Kurdistan Parliament: Formation of A De Jure Institution in a De Facto State

Abstract

The Kurdistan Parliament – Iraq was established in 1992 and has increasingly gained legitimacy both inside and outside the
region. The parliament is a unicameral legislative body in the northern part of Iraq recognized as a federal region officially
known as Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI). It has been functioning as a de jure institution in a de facto state, with a reasonably
stable legislative capacity. The formalized procedures and legally established functions of this parliament are indicative of a
functional institution, albeit with long periods in which the main parliamentary parties do not reach the required consensus to
legislate. After five election cycles, five parliamentary terms and having passed hundreds of laws, are the region and its
representative institution able to pass the test of being a minimal democracy?