2.2 Separation of Powers and Checks and Balances

The doctrine: the state's power divided among three organs — legislature (law-making), executive (execution), judiciary (adjudication) — each confined to its own function; the logic: liberty's protection (power checking power — Montesquieu's warning that concentrated power corrupts). The doctrine's faces: The rigid (American) version: the three branches sealed from each other, personnel separated; The flexible (Westminster/Nepali) version: the legislature-executive fusion (the PM and ministers from parliament) with the judiciary independent — separation as a principle of BALANCE, not of walls. The modern administrative reality (the honest admission): the administration exercises all three functions in modified form — Quasi-legislative: delegated legislation (rules and regulations — Unit 4); Quasi-judicial: administrative adjudication (tribunals, licensing decisions — Unit 6); Executive proper: the implementation and casework. This blend is neither heresy nor accident: the welfare state demands it. The constitutional question is not WHETHER the administration may exercise these functions but ON WHAT TERMS — each borrowed function carries the native function's disciplines (rule-making carries publication and parliamentary control; adjudication carries natural justice and judicial review). Checks and balances (the doctrine's other half): The legislature checks the executive: questions, committees, no-confidence, the budget; The executive checks the legislature: the dissolution, the ordinance power, the bill's initiation; The judiciary checks both: the judicial review — the statutes' constitutionality, the administration's legality (Articles 133/137); The executive checks…