Minority Governments andLegislative Porfessionalization: The Case of the Mexican StatesLegislatures.

Although over the past years scholars have emphasized the need for legislative professionalism in developing democracies’ political science literature on this issue has not substantially increased. This paper is an attempt to enhance our knowledge of the factors that produce legislative professionalism in developing democracies by examining the case of Mexico. This paper analyzes the impact of minority governments on legislative professionalism in the assemblies of the Mexican states. The hypothesis of the paper is that under minority government the divergence of preferences between the legislature and the executive promotes a heterogeneous environment that makes it necessary for both branches to engage in negotiations over policy. Therefore, when legislators face a powerful executive with divergent preferences, they will have more incentives to increase the level of professionalism in the chamber. Thus, we should expect an increase in the level of a legislature’s capacity to perform its role in the policy-making process when minority government becomes more prevalent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]