The relationship of the Primeminister with the cabinet faithfully reflects the
characteristics of the constitutional system.  There are political and organisational
factors that condition this relationship.

In general we may say that the relationship between the Primeminister and the other
cabinet members has hierarchy and colectivity elements.  In different systems we face
various solutions in favour of the hierarchy and/or in favour of collegiality. Below we
will try to identify the factors that feed one or the other tendency.

As we mentioned above these factors may be either political or organisational.  Let
start with the political factors

Such a factor is undoubtably the constitutional tradition.  In some systems the
government is considered, and in fact acts as a political body (e.g. Great Britain) This
means that the government dos not deal with concrete administering issues, but simply
identifies the main policies to be followed in the country e.g. whether there will be any
privatisation or either nationalisation of the economy, or whether the stress will be put
at the social state or the free market economy and so on.

In some systems (typically in Austria) the government is simply the highest body of the
state administration and accomplishes classic administering duties (identification of the
sectors to be privatised and studying of their rentability, estimation of social causes of
the market economy etc., however in most of the systems the governments present
mixed political and/o administering functions.

What is important for the purpose if this concept paper is the conclusion that in the
systems where the governments are political bodies, the relationship between the
Primeminister and the other ministers are hierarchic ones.  The colectivity is easily
identified in systems were the government has simply administrative functions.

The process of formation of government is an other political factor that incise on the
relationship between the prime ministers and cabinet.  In this framework may be
identified cabinets whose composition is a result of compromises between the political
forces (government of coalition) and other cabinets whose composition is exclusively
defined from the will of the most successful political party (government of one colour).

Obviously in coalition governments the relationship between the Primeminister and its
collogues ministers are much more colective.  We may simply mention the attempt left
incomplete of Primeminister Nano to make some changes to its cabinet.  This is an
example that clearly demonstrates the nature of the relationship between the
Primeminister and its ministers in such an environment.  So in Albania the coalition is
not indispensable (at least from the mathematic point of view) to govern.  Please
imagine how desperate may such a attempt be for example from Prodi in Italy.

The opposite happens in the so called one-colour cabinets.  In this cases is identified a
strong hierarchy at the relationship between Primeminister-Ministers. This because in
such cabinets the ministerial offices are not fulfilled because of the political background,
but as a  result of personal skills and Primeminister preferences.

As mentioned above there are organisational factors that incise the relationship
between Primeminister and minister in various ways.  It is a matter of fact that the
number of the cabinet members is increased substantionally especially during the
decade after the second world war.  Today is more than normal for a cabinet to be
composed of 20 or 30 members. Because of the increase in number of members the
cabinet meetings are being formalised and held according to specific procedure rules.

An other new element of organisation is establishment of the so called governmental
committees or intra ministerial committees.

These organisational and structural changes has brought with them a increase into the
hierarchy of internal life of cabinets by playing a important role into relationship
between Primeminister and the other members of cabinets.

There is a obvious conclusion concerning the nature of the relationship in question
independently from the above mentioned factors: In all systems there is a trend to
promote the role of Primeminister with regard to the other ministers and establishment
of hierarchy relationship between them.

Submitted by Gent Ibrahimi
Legal Advisor, Ministry of Legislative Reform and Parliament Relation, MLR
Tirana, Albania
Phone: 355 42 290 84
Fax: 355 42 284 10