The Greek Parliament of 2012: Coalitions, Incentives & Power Indices in Context
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In this retrospective study, we revisit the twin Greek Parliamentary elections of May and June 2012 and the Presidential election that led to the dissolution of the Parliament in December 2014. Apart from their political impact at European-wide level, these elections provide a unique political field experiment for the application of power indices and their interpretation in context. We model three different Parliament configurations as weighted majority games and utilize available software to evaluate the Shapley-Shubik, Banzhaf (normalized and absolute), Deegan-Packel, Public Good (Holler) and when applicable the Myerson, Owen and Coleman's indices. By comparing the indices evaluations with the actual events, our findings have twofold implications. On a context specific level, we identify discrepancies between parliamentary seat share and formal power of each party. In this way, we understand parties' motives and strategic considerations that offer an alternative perspective to existing political analyses. On a methodological level, we are able to comment on the predictive and explanatory quality of the various power indices at least in this case-specific context. Finally, we discuss constitutional problems that emerge in the dichotomous voting processes at the enhanced majority of 60% stipulated by the Greek Constitution and propose necessary policy amendments.
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