Parliaments and Assemblies: Democratic deficits of the Parliamentary Assembly of Bosnia and Herzegovina

Abstract

The political system of Bosnia and Herzegovina is complex. The Parliamentary Assembly of Bosnia and Herzegovina, as nominally the highest legislative-representative body in the state, reflects that complexity, not only through its composition, means of functioning, jurisdictions and activities, but also through its name. By using a comparative method of most similar cases and contents analysis, this paper shows that the ambivalence deriving from the name of the Parliamentary Assembly of Bosnia and Herzegovina is reflected on the relationship between the political elites and citizens which undermines, i.e. makes impossible, a successful development of society and brings about a deficit in the democratic practises of the political system. Comparing the bicameral bodies of 37 states, and then a few parliamentary assemblies created around the world, the paper confirms that parliamentary assemblies are an integral part of the institutional framework of international organizations, i.e. that they are integral units of the international system within which states act as holders of sovereignty. In national states, where sovereign will comes from the individual citizen, parliamentary assemblies cannot function optimally since the source of their legitimacy is different.