EIRP Proceedings, Vol 6 (2011)

Abstract

This paper is innovating the theory of elités in the way it was configured by the Central and Eastern European thinking (researches and studies) because it is focused on the way the changing of the electoral system influences the structure of political parliamentary elités. This study aims at revealing the connection between the electoral system and the structure of political élites, and it is based on two sociological researches that took place in the Romanian Parliament (Chamber of Deputies) in two different chronological and political moments. The first chronological moment was in October 2008 and the second was in November 2009. The political moments are given by the presence of two different types of electoral systems. In the first research, the political élites analyzed belonged to a parliament elected by a  proportional representation system (PR) on closed lists, and in the second, the elections took place by „uninominal” system. It is shown that the change of electoral system from a period to another does determines the strategy of behavior of the political parliamentary élites and, implicitly, the functioning of parliamentary democracy through the political decisions that shape a certain behavior of élites.