I just realised the complete lack of division inside the magical government, and how that affects how it works and who has more power. There are no checks and balances, the power of the Minister is almost absolute, since:

1- He can indicate the Head of departments, that are only below him in terms of direct power inside the government.

2- There is no indication whatsoever that there is a Legislative, so no Parliament or Cabinet to control or influence the Minister.

3- There is only one branch of the Executive, no indication of local branche or the like, even in other parts of the UK. Kinda understandable with the small size of the magicak population, but stil...

4- No Judiciary, the Executive and some almost completely mysterious organ (the Wizgamont) does its duties.

5- No indication of any direct representtation or participation.

6- Minimum government is not a reality. The government is omnipresent in all parts of life, from Sports and Education, to International relations between private parts.

Those were my conclusions. Any thoughts? Mistakes or wrong assumptions? My canon fu isn't very strong, so please do correct me if you can.

 

The Wizengamot seems to be both a Judiciary of sorts and a....Parliamentary/Senate system? Regardless, the Minister does in fact have some limits and can't just run rampant without support.

 

You know, I feel like JKR came pretty close to what a hidden population's government might actually be like. A centralized power structure would be absolutely necessary. If there were ever a large scale breach of the Statute of Secrecy, the government response would need to be coordinated and swift. I doubt a decentralized power structure riddled with partisan politics and cockblocking would be able to manage it.

 

So a common law government with a unwritten Constitution like the muggles. The Ministry of Magic is what I imagine that would happen if Cromwell had created the Prime Minister role instead of his bullshit one and eliminated the independent courts and merged both Houses. That begs the question on how are the other magic governments and if they are as similar as the british one, which has the most stable history of all western countries, by far, followed by the US.

I wish JK had at least given some justification to all the power that Fudge had, like the mass break out, but it was far too late in the history to be able to justify it. And no mentions any outrageous abuse either. Fudge seems to be much more like a populist president in Latin America in the 60s than a british prime minister in regard how he acts and his powers.

But Khan is right, a central strong government would be a must. If only as an excuse by the ruling politicians.

 

On the note of the demotation of the chief warlock, considering the fact that warlock is used to refer to those skilled at dueling, and sometimes security guards, I always assumed the chief warlock was just the head of security, and not actually a member of the wizengamot at all. This makes everything make way more sense BTW.

 

The chief Warlock is likely in the position of advising the wizengamot, particularly on war issues. My point is the roll would not be called chief warlock if it did not, in some way, involve fighting. Unless they mean he is the chief weird looking person, which I suppose wouldn't be that much stranger than any other Rowling political statement.

 

Worlocks are oathbreakers.

 

I meant Warlock in the harry potter world. Look it up.
There are security warlocks. This is a thing. A pottermore thing, but a thing nonetheless. The title of warlock was, at one time, given like a knighting, to those particularly skilled at dueling. Other than that it is used to denote a wizard of odd appearance, or the chief warlock.
Therefore, it seems likely the chief warlock has something to do with what a warlock is, particularly since we know the wizengamot is headed by the minister of magic.

 

We don’t know that the Wizengamot is headed by the Minister for Magic. The only time we see this is during Harry’s trial where Fudge could also temporarily act as the Chief Warlock, considering Dumbledore lost this title only a short time before. There is no indication in the books that the Chief Warlock would be Head of Security. They were fighting a war, so I think Dumbledore would have mentioned it if he were the Head of Security Warlocks, meaning the head of a group of skilled fighters.

A quote from "The Tales of Beedle the Bard".

I think the important part is that these days a warlock can be wizard of particular skill or achievement in any field. Not only a wizard skilled in dueling. So the word Warlock in Chief Warlock doesn't necessarily mean that there is a connection to Security Warlocks.

 

Regarding the separation of powers more generally, it's worth noting that the British interpretation of the principle of separated powers is not the same as you'd see in the US.

Firstly, while the separation of powers is considered an important constitutional principle, it is not considered the only such principle. Separation of powers has to be balanced against other principles.

Foremost among these is the concept of the supremacy of Parliament: the idea that Parliament is the ultimate authority in the UK, capable of making and unmaking any law and unable to be overruled. This is justified on the principle of democracy, Parliament being the representatives of the people.

Given the supremacy of Parliament, separation of powers has a different interpretation. An executive and a judiciary completely divorced from Parliament would have no authority, because authority is derived from Parliament. There's no point separating powers completely when one of the three is capable of overruling the other two. So leadership of the executive is made up of members of the legislature, and the Supreme Court was established via Act of Parliament and lacks the power to strike down primary legislation. (Prior to the Supreme Court the highest court was Parliament itself, in the form of a committee of the House of Lords).

It is expected that the head of the executive will be able to pass any legislation he or she wants. Indeed, any other circumstance is considered unacceptable - a vote of no confidence in the executive by the legislature - and generally triggers another election.

Secondly, the historical source of constitutional danger is different in the UK. In the US, you have two groups: the government, and the people. The constitution developed to protect the people from the government. But in the UK you have three groups: the Crown, the government, and the people. In the UK, the government developed to protect the people from the Crown. (Where "the people" historically meant landowners, much like it did in the US). This inevitably leads to a different approach to separation of powers. In the US, government is seen as the danger to civil liberties, and so checks are placed on it. In the UK, Parliament is seen as the guarantor of civil liberties, and so it is given sufficient power to perform this role.

Of course it's been a long time since the Crown did anything to try to gather power to itself, but cultural memory is a long thing. Even though the monarchy has long been neutered, we all learn about the English Civil War in school, when Parliament executed a monarch who tried to raise taxes. There's a definite sense, even in modern times, that Parliament is in some sense the defender of the people. For some, anti-terrorism legislation is changing this view, but for the general public it's not something on their radar.

