The provisions of the Jordanian Constitution give the Prime Minister the right to change his entire ministerial team without having to seek a renewed vote of confidence from the House of Representatives.
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This has never happened before. However, in the experience of long-serving governments, prime ministers have typically resorted to more than one reshuffle, with the result being that more than half of the cabinet is replaced within three or four years.
This means that the foundation of parliamentary confidence rests with the Prime Minister and the government’s program, or “ministerial statement,” on the basis of which the government secures parliamentary confidence.
In recent years, this approach has become more firmly established following the state’s adoption of an economic and administrative modernization vision that extends beyond individual governments.
The vision has produced implementation programs that successive governments are responsible for carrying out according to specific timelines for each sector and ministry.
For decades, cabinet reshuffles were associated with considerations that were entirely different from the criteria of the current phase.
At times, a reshuffle brought changes to the policies of the ministries concerned simply because the minister had changed, creating confusion in performance and negatively affecting implementation.
At other times, the Prime Minister would be driven to reshuffle the cabinet under pressure to satisfy regional, geographic, or even personal demands from his close associates. It became a familiar game of exchanging ministerial seats in stages, allowing everyone to leave satisfied with their friend, the Prime Minister.
Today, a cabinet reshuffle is much closer to a replacement than to a reshuffle in the political sense of the word.
After a year or two of experience in office, the Prime Minister may conclude that a change in a ministerial position is necessary to ensure that the required program is implemented on schedule.
Alternatively, the requirements of projects targeted for the next phase may call for a minister with different qualifications, after the previous minister has completed the first stage of the task.
The Prime Minister who owns the program will usually prefer to keep any changes to the narrowest possible limits, so as not to waste the ministry’s time, or his own, during a transitional period for a new minister who needs at least two or three months to become fully engaged in the machinery of government and absorb the programs and projects of his sector.
Some prime ministers may prefer to retain a minister who delivers at a 60 percent level rather than appoint a new minister who has to start from scratch. There have been prime ministers who adopted this approach, particularly because cabinet reshuffles generally draw from a government’s political capital rather than add to it.
No prime minister can satisfy all the political elites aspiring to a ministerial seat. In the end, after a reshuffle, he may have satisfied no more than a handful of people while angering hundreds and earning their hostility, along with their endless criticism of what they usually describe as a disappointing reshuffle. And what they mean, of course, is disappointing for their own ambitions.
In short, under the new model based on a program-driven government, a cabinet reshuffle is no longer a political event carrying significant implications for a change in the government’s approach or public policies.
It is much closer to the rules governing sports, and football in particular. The coach is the person with the vision and the leader of the team, which plays according to his instructions and plans.
During the 90 minutes in which the players battle on the field, some of them inevitably need to be substituted so that the team can continue playing with the same momentum and energy in pursuit of victory.
So what about a ministerial team that has been running on the field for a year or two? Clearly, some of its members may need a period of rest, making room for others sitting on the substitutes’ bench to test their abilities.
