A cabinet reshuffle is a change in the composition of a government’s ministerial team. Reshuffles can either be minor, in which case a minister simply gets replaced after a resignation, or substantial, with whole departments (and sometimes ministerial posts) being created or abolished and other changes to the responsibilities assigned to different ministries. Such reshuffles are far more common in parliamentary systems than in presidential ones, where cabinet heads are typically confirmed by a legislative body, and often follow political scandals or electoral defeats.
Reshuffles are often considered important political events despite the fact that the cabinet, as an institution, has conspicuously limited clout in contemporary politics, having been famously characterized as ‘a secondary political institution’ (Fenno 1966: 5). Yet, even in systems where the cabinet has little or no sway, individual ministers have significant power to shape public policy and public opinion.
There is also a large literature on the politics of cabinet reshuffles, and the main argument in this article is that the type and mode of a reshuffle – the degree to which it is proactive or reactive – makes a big difference with regard to most of its effects. Ceteris paribus, proactive reshuffles tend to have more favourable outcomes than reactive reshuffles, as the former provide a tool against ministerial drift by promoting or demoting underperformers while at the same time preserving general cabinet equilibria.
This article builds on the previous work in this field, and presents a novel definition of reshuffle. It then develops a reshuffle typology and demonstrates its discriminating power by comparing the reshuffle landscape in four large West European countries.
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