Introduction: The Impartiality of Parliamentary Administration

This introduction to a special issue discusses the importance of political impartiality to parliamentary administration. We argue political impartiality is part of the infrastructure of democracy; that it deserves closer attention because of its tacit, fragile nature; and because of the febrile political times that we live in, where established norms and institutions are increasingly under attack. Moreover, political impartiality has largely been examined in an executive context, but in a legislative setting it becomes particularly problematic, because of the presence of multiple political principals in an intense and much more intimate environment. We adopt a working definition of political impartiality: it is a stance, largely based on tacit knowledge and learned through practice, which applies to permanent parliamentary staff; and it involves a complex responsiveness to a number of principals (including parliament as an institution); and is qualified by a duty of self-abnegation.