WESTMINSTER LEGACY? EXECUTIVE AGENDA CONTROL AND LEGISLATIVE TIME IN A MULTIPARTY PARLIAMENTTHE ISRAELI KNESSET IN COMPARATIVE-HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE

This dissertation resolves a central puzzle in comparative politics: how Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, built on a consensual electoral framework, exhibits the powerful executive agenda control characteristic of a majoritarian Westminster system. I argue this paradox is sustained by a path-dependent hybrid system where individual-centric procedural rules function as the trigger for powerful, party-centric control. This argument is tested using a mixed-methods design, grounded in a novel, manually-coded dataset covering 1,699 bills and the universe of over 29,500 associated amendments from 2009 to 2022. The statistical analysis uncovers a stark asymmetry in the procedural power of amendments: those from the opposition cause significant legislative delay, while those from the governing coalition produce no significant delay. This is explained by a "pre-emptive negotiation" mechanism, where ideologically diverse coalitions resolve disputes in private to avoid the high costs of public infighting. The analysis also reveals a predictable lifecycle of this conflict, driven by government alternation and legislative timing. The dissertation traces this hybrid framework to its origins in Israel’s founding (1948–1951), where two distinct inheritances were combined: a consensual system from the pre-state political culture, and an executive-centric procedural core from the British Mandate. Ultimately, this research makes several distinct contributions. For legislative studies, it introduces a comprehensive new dataset and an integrated model of the strategic lifecycle of legislative conflict. For Israeli studies, it offers a historically-grounded institutional lens for interpreting contemporary political conflicts. Finally, for comparative politics, it provides the first systematic classification of Israel's agenda control powers using Döring's framework, empirically grounding its paradoxical institutional placement, and argues for repositioning Israel as a critical, and often overlooked, case in the study of Westminster-inflected systems.