Parties and party system change

Number Of Parties ◽

This chapter examines parties and party system change across the MENA countries since December 2010. The discussion begins with a brief overview of party systems in the region on the eve of the Arab Spring, thereby providing a quick introduction to the selected cases as well as a benchmark against which to measure change. Party system change is determined via indicators such as the effective number of parties, party system fragmentation, electoral volatility and the entry of new parties into the system. The analysis of the indicators of party system change is coupled with a discussion of empirical data on the political environment during and in the immediate aftermath of the elections, including issues such as regime classification, rotation of power, coalition structures, prohibited parties, and societal cleavages. The author explains how - despite the fact that some old regimes fell and elections were held - the traditionally dominant or hegemonic political parties stayed preeminent in a number of MENA countries. Finally, this chapter shows what party system change tells us about the prospects for democracy some five years after the outbreak of the Arab Spring.

Adapt or Perish? How Parties Respond to Party System Saturation in 21 Western Democracies, 1945–2011

British Journal of Political Science ◽

10.1017/s0007123419000152 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 1-23 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Marc van de Wardt ◽

Arjen van Witteloostuijn

Keyword(s):

Time Series ◽

Party System ◽

System Change ◽

Party Systems ◽

Limited Capacity ◽

Effective Number ◽

Time Series Analyses ◽

Number Of Parties ◽

Western Democracies

Abstract This study examines whether (and how) parties adapt to party system saturation (PSS). A party system is oversaturated when a higher effective number of parties contests elections than predicted. Previous research has shown that parties are more likely to exit when party systems are oversaturated. This article examines whether parties will adapt by increasing the nicheness of their policy platform, by forming electoral alliances or by merging. Based on time-series analyses of 522 parties contesting 357 elections in twenty-one established Western democracies between 1945 and 2011, the study finds that parties are more likely to enter – and less likely to leave – electoral alliances if PSS increases. Additionally, a small share of older parties will merge. The results highlight parties’ limited capacity to adapt to their environments, which has important implications for the literature on party (system) change and models of electoral competition.

Federal and Subnational Elections in Russia: Coherence and Divergence in Electoral Outcomes

Russian Politics ◽

10.30965/24518921-00503004 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 5 (3) ◽

pp. 329-353

Author(s):

Rostislav Turovsky ◽

Marina Sukhova

Keyword(s):

Party System ◽

Party Systems ◽

Strong Connection ◽

Regional Parties ◽

Electoral Outcomes ◽

Electoral Authoritarianism ◽

Subnational Elections ◽

Number Of Parties ◽

Regional Elections

Abstract This article examines the differences between Russian voting at federal elections and regional legislature elections, both combined and conducted independently. The authors analyse these differences, their character and their dynamics as an important characteristic of the nationalisation of the party system. They also test hypotheses about a higher level of oppositional voting and competitiveness in subnational elections, in accordance with the theory of second-order elections, as well as the strategic nature of voting at federal elections, by contrast with expressive voting during subnational campaigns. The empirical study is based on calculating the differences in votes for leading Russian parties at subnational elections and at federal elections (simultaneous, preceding and following) from 2003, when mandatory voting on party lists was widespread among the regions, to 2019. The level of competitiveness is measured in a similar way, by calculating the effective number of parties. The study indicates a low level of autonomy of regional party systems, in many ways caused by the fact that the law made it impossible to create regional parties, and then also by the 2005 ban on creation of regional blocs. The strong connection between federal and regional elections in Russia clearly underlines the fluid and asynchronic nature of its electoral dynamics, where subnational elections typically predetermine the results of the following federal campaigns. At the same time, the formal success of the nationalisation of the party system, achieved by increasing the homogeneity of voting at the 2016 and 2018 federal elections, is not reflected by the opposing process of desynchronisation between federal and regional elections after Putin’s third-term election. There is also a clear rise in the scale of the differences between the two. At the same time, the study demonstrates the potential presence in Russia of features common to subnational elections in many countries: their greater support for the opposition and presence of affective voting. However, there is a clear exception to this trend during the period of maximum mobilisation of the loyal electorate at the subnational elections immediately following the accession of Crimea in 2014–2015, and such tendencies are generally restrained by the conditions of electoral authoritarianism.

Crowded Space, Fertile Ground: Party Entry and the Effective Number of Parties

Political Science Research and Methods ◽

10.1017/psrm.2015.22 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 4 (2) ◽

pp. 317-342 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Daniel M. Kselman ◽

Eleanor Neff Powell ◽

Joshua A. Tucker

Keyword(s):

Political Parties ◽

Party System ◽

Status Quo ◽

Policy Implications ◽

Policy Outcomes ◽

Effective Number ◽

Data Set ◽

Fertile Ground ◽

Number Of Parties

This paper develops a novel argument as to the conditions under which new political parties will form in democratic states. Our approach hinges on the manner in which politicians evaluate the policy implications of new party entry alongside considerations of incumbency for its own sake. We demonstrate that if candidates care sufficiently about policy outcomes, then the likelihood of party entry shouldincreasewith the effective number of status quo parties in the party system. This relationship weakens, and eventually disappears, as politicians’ emphasis on “office-seeking” motivations increases relative to their interest in public policy. We test these predictions with both aggregate electoral data in contemporary Europe and a data set on legislative volatility in Turkey, uncovering support for the argument that party system fragmentation should positively affect the likelihood of entry when policy-seeking motivations are relevant, but not otherwise.

