Valerie Belu

Biographic Data

ID4390515
NAMEValerie Belu
GIVEN NAMESValerie
FAMILY NAMEBelu
SIGNATUREBELU V
AFFILIATIONSUniversity of Oxford
VERIFIEDNo
TOTAL WORKS6
TOTAL CITATIONS23
WORKS AS AUTHOR6
WORKS AS EDITOR0
FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR2014
LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR2018
H-INDEX3

  • Electoral incumbency advantages and the introduction of fixed parliamentary terms in the United Kingdom

    Open AccessPetra Schleiter, Valerie BeluARTICLEThe British Journal of Politics…2018Cited by: 3References: 12

    Can fixing the parliamentary term be expected to reduce electoral incumbency advantages? The United Kingdom’s 2011 Fixed-term Parliaments Act aims to prevent incumbents from scheduling early elections for political benefit. Yet, the view that flexible election timing gives incumbents an unfair advantage remains contested. The literature on opportunistic election calling—including the signalling effects of this strategy and the competence of gover…

  • Hung Parliaments and the Need for Clearer Rules of Government Formation

    Open AccessPetra Schleiter, Valerie Belu et al.ARTICLEThe Political Quarterly2017Cited by: 2

    The general elections of 2017 and 2010 produced hung parliaments in which no single party could command an overall majority; in May 2015 the UK only narrowly avoided that outcome. When a parliament is hung, more than one potential government can be viable, and the constitutional rules that determine who has the first right to form the government can thus have a decisive influence on which government forms. In the past, the UK has applied several …

  • The Decline of Majoritarianism in the UK and the Fixed-term Parliaments Act

    Petra Schleiter, Valerie BeluARTICLEParliamentary Affairs2016Cited by: 8References: 17

    In 2011, the coalition government enacted the Fixed-term Parliaments Act, which constrains the prime minister's discretion to dissolve parliament. This article argues that the Act not only reflects the secular decline of majoritarianism in the UK, but is also contributing to its further erosion. While this makes the legislation controversial, its repeal would be unlikely to secure a return to the majoritarian politics of the 1950s and 1960s. More…

  • The Coalition and the Decline of Majoritarianism in the UK

    Open AccessOonagh Gay, Petra Schleiter et al.ARTICLEThe Political Quarterly2015Cited by: 4

    The United Kingdom has traditionally featured many aspects of the majoritarian model of democracy: its first‐past‐the‐post electoral system tends towards producing single‐party majorities, while its legislative decision rules concentrate policy‐making power in the hands of the resulting single‐party governments. However, in an unprecedented break with the UK 's postwar conventions, the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats formed a coalition follow…

  • The Challenge of Periods of Caretaker Government in the UK

    Petra Schleiter, Belu et al.ARTICLEParliamentary Affairs2015Cited by: 6References: 7

    Journal Article The Challenge of Periods of Caretaker Government in the UK Get access Petra Schleiter, Petra Schleiter * Department of Politics and International Relations, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK *Correspondence:[email protected] Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Valerie Belu Valerie Belu Department of Politics and International Relations, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK Search for…

  • Avoiding Another ‘Squatter in Downing Street’ Controversy

    Open AccessPetra Schleiter, Valerie BeluARTICLEThe Political Quarterly2014

    In the UK the rules governing caretaker situations have historically been underspecified. The UK's constitutional traditions, such as prime ministerial discretion to time elections and its two‐party system, have in the past limited the frequency and duration of caretaker periods. However, the recently lengthened election timetable, new constraints on the executive introduced by the Fixed‐term Parliaments Act (2011), and a decline in the dominance…