(It will be interesting to see if, in the future, US idea of government develops into something closer to the British version, if business interests take on a role functionally similar to the Crown. The American people might consent to greater government powers to protect them from powerful private interests.)

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With all of this in mind, and being aware that JKR is British and so will be familiar with the UK's politics, you can see how the Ministry of Magic is modelled after the Muggle system.

If there is a legislature in wizarding Britain, it's likely the Wizengamot, which is also the highest court. This mirrors the UK situation before the Constitutional Reform Act 2005, where the House of Lords was the highest court and part of the legislature.

The Minister, equivalent to the Prime Minister, has a significant role in the appointment of judges (his ability to dismiss the Chief Warlock). Though again, the Constitutional Reform Act 2005 has significantly reduced the role of the Prime Minister in this capacity. He basically now just recommends to the Queen the candidate that an independent panel recommends to him.

The Minister also has significant law-making power himself. This mirrors the way the Prime Minister doubles as the leader of the legislature, and also mirrors the significant amount of law-making power that Parliament has delegated to the executive (aka secondary legislation).

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To be clear, what I'm saying here is that the Ministry of Magic (like the Muggle state it mirrors) does have a separation of powers, it's just a different kind of separation than what you might see internationally. It's not a separation of powers by statute, but rather by convention. It is enforced not by law but by political reality.

For example, the Prime Minister is the one to recommend Supreme Court judges to the Queen, but if he were to go around making political appointments, as is done in the US, there would be a massive outcry, even from within his own political party. Though he has the legal right to recommend anyone he likes, convention is that he recommends a candidate who commands the respect of the judiciary.

Departing from this convention would cause a scandal, a media field day, and very possibly the end of his political career. So while the judiciary depends on Parliament for their authority, political reality means that Parliament is generally prevented from any actions which might be seen as compromising the independence and political neutrality of judges.

Similarly, I expect the Minister of Magic, while having great statutory powers, is expected to do things in certain ways, and deviating from those conventions will raise eyebrows. Of course, in certain exceptional circumstances, conventions can be deviated from. Indeed, this is one of the great advantages of the "convention based" system, as it's flexible enough to change with the times. But it does also mean that a false emergency (as Fudge was creating in OotP with his anti-Dumbledore campaign) can lead to the Minister getting away with a lot.

It's not hard to see how this happens. The US Presidency has significantly increased its ability to engage in military action independent of Congress' approval, and this has occurred because there was public support for those actions at the time they were taken. (In the UK it's the reverse: historically the executive has had the power to declare war, but a new convention was established in 2003 when Tony Blair had Parliament vote on the Iraq War, a convention reaffirmed with the vote on Syria. It's now unthinkable that a Prime Minister could go to war without a vote in Parliament).

 

I think like most people here I have my own headcanon regarding the Ministry's structure but I can't really back it up with anything other than it has to be structured poorly to allow so much corruption.

 

I see the Ministry as being a kind of hybrid organisation. I imagine that the Wizengamot pre-dates the Ministry significantly, and used to have a much more significant role, perhaps even being the same thing as the Warlock's Council. It may have had some kind of royal connection. I see it as having developed quite organically over the years as a gathering of powerful people (the wizarding equivalent of landowners) who would decree this and that in response to particular issues that arose. Over time it would formalise and sit regularly rather than ad hoc.

On the other hand, the Ministry arrived around the time of the Statute of Secrecy and represents the modern idea of the state, complete with a modern civil service.

Some event would have forced the two into a single organisation.

 

Given the Wizengamot's etymological roots in the Witenagemot, it would not be unreasonable that the Wizengamot would have similar functions. That body had some power over legislative, administrative, and juridical affairs though was still subordinate to the king. It stands to reason that they currently have a similar function with regards to the Minister of Magic — though who they "advised" prior to the founding of the Ministry is anyone's guess. The etymology also suggests the Wizengamot predated the Ministry in at least some form, which supports some of Taure's assertions.

 

If everybody hasn't, lets take a moment to realize the actual scale of governance we are talking about here.

If Hogwarts has anything close to 50% of the total student population of Britain/Ireland, then even with long Wizardly lives, and an assumption that feminist advances[Birth control and Contraceptive spells and potions, relatively easy divorce, increased difficulty of, to be frank, co-ercion into marriage](much easier when everyone is armed to the teeth by default*), and the war hit really hard and so Harry's generation is exceptionally small, then Magical Britain has a Human/part Human population of no more than 30,000.

And thats being generous. Its more likely around 13,000.

So everyone remember, this isn't the President as Prosecutor, this is the Mayor as Prosecutor. It's really a small town, an enormously huge small town, with a (by the movies which screwed some things up) somewhat overgrown government.

So keep that in mind. It might be less "Blatant horrid corruption" and more a function of how few people their are and the fact that the Minister, frankly, has the time to spare.

*God made man and woman. Samuel Colt made them equal. Except so much more hilarious and horrifying.

That event likely being that close relatives of the Wizengamot, or members themselves, were also part of the Ministry or likely were. Because of the above.

 

I remember some nice bit in a random story with Arthur confused by a concept of impartial jury. How somebody may be impartial with everybody knowing each other?

 

I am confused by the concept of trusting any law-related decision to jury, who are formed not from the ranks of lawyers, thus know next to nothing about law and decide based on the rhetoric rather than a set of rules. And I'm not even touching the impartial part.

This is a throwaway comment, rather than an attempt to spark a debate about advantages and disadvantages of juries.

The point I want to make is this - the wizarding world is a whole new world, and any and all legislative differences are to be different from what we practice. Anyone could wonder about anything. Hell, Arthur wonders about the purpose of a rubber duck.