On the nature of the Romanian political regime: reflections on the recent jurisprudence of the constitutional court

Abstract

The participation to the European Council, an issue that generated many debates in the framework of the cohabitation between the President and the Prime Minister, couldn't be decided by an agreement between the two heads of the executive, but only by the decision of the Constitutional Court no. 683/2012. For the purpose of solving the case, the Constitutional Court has raised the issue of the nature of the Romanian political regime and has decided that it is semi-presidential. This decision has been followed by another one, no. 784/2012, where the Constitutional Court reiterated the same conclusion about the nature of the political regime. The public law and political science authors analyzed in this article could not agree about this issue. The main characteristics of the semi-presidential regime have been either partially implemented or modified in the Romanian Constitution and this leads to the opinion that this is an "attenuate" or "parliamentarized" version, or that is a parliamentarian regime, or even that it will transform itself into a presidential one. The Constitutional Court has solved the case but the debate about the nature of the Romanian political regime is not over yet.