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Introduction
The first democratic elections in Iraq occurred on January 30, 2005. However, it was not until April 28, fully
88 days later, that an Iraqi government actually took office. This delay in the Iraqi government formation
process was a cause of some concern around the world. Much of the world’s media, along with the American
government, attributed the delay to the lack of democratic experience among Iraqi politicians - the members
of the transitional legislature in Iraq simply did not have enough democratic experience building coalitions
for the government formation process to have been completed more quickly.
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The same reason was given
to explain why it took five months of negotiations to form a second Iraqi government after elections in
December 2005. However, while the Iraqis were certainly faced with some additional difficulties not present
in more established parliamentary democracies, it should be noted that the 88 days that it took them to form
a government in early 2005 was about the same as the average length of time it takes the Dutch to form a
government after elections. In fact, there are at least sixteen instances since 1945 in Western Europe where
cabinet negotiations lasted longer – in some cases, much longer – than 88 days. Even the five months that it
took the second Iraqi government to form did not come close to matching the 208 days that it took to form
the Dutch government in 1977. Yet we do not argue that such delays in countries like Austria, Belgium,
Iceland, Italy or the Netherlands are caused by an unfamiliarity with democratic politics. It is simply part
and parcel of most parliamentary systems that election results do not regularly determine the identity of
the government. Instead, elections usher in what can be quite a long period of negotiations in which party
leaders bargain over the composition and policy objectives of the cabinet. But what factors account for the
delay in the government formation process? Why do cabinets in some countries form quite quickly but take
weeks or even months in others?
Delays in the government formation process have important implications for democratic governance.
Typically, there is a strong norm in most countries that caretaker governments, which rule while the next gov-
ernment is being formed, do not have the authority to make major policy initiatives (Laver & Shepsle 1994,
292). As a result, delays in the government formation process can be quite problematic, particularly if
the previous cabinet has fallen due to some sort of political, economic, or military crisis as in the Iraq
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In an interview for NBC News on April 27, 2005, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice voiced this widespread opinion
when she stated that the three month delay in forming the Iraqi government was not surprising: “The Iraqis haven’t had what I
would call horizontal conversations in many, many years because it has been a dictatorship.”
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Convention