2021. "Routine or Rare Activity? A Quantitative Assessment of Parliamentary Scrutiny in the European Semester," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 9(3), pages 112-123.
    6. Robert Csehi & Daniel F. Schulz, 2022. "The EU's New Economic Governance Framework and Budgetary Decision‐Making in the Member States: Boon or Bane for Throughput Legitimacy?," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(1), pages 118-135, January.
    7. Xavier Debrun & Tidiane Kinda, 2017. "Strengthening Post‐Crisis Fiscal Credibility: Fiscal Councils on the Rise – A New Dataset," Fiscal Studies, Institute for Fiscal Studies, vol. 38, pages 667-700, December.
    8. Gorčák Martin & Šaroch Stanislav, 2021. "Impact of fiscal institutions on public finances in the European Union: Review of evidence in the empirical literature," Review of Economic Perspectives, Sciendo, vol. 21(2), pages 215-232, June.
    9. Slawomir Franek, 2016. "Measurement of Fiscal Council Independence in the Countries of the European Union (Pomiar niezaleznosci rad fiskalnych w krajach Unii Europejskiej)," Problemy Zarzadzania, University of Warsaw, Faculty of Management, vol. 14(63), pages 159-168.
    10. Falilou Fall & Debra Bloch & Jean-Marc Fournier & Peter Hoeller, 2015. "Prudent debt targets and fiscal frameworks," OECD Economic Policy Papers 15, OECD Publishing.
    11. -, 2014. "Multi-dimensional Review of Uruguay. Volume 1: initial assessment," Coediciones, Naciones Unidas Comisión Económica para América Latina y el Caribe (CEPAL), number 37080 edited by Cepal, September.
    12. Aida Caldera Sánchez & Morten Rasmussen & Oliver Röhn, 2016. "Economic Resilience: What Role for Policies?," Journal of International Commerce, Economics and Policy (JICEP), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 7(02), pages 1-44, June.
    13. Mohamed Zaky & Sarah El khishin, 2016. "Fiscal Governance in Egypt: Strengthening Budgetary Institutions to Counteract Political Fragmentation," Working Papers 1027, Economic Research Forum, revised Jul 2016.
    14. Bethlendi, András & Lentner, Csaba & Póra, András, 2020. "Független költségvetési intézmények fejlődése a 2008-as válság után [Development of independent fiscal institutions since the crisis of 2008]," Közgazdasági Szemle (Economic Review - monthly of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences), Közgazdasági Szemle Alapítvány (Economic Review Foundation), vol. 0(7), pages 787-808.
    15. Sonja Bekker, 2021. "The EU’s Recovery and Resilience Facility: A Next Phase in EU Socioeconomic Governance?," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 9(3), pages 175-185.
    16. Ryta Dziemianowicz & Aneta Kargol-Wasiluk & Renata Budlewska, 2016. "Fiscal Councils As An Element Of The Concept Of Fiscal Governance In The European Union Member States," Equilibrium. Quarterly Journal of Economics and Economic Policy, Institute of Economic Research, vol. 11(4), pages 675-687, December.
    17. Slawomir Franek, 2015. "Are Independent Fiscal Institutions Really Independent?," Eurasian Journal of Economics and Finance, Eurasian Publications, vol. 3(3), pages 35-44.
    18. Haroutunian, Stephan & Bańkowski, Krzysztof & Bischl, Simeon & Bouabdallah, Othman & Hauptmeier, Sebastian & Leiner-Killinger, Nadine & O'Connell, Marguerite & Oleaga, Iñigo Arruga & Abraham, Laurent , 2024. "The path to the reformed EU fiscal framework: a monetary policy perspective," Occasional Paper Series 349, European Central Bank.
    19. McQuinn, Kieran & Addison-Smyth, Diarmaid, 2015. "Assessing the Sustainable Nature of Housing-Related Taxation Receipts: The Case of Ireland," Papers WP503, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
    20. Federica Genovese & Gerald Schneider, 2020. "Smoke with fire: Financial crises and the demand for parliamentary oversight in the European Union," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 15(3), pages 633-665, July.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cog:poango:v9:y:2021:i:3:p:135-144. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: António Vieira or IT Department (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.cogitatiopress.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.