Understanding the root causes of the conflict in Yemen

Bussecon Review of Social Sciences (2687-2285) ◽

10.36096/brss.v2i2.199 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 2 (2) ◽

pp. 14-20

Author(s):

Hani Albasoos ◽

Buthaina Al Hinai

Keyword(s):

Saudi Arabia ◽

Arab Spring ◽

Peace Process ◽

The Other ◽

Humanitarian Crisis ◽

Trace Back ◽

Proxy War ◽

The Media ◽

Number Of Parties ◽

Following the Arab Spring in 2011, Yemen’s devastating conflicts have deepened even further, leading the country to be the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. Despite the international community's multiple attempts to resolve this conflict, the conflict seems to have reached a stalemate. To make matters worse, resolving the conflict is made difficult by the large number of parties involved, internally and externally, and by the complex, dual and fluid nature of the relationships they share. Although the media and international community's focus is directed towards the binary conflict between the Hadi government and Saudi Arabia on one side and Iran and the Houthis on the other, the conflict is greatly multifaceted and far from being binary. This paper critically analyzes and explores other participating actors to comprehend the root causes of the conflict entirely. Although this conflict has been advertised as a proxy war, while others trace back the motivation to sectarianism, this paper argues how this analysis can be misleading and hindering the peace process.

The Number of Parties and Party System Nationalization in an Integrated Analytical Framework

Comparative Sociology ◽

10.1163/15691330-12341362 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 14 (5) ◽

pp. 662-681

Author(s):

Grigorii V. Golosov

Keyword(s):

Party System ◽

Empirical Test ◽

Analytical Framework ◽

Direct And Indirect Effects ◽

Effective Number ◽

Regional Parties ◽

Methodological Tool ◽

Nuanced Understanding ◽

Number Of Parties

This study develops a methodological tool for integration of research on party system fragmentation and party system nationalization. The method is built by decomposing a standard indicator of fragmentation, the effective number of parties, into individual-party components (effective size scores), and weighting them by nationalization scores, which allows for disaggregating the number of parties into two distinct components, the effective numbers of national and regional parties. As a result, it becomes possible to assess the influences of substantively important factors upon the components of the number of parties and the overall level of fragmentation in a methodologically consistent, quantifiable way. In addition, the proposed framework of analysis differentiates between direct and indirect effects upon party system fragmentation. A preliminary empirical test on a sample from 90 countries demonstrates that the proposed framework for analysis allows for achieving a rich and nuanced understanding of the factors of party system fragmentation.

Public rights and liberties

Political Change in the Middle East and North Africa ◽

10.3366/edinburgh/9781474415286.003.0010 ◽

2017 ◽

Author(s):

Luis Melián

Keyword(s):

Arab Spring ◽

Civil Liberties ◽

Primary Sources ◽

Mena Region ◽

Significant Deterioration ◽

Mena Countries ◽

Legal Reforms ◽

Public Rights ◽

Legislative Framework ◽

A key issue in the study of political change is the situation and development of rights and freedoms. Specifically, this chapter studies the impact that the eruption of the Arab Spring has had on these liberties. In order to meet this objective it analyses primary sources, legal reforms and frameworks, and databases and research reports. The question this chapter addresses is whether political changes in the MENA region reflect deepening liberalisation processes through de iure modifications of the civil liberties legislative framework; and the extent to which these changes have had a de facto impact on regimes. In sum, it assesses whether these changes have been sufficient to represent an advance or regression in the democratic character of the region's political regimes. After the analysis, it can be concluded that the situation of civil liberties in the region is either precarious or alarming in the majority of the MENA countries. Furthermore, with the exception of Tunisia, the Arab Spring has not led to a substantive improvement despite the reformist ambition of some countries, and has even led to a significant deterioration in various cases.

Did the Arab Spring reduce MENA countries’ growth?

Applied Economics Letters ◽

10.1080/13504851.2019.1588938 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 26 (19) ◽

pp. 1579-1585 ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

Mahmoud Arayssi ◽

Ali Fakih ◽

Nathir Haimoun

Keyword(s):

Arab Spring ◽

Mena Countries ◽

A Statistical Model for Party-Systems Analysis

Political Analysis ◽

10.1093/pan/mpr041 ◽

2012 ◽

Vol 20 (2) ◽

pp. 235-247 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Arturas Rozenas ◽

R. Michael Alvarez

Keyword(s):

Party System ◽

Party Systems ◽

Data Sets ◽

Novel Approach ◽

Proposed Model ◽

Index Value ◽

Party Vote Shares ◽

Number Of Parties ◽

Index Measure

Empirical researchers studying party systems often struggle with the question of how to count parties. Indexes of party system fragmentation used to address this problem (e.g., the effective number of parties) have a fundamental shortcoming: since the same index value may represent very different party systems, they are impossible to interpret and may lead to erroneous inference. We offer a novel approach to this problem: instead of focusing on index measures, we develop a model that predicts the entire distribution of party vote-shares and, thus, does not require any index measure. First, a model of party counts predicts the number of parties. Second, a set of multivariate t models predicts party vote-shares. Compared to the standard index-based approach, our approach helps to avoid inferential errors and, in addition, yields a much richer set of insights into the variation of party systems. For illustration, we apply the model on two data sets. Our analyses call into question the conclusions one would arrive at by the index-based approach. Software is provided to implement the proposed model.