The importance of attachment to an ideological group in multi-party systems: Evidence from Israel

2021 ◽  
pp. 135406882110444
Author(s):  
Odelia Oshri ◽  
Omer Yair ◽  
Leonie Huddy
Keyword(s):  
Party System ◽  
Political Action ◽  
Political Engagement ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Vote Choice ◽  
Survey Experiments ◽  
Partisan Identity

In this research, we examine the role of attachment to an ideological group as a source of stability in a volatile multi-party system. In two studies conducted in Israel ( N = 1320), we show that a multi-item Attachment to an Ideological Group (AIG) scale is strongly tied to vote choice and political engagement, and its effects are independent of, and more powerful than, issue-based ideology and partisan identity strength. Compared to individuals with a weak ideological attachment, those who score highly on the AIG scale are more likely to vote for a party from their ideological camp and participate in politics. Moreover, in two survey experiments, respondents high in AIG displayed stronger anger or enthusiasm—known harbingers of political action—in response to threat or reassurance to their ideological group’s status, attesting to a link between AIG and political engagement. Our findings underscore the importance of ideological group attachments in a volatile multi-party system.

Segmental Volatility in Ethnically Divided Societies: (Re)assessing Party System Stability in Southeast Europe

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-19
Author(s):  
Damir Kapidžić ◽  
Olivera Komar
Keyword(s):  
Ethnic Identity ◽  
Party System ◽  
Ethnically Diverse ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
System Stability ◽  
Southeast Europe ◽  
East European ◽  
Ethnic Parties ◽  
Stabilizing Factors

Abstract This article examines the role of ethnicity and ethnic parties as stabilizing factors in Southeast European party systems. It compares two ethnically divided countries in Southeast Europe: Bosnia and Herzegovina, where ethnic identities that form the political cleavage are firm, and Montenegro, where they are malleable. Theoretically, it addresses the debate between scholars who either find stability or instability in East European post-communist party systems. The article traces the role of ethnicity in the formation and development of electoral contests and compares the two cases by utilizing measures of block volatility, based on analysis of official electoral data. We argue that party systems in ethnically diverse countries are stable at the subsystems level, but unstable within them. In BiH, firm ethnic identity stabilizes the party system by limiting competition between blocks, leading to closure. Malleable ethnic identity in Montenegro opens competition to non-ethnic parties seeking to bridge ethnic divisions, leading to more instability. We find that party system dynamics in ethnically divided new democracies depend on identity rigidity and cleavage salience, in addition to levels of heterogeneity.

Party Systems and Government Stability in the Indian States

1977 ◽  
Vol 71 (4) ◽  
pp. 1384-1405 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul R. Brass
Keyword(s):  
Party System ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
State Governments ◽  
Indian States ◽  
Leadership Skill ◽  
Dominant Party ◽  
Coalition Governments ◽  
Indian State ◽  
Degree Of Fragmentation

This paper contributes to the substantive and methodological discussion of the issues concerning the causes of cabinet instability through analysis of data from Indian state politics. The focus of the analysis is on explaining the duration of Indian state governments in days with variables measuring the degree of fragmentation and cohesion in the party system, the composition of the cabinet, the characteristics of the opposition, and the role of ideological differences. A substantial amount of the variation in the durability of coalition governments is explained with variables that measure the degree of party system institutionalization and the extent of political opportunism, but ideological factors do not explain much of the differences in durability of governments. It is also found that none of the measures used can explain much of the variation in one-party majority governments for which, it is argued, explanations must be sought that focus on leadership skill and on relationships between leaders and factions in a dominant party.

scholarly journals The role of political opposition: A pre-requisite for democracy

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 63-71
Author(s):  
Arif Khan ◽  
Saiful Islam ◽  
Muhammad Alam
Keyword(s):  
Party System ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Parliamentary Democracy ◽  
Democratic System ◽  
The Government ◽  
Incumbent Party ◽  
The Times ◽  
Set Up ◽  
Do So

No doubt for a democracy to be triumphant, multi-party system or, at least two party systems is obligatory. A country where there is one party system and lack observant and efficient opposition there are every chances for the incumbent party to become autocratic and domineering. One party system is most of the times susceptible to transform into dictatorship. Most of the times where there is one party system, the opposition is stifled and trampled and the dictatorship of the single party is established. Germany during Hitler’s rule and Italy during Mussoloni rule are the cases in point. One cannot imagine of a democratic set up without a healthy and watchful opposition. For the success of any parliamentary democracy, an effective opposition is must to carry out its functions courageously and effectively. The paper analyses the rights, responsibilities and obligations of opposition in a democratic system. For this purpose, the techniques adopted by the researcher for data collection include a detailed survey of the available literature covering different aspects of the topic. The internationally reputed authors and experts have been quoted. It is for the government to allow the opposition to fulfil their functions, which indicates a sign of democratic maturity on the part of government. The opposition has to focus on its democratic functions and if it fails to do so, it will be a sign of dysfunctional democracy.

Party Systems: Types, Dimensions, and Explanations

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zsolt Enyedi ◽  
Fernando Casal Bértoa
Keyword(s):  
Party System ◽  
Balance Of Power ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
System Stability ◽  
Informal Institution ◽  
Democratic Experience ◽  
The Stability

The study of political parties and party systems is intimately linked to the development of modern political science. The configuration of party competition varies across time and across polities. In order to capture this variance, one needs to go beyond the analysis of individual parties and to focus on their numbers (i.e. fragmentation), their interactions (i.e. closure), the prevailing ideological patterns (i.e. polarization), and the stability of the balance of power (i.e. volatility) in all spheres of competition, including the electoral, parliamentary, and governmental arenas. Together, these factors constitute the core informal institution of modern politics: a party system. The relevant scholarship relates the stability of party systems to the degree of the institutionalization of individual parties, to various institutional factors such as electoral systems, to sociologically anchored structures such as cleavages, to economic characteristics of the polity (primarily growth), to historical legacies (for example, the type of dictatorship that preceded competitive politics) and to the length of democratic experience and to the characteristics of the time when democracy was established. The predictability of party relations has been found to influence both the stability of governments and the quality of democracy. However, still a lot is to be learned about party systems in Africa or Asia, the pre-WWII era or in regional and/or local contexts. Similarly, more research is needed regarding the role of colonialism or how party system stability affects policy-making. As far as temporal change is concerned, we are witnessing a trend towards the destabilization of party systems, but the different indicators show different dynamics. It is therefore crucial to acknowledge that party systems are complex, multifaceted phenomena.

Parties as Agents of Transition

2019 ◽  
pp. 580-584
Author(s):  
Saara Inkinen
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Political Science ◽  
Party System ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Science Literature ◽  
Party Strategies ◽  
Collective Actors ◽  
