Oh dear! Oh dear! I shall be too late!”Popularity Gains as an Incentive to Legislate Frantically?
Résumé
The paper analyzes the relations between the legal and regulatory production and the gains of popularity for the President and the Prime Minister in France. Using the GMM system estimation, we show that the Executive's popularity depends on legislative activism, creating reasons to legislate frantically, but also that the Executive has strong incentives to strategically set the legislative agenda, possibly timing landmark laws during honeymoon periods. Moreover, if Prime Ministers can benefit actions taken in the last months of their term, this is not true for Presidents. Our results also confirm the traditional view, according to which incumbents are always bestowed with favorable ratings when the economic situation improves.