Legislatures and the Budget Process

In almost all political systems, it is generally accepted that the executive has the primary role in developing an annual budget and presenting it to the legislature. The legislature has the right to review, debate, in some cases amend, and approve or reject the spending plan proposed by the executive. Within this broad framework, the actual workings of the budget process vary from nation to nation based on the constitution, laws, legislative rules of procedure, balance of political power, tradition, and expectations of the political actors and the people. This paper examines a legislature's ability to influence the budget and reviews the budgetary trends in developed and developing democracies.

1. Introduction
2. The Legislative Role in the Budget Process
a. Sharing Power and Responsibility
b. Recent Legislative Trends in Budgeting
c. Constitutional Underpinnings of Legislative Budget Authority
i. Restrictive Constitutions
ii. Constitutional Role Not Developed
iii. Changing Constitutions
d. Barriers to Legislative Involvement
i. Executive Dominance
ii. Legislative Hesitancy to be Involved
iii. External Forces
3. Timetable for the Budget Process
a. Involvement Before Introduction
b. Time Between Budget Introduction and the New Fiscal Year
c. Dealing with Deadlines
4. Procedures and Structures for Legislative Budgeting
a. Committee Responsible for Budgeting
i. Budget or Finance Committee
ii. Policy or Sector Committee Involvement
b. Amending Budget Bills
i. Amendments as a Legislative Tool
ii. Rules of Procedure
iii. Prohibiting New Spending
iv. Budgetary Offsets
c. Legislative-Executive Cooperation
d. Role of Second Chamber in Budgeting
5. Legislative Resources for Budget Analysis
a. Legislative Control of the Legislative Budget
i. Restrictive
ii. Consultative
iii. Independent
b. Legislative Staffing Resources
i. Budget Committee Staff and Resources
ii. Partisan Staff
iii. External Resources
iv. Legislative Budget Agencies
c. Drawing on Government Resources
i. Executive Transparency
ii. Requesting Additional Information
d. Citizen Involvement
6. Legislative Branch Oversight Capacity
a. Oversight by Legislative Committee
b. Oversight by Independent Agency
c. Formal Legislative Oversight
7. Conclusion
8. Endnotes