scholarly journals Gender and Democratic Politics: A Comparative Analysis of Consolidation in Argentina and Chile

2000 ◽  
Vol 32 (3) ◽  
pp. 765-793 ◽  
Author(s):  
GEORGINA WAYLEN
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Comparative Analysis ◽  
Gender Relations ◽  
Party System ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Democratic Consolidation ◽  
Transition System ◽  
Democratic Politics ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Presidential Systems

This article highlights a number of themes useful in the gendered analysis of democratic consolidation in Latin America by means of a comparative analysis of Argentina and Chile. It starts from the assumption that much of the work on democratisation in Latin America – both orthodox and the literature concentrating on women and transitions – produced up until now, has been too voluntaristic in its approach. It argues that what is needed, particularly in the study of democratic consolidation, is an analysis not only of the impact of women and women's organisations on institutions and structures but also of how these institutions and structures can shape and change gender relations and different women's activities. Any gendered analysis of democratic consolidation must begin by examining the terms of transition which, while they can be subject to some renegotiation later, affect the nature of the subsequent system and the space available to different actors. It is argued that a number of characteristics of the post-transition system are significant: first the impact of more arbitrary populist or presidential systems, second the importance of women's organising both inside and outside the state and party systems and third the existence of an institutionalised party system.

Parties and Regime Change in Latin America

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Gamboa
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
Party System ◽  
Regime Change ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Democratic Politics ◽  
Democratic Institutions ◽  
Party Leaders ◽  
Party System Institutionalization

The importance of political parties has been at the heart of the debate about regime and regime change. Parties are essential actors for democratic politics. They can trigger transitions from and to democracy, polarize making democracies vulnerable to breakdown, or manage conflict to protect democratic institutions. However, not all parties or party systems are equal. The levels of fragmentation, polarization, and institutionalization in any given party and/or party system are key to understanding the rise, fall, and survival of democracy. In Latin America, the literature has focused, mostly, on party and party system institutionalization. In general, scholars agree that institutionalization fosters democracy. The organizational strength and embeddedness of political parties in society and the extent to which they interact regularly in stable ways, they argue, is key to the survival of democratic politics. There are instances, however, that suggest that this relationship is more problematic than the literature assumes. In contexts of crisis, highly institutionalized parties and party systems can be slow to adjust to new groups or demands and stiffen party leaders’ ability to respond to new issues. When facing a polarizing potential autocrat, for instance, high levels of party and party system institutionalization could hurt more than help democracy. They can reduce the ability of politicians to attract moderate voters from opposing parties, hinder their capacity to counteract antisystemic trends in order to lead opposition efforts, or limit the extent to which they can reach across the aisle to build ideologically diverse prodemocratic coalitions.

scholarly journals Market Reform, Programmatic (De)alignment, and Party System Stability in Latin America

2012 ◽  
Vol 46 (11) ◽  
pp. 1422-1452 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kenneth M. Roberts
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Party System ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
System Stability ◽  
Reform Process ◽  
Economic Adjustment ◽  
Democratic Regimes ◽  
Partisan Competition ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Leftist Parties

Although democratic regimes in Latin America since the early 1980s have been surprisingly durable, party systems in much of the region continue to experience very high levels of electoral instability. A critical juncture approach to institutional change suggests that variation in party system stability is related to the impact of market liberalization in the 1980s and 1990s on the programmatic alignment—or dealignment—of partisan competition. Market reforms that were adopted by conservative leaders and opposed by a major leftist rival aligned party systems programmatically, allowing societal opposition to be channeled into institutionalized forms of competition that were highly stable in the postadjustment era. By contrast, bait-and-switch reforms adopted by populist or leftist leaders were programmatically dealigning for party systems, leaving them vulnerable to highly destabilizing reactive sequences in the aftermath to the reform process—including mass social protests, the demise of historic conservative parties, and the outflanking of traditional populist or leftist parties by more radical, anti-neoliberal outsiders. The political dynamics of market-based economic adjustment thus heavily conditioned the ways in which party systems would process the postadjustment revival of populist and leftist alternatives in the region.

scholarly journals The Centre Does Not Hold: Coalition Politics and Party System Change in the Netherlands, 2002–12

2016 ◽  
Vol 53 (2) ◽  
pp. 231-255 ◽  
Author(s):  
Huib Pellikaan ◽  
Sarah L. de Lange ◽  
Tom W.G. van der Meer
Keyword(s):  
Coalition Formation ◽  
Party System ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Coalition Politics ◽  
Coalition Formation Process ◽  
The Impact

Like many party systems across Western Europe, the Dutch party system has been in flux since 2002 as a result of a series of related developments, including the decline of mainstream parties which coincided with the emergence of radical right-wing populist parties and the concurrent dimensional transformation of the political space. This article analyses how these challenges to mainstream parties fundamentally affected the structure of party competition. On the basis of content analysis of party programmes, we examine the changing configuration of the Dutch party space since 2002 and investigate the impact of these changes on coalition-formation patterns. We conclude that the Dutch party system has become increasingly unstable. It has gradually lost its core through electoral fragmentation and mainstream parties’ positional shifts. The disappearance of a core party that dominates the coalition-formation process initially transformed the direction of party competition from centripetal to centrifugal. However, since 2012 a theoretically novel configuration has emerged in which no party or coherent group of parties dominates competition.

scholarly journals Regime Types or Party Systems: What Matters More For Political Instability In The Developing World?

