The Selection of Ministers in Europe: Hiring and Firing

This volume examines, through a series of case studies of countries with differing institutional and cultural structures, the process of selection, shuffling and removal of ministers in national cabinets since 1945.

1. Structural and Strategic Factors Affecting the Hiring and Firing of Ministers 2. Hiring and Firing Ministers under Informal Constraints: Germany 3. Cabinet Dynamics and Ministerial Careers in the French Fifth Republic 4. Choosing, Moving and Resigning at Westminster 5. Italy: the Difficult Road towards a more Effective Process of Ministerial Selection 6. Cabinet Dynamics in Democratic Spain 7. Ups and Downs of Ministerial Careers in a Partitocratic Federal State 8. Portugal: The Primacy of "Independents' 9. In Tranquil Waters: Swedish Cabinet Ministers in the Post-War Era 10. Constructing and Maintaining Irish Governments 11. More Safe than Sound? Cabinet Ministers in Iceland 12. Learning to Rule: Ministerial Careers in Post-Communist Democracies