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The Weight of Precedent: Parties, Institutions, and Executive Norms

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  • Goldstein, Daniel A. N.

    (University of Oslo)

  • Schumock, Collin Thomas

Abstract

Political executives often adhere to informal traditions established by their predecessors. Yet, without legal backing, elites have incentives to violate norms for political gain. Under what conditions do constraining executive norms persist and when are they abandoned? We address this question by using an infinite horizon formal model to analyze the maintenance of executive norms. We identify intra-party accountability and variation in patience among actors within the same party as significant for norm maintenance. We also detail how expectations about the expected behavior of out-of-power parties shape the willingness to violate norms while in office. The insights from the model enable us to classify a number of executive norms according to their fragility and to examine the trajectory of one norm in-depth: the two-term tradition of the American presidency. Our findings shed light on how informal institutions regulate executive behavior and advance our understanding of institutional stability and erosion.

Suggested Citation

  • Goldstein, Daniel A. N. & Schumock, Collin Thomas, 2025. "The Weight of Precedent: Parties, Institutions, and Executive Norms," SocArXiv 9dv4u_v1, Center for Open Science.
    • Handle: RePEc:osf:socarx:9dv4u_v1
    DOI: 10.31219/osf.io/9dv4u_v1
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    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Axelrod, Robert, 1986. "An Evolutionary Approach to Norms," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 80(4), pages 1095-1111, December.
    2. Anthony Downs, 1957. "An Economic Theory of Political Action in a Democracy," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 65(2), pages 135-135.
    3. North, Douglass C. & Weingast, Barry R., 1989. "Constitutions and Commitment: The Evolution of Institutions Governing Public Choice in Seventeenth-Century England," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 49(4), pages 803-832, December.
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