The Roots of the Bahamian Parliamentary System

by Sir Arthur Foulkes

Those who had the time to watch on television last week the transition of power from one prime minister to another in Britain would have been greatly rewarded by the experience.

It was instructive to watch this seamless process in one of the world’s great democracies and the former imperial power from which we inherited our system of parliamentary democracy.

Among those countries in the world that can be described as democracies, about 60 have chosen to be parliamentary democracies with Iceland being the oldest and India the biggest. Some are unicameral.

Nearly all of the former colonial territories in the Caribbean chose to be parliamentary democracies, including Trinidad and Tobago and Dominica which are republics. Guyana is the exception.

There is obviously a consensus among them that this system is to be preferred over the presidential republic in which great power is vested in a directly-elected head of government who is also head of state.