2015 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 28
Author(s):  
M. Moniruzzaman
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Party System ◽  
Developing World ◽  
Political Instability ◽  
Political Stability ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Dominant Party ◽  
Regime Types ◽  
What Matters

<p>Political stability is desired by every state. But is it contingent upon regime types or party systems? Existing studies on political stability suggest that regimes such as authoritarianism, democracy, and dictatorship and their variants have variously influenced political stability. Some have proved to be friendly with political stability in certain countries, while counterproductive for some other. However, the existing literature has exclusively focused on regime types alone neglecting the factor of party systems. This article argues that not only regime types but party systems also influence political stability. Based on data from Asia, Africa and Latin America this article examines the following four assumptions. Firstly, absolute monarchy and absolute authoritarianism together with no or one party system generally maintain political stability. Secondly, constitutional monarchies together with multiparty system generally maintain political stability. Thirdly, presidentialism together with dominant party system generally maintains political stability. And finally, parliamentarianism together with multi-party system is generally negatively related with political stability.</p>

Party Systems in Latin America

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Wills-Otero
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Latin American ◽  
Party System ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Third Wave ◽  
The Third ◽  
Voter Preferences ◽  
Political Configuration ◽  
American Party ◽  
Over Time

Since the beginning of the third wave of democratization in the late 1970s, Latin American party systems have confronted several challenges, and they have frequently been transformed. There have been various types of changes. While some systems collapsed in the 1990s (e.g., Venezuela and Peru), others realigned (Colombia, Chile, and Uruguay), or expanded (Argentina and Mexico), or were able to become consolidated and ensure their stability over time (e.g., Brazil). What factors explain the transformations in party systems during the past three decades, and how can Latin American party systems be classified according to their attributes? In trying to answer these questions, scholars of Latin America have undertaken studies that are both theoretically and empirically rich. Their work has increased our knowledge of the party systems and representative democracies in the region. Different factors have been highlighted in order to explain the changes these systems have undergone since the third wave of democratization. Some works emphasize the importance of institutional reforms introduced by politicians or by constitutional assemblies. The questions they address are the following: What political reforms have been introduced into Latin American political systems, and what effects have they had on the party systems in different countries? The researchers do not limit their attention to reforms of electoral systems. For example, some of them also study decentralization processes and their effects on party systems. From a different perspective, other authors focus on changes in electoral preferences and their effects on the configuration of political power, exploring how regional economic, political, and social changes have affected voter preferences and the political configuration of party systems. Still others consider the crises of democratic representation in these countries, underlining the decline in the programmatic character of parties as an explanatory variable for the crises and noting that the level of institutionalization of a party system declines when parties abandon this distinctive feature and become clientelistic or personalistic instead. On the other hand, in order to describe party systems and to observe the changes they have undergone, academics have proposed a set of concepts and measurements that make it possible to identify their levels of institutionalization (i.e., stability vs. volatility), nationalization, and programmatic structuration, among other aspects. The operationalization of these concepts has provided researchers with useful data for describing, comparing, and analyzing the party systems of the region transversely over time. Understanding the transformation and characteristics of Latin American party systems over time sheds light on both the progress democratic regimes have made and the setbacks they have suffered within specific countries and in the region at large.

scholarly journals Active and passive: two ways party systems influence electoral outcomes

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 451-467
Author(s):  
Miroslav Nemčok
Keyword(s):  
Party System ◽  
Electoral Systems ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Set Size ◽  
Electoral Outcomes ◽  
Chapel Hill ◽  
Ideological Polarization ◽  
Two Factors ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Choice Set

AbstractParties can not only actively adjust the electoral rules to reach more favourable outcomes, as is most often recognized in political science, but they also passively create an environment that systematically influences electoral competition. This link is theorized and included in the wider framework capturing the mutual dependence of electoral systems and party systems. The impact of passive influence is successfully tested on one out of two factors closely related to party systems: choice set size (i.e., number of options provided to voters) and degree of ideological polarization. The research utilizes established datasets (i.e., Constituency-Level Elections Archive, Party System Polarization Index, Chapel Hill Expert Survey, and Manifesto Project Database) and via regression analysis with clustered robust standard errors concludes that the choice set size constitutes an attribute with passive influence over electoral systems. Thus, it must be reflected when outcomes of electoral systems are estimated or compared across various contexts.

scholarly journals Party System Institutionalization, Party Collapse and Party Building

2016 ◽  
Vol 51 (4) ◽  
pp. 691-716 ◽  
Author(s):  
Scott Mainwaring
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Party System ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Time And Space ◽  
Party Building ◽  
Good For ◽  
Party System Institutionalization ◽  
Over Time

