A Ceremonial President amid Constitutional-Political Crisis: Insights from Israel

The Institution of the Israeli Presidency is regarded as one of the weakest among ceremonial presidents in parliamentary democracies. This weakness is primarily manifested in the total absence of constitutional powers such as reviewing legislation or the formal nomination of cabinet ministers. Despite that, or perhaps due to this lack of powers, Israeli presidents enjoy a higher level of public trust relatively to other political institutions (parliament, government, political parties). The study aims to analyze the role of the Israeli presidency from 2018 to 2023. In this turbulent period Israel experienced the most severe political crisis of its history. The crisis was manifested in a political deadlock leading to five general elections in less than 4 years. Moreover, it saw unprecedented attacks on democratic norms and institutions that serve as safeguards against the extensive power of the executive branch. This came to a climax in 2023, in so-called "judicial reform" (or judicial overhaul) promoted by Netanyahu’s extremist right-wing government. In this context, the presidents (Reuven Rivlin until June 2021, Isaac Herzog since then) had several opportunities to intervene and make an impact. Such interventions could either take the form of performing their rather-constrained formal powers or using their informal powers. This paper outlines the presidential actions during this period and assesses their impact and effectiveness. We find that, unsurprisingly, the presidents’ weak constitutional powers make their informal powers much more relevant. But even this mode of operation is often futile within the context of democratic backsliding and vis-à-vis populist governments.