Presidents and Terminal Logic Behavior: Term Limits and Executive Action in the United States, Brazil, and Argentina

Chapter 2: Institutionalism: Presidential Behavior and the Rule of Law

16 2.1 DEVELOPING A DEFINITIONAL FRAMEWORK T he context of this research has a focus like that of the early institutionalists —on the interaction between the rule of law and political practice.1 I am interested in the institution of term limits and how it structures presidential behavior. The term institution has come to describe many things, and, arguably, it has so much so that its unrestricted inclusivity often detracts from its perceived usefulness in political science.2 If truth be told, institutionalism or the general study of institutions has a long history and would take volumes to properly expose its conception over time. It can be traced as far back as Aristotle , with his notion of “most perfect forms of government,”3 and to contract theorists of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, like Locke, Hobbes, and Montesquieu. Early institutionalism (termed old institutionalism), focuses largely on formal, constitutional rules and the centrality of law, and historicism is greatly emphasized. Political thinkers of centuries past recognized the importance of inCHAPTER 2 Institutionalism Presidential Behavior and the Rule of Law Every word of [the Constitution] decides a question between power and liberty. —James Madison (1792) INSTITUTIONALISM 17 stitutions and the need to understand the effects of their design on human behavior . Hobbes, for instance, recognized that humankind needs structure in place to preserve political life. Locke, recognizing more virtue than vice in human nature, saw institutions as a conduit to protecting liberty and property. Montesquieu, in his Spirit of the Laws (1748), also related institutional type to behavioral tendency in his connecting of war to regime type. The mid-1980s experienced a rebirth of institutionalism, a revived social theory that was doggedly less normative and more focused on methodology and theory. James March and Johan Olsen, pioneers of the new institutionalism, emphasized the reciprocity of human agency and structure, perceiving structure as not only an active agent but a reactive one as well. A defining characteristic of new institutionalism is this reciprocated effect and consequence of human agency on structure. With a focus on collective action generally and on this multidirectional relationship between collectivities and the socioeconomic environment within which they operate, the concept of institutions has greatly expanded beyond the formal and statutory. Peters (2005), for instance, describes any approach as “institutional” if it (1) describes a structural feature of society and/or polity, (2) affects individual behavior, and (3) offers some degree of stability in that behavioral interaction over time. Institutions have been described at the microlevel of individuals and at the macrolevel of societies and international systems.4 Aside from political science , other academic disciplines such as sociology, psychology, and economics offer their own formulations of what constitutes an institution. Even within the discipline of political science, its various subfields have different notions as to what an institution represents and describes. How, therefore, can such a term be understood and conceptualized in order to pave the way for a more sophisticated understanding of what we are studying? I answer this question by first defining and conceptualizing what is meant by the institution of term limits within the context of this study. Term limit is defined as the established law or practice of obligating an elected official to leave office after the official has served a predetermined term. This study focuses exclusively on only one type of tenure and only one type of elected official. The focal point here is those heads of state in presidential systems, who are legally limited to serve a set time period (e.g., of four, five, or six years) and who have the possibility of reelection to only one subsequent term.5 CHAPTER 2 18 Second, I describe the larger framework that informs the construction of my theory and research design. I find that the ideas put forth by Waltz (1954) in his book Man, the State, and War: A Theoretical Analysis provide a useful definitional framework. Waltz introduces three images through which international behaviors, particularly those related to war, can be explained. He explains that the locus of cause can be derived from the analysis of human beings, the structure of separate states, and the state system. The focus here is not on the particularities of Waltz’s images or their application but on the nature of their connectedness. All three images are linked together through a system of endogenous relationships. Humans are as much defined by a collective society...