This essay reviews five important recent books on party system institutionalization, party collapse and party building. The first section analyses broader lessons about party system institutionalization derived from these books. What have we learned about how party system institutionalization varies over time and space and about its causes? All five volumes underscore the difficulty of institutionalizing democratic party systems in contemporary Asia, Africa and Latin America. At the same time, they demonstrate that there have been some successful cases of party building and party system institutionalization. In all three regions, variance across countries is great. The three books on Latin America show that sharp conflict and programmatic differences are good for institutionalization, partially countering earlier arguments about the perils of polarization. Across regions, erstwhile authoritarian ruling parties have sometimes helped to forge institutionalized party systems under competitive regimes. The rest of the essay analyses the three single-authored books in some detail and provides brief overviews of the two edited volumes.

scholarly journals Relationship Between Regional and National Level of Electoral Competition and Parameters of Party System Structuring in the Countries of the Visegrad Group

2019 ◽  
pp. 132-139
Author(s):  
Oleksandra Cholovska
Keyword(s):  
Party System ◽  
Electoral Systems ◽  
Electoral Competition ◽  
Political Process ◽  
National Level ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
National Elections ◽  
Regional Elections ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Visegrad Group

The vast majority of party and electoral researches, including the countries of the Visegrad Group,  focuses on the impact of elections and electoral systems on the institutionalization of parties and party systems, predominantly at the national level. However, the proposed article broadened this analysis mainly at the national level, in particular by analyzing regional elections and regional party systems. This is due to the fact that party-electoral interconnection is not one-tier, but instead is determined territorially, including territorial or administrative heterogeneity during elections. In other words, the study aims to show how region and regional elections (in the format of party system regionalization) affect the national political process, and, conversely, how national elections (in the format of party system nationalization) influence the regional political process in the context of the countries of the Visegrad Group. In this regard, the indicators of voter turnout, electoral volatility, influence of regional parties and coalitions, peculiarities and consequences of electoral blocsʼ and coalitionsʼ formation, parameters of territorial and socio-political cleavages and constructions of electoral systems and formulas were the directories of this relationship, both at national and regional levels, in the proposed study. Their use at the example of the Visegrad countries has made it possible to argue that the relationship between regional and national level of electoral competition and the parameters of the structuring of party systems in the analyzed region is largely reflected in nationalization processes at both national and regional level. Although it is theoretically found that such a relationship is bilateral and counter-dependent on the processes of regionalization of national elections and national electoral systems, or instead on nationalization of regional elections and regional party systems. Keywords: national elections, regional elections, party systems, nationalization and regionalization of party systems, the countries of the Visegrad Group.

scholarly journals Party System Compactness: Measurement and Consequences

2004 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 46-62 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. Michael Alvarez ◽  
Jonathan Nagler
Keyword(s):  
Great Britain ◽  
Party System ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
The United States ◽  
Vote Decision ◽  
Two Measures ◽  
Voter Choice ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Over Time ◽  
Issue Space

An important property of any party system is the set of choices it presents to the electorate. In this paper we analyze the distribution of parties relative to voters in the multidimensional issue space and introduce two measures of the dispersion of the parties in the issue space relative to the voters, which we call measures of the compactness of the parties in the issue space. We show how compactness is easily computed using standard survey items found on national election surveys. Because we study the spacing of the parties relative to the distribution of the voters, we produce metric-free measures of compactness of the party system. The measures can be used to compare party systems across issues, over time within countries, and across countries. Comparing the compactness of party systems across countries allows us to determine the relative amount of issue choice afforded voters in different polities. We examine the compactness of the issue space and test the impact it has on voter choice in four countries: the United States, the Netherlands, Canada, and Great Britain. We demonstrate that the more compact the distribution of the parties in the issue space on any given issue, the less voters weight that issue in their vote decision. Thus we provide evidence supporting theories suggesting that the greater the choice offered by the parties in an election, the more likely it is that issue voting will play a major role in that election.

Party System Format and the Longevity of Party Systems: An Empirical Examination

2014 ◽  
Vol 13 (6) ◽  
pp. 727-747
Author(s):  
Grigorii V. Golosov
Keyword(s):  
Party System ◽  
Proportional Hazards ◽  
Proportional Hazards Model ◽  
Control Variable ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Cox Proportional Hazards ◽  
Cox Proportional Hazards Model ◽  
Empirical Examination ◽  
Methodological Innovation ◽  
The Impact

This article employs the Cox proportional hazards model to discover the factors of survival of 162 party systems from 1792 to 2009. In order to avoid the endogeneity problem, the analysis employs the level of democracy as a control variable. The impact of the overall level of party system fragmentation is found negligible, even though excessive fragmentation is conducive to a higher hazard of party system termination. More importantly, systems with close competition among leading parties – including two-party systems and systems with close competition among up to four parties – are more likely to survive across time. The article introduces a methodological innovation by disaggregating the effective number of parties into two components, the leading parties’ balance and the residual fragmentation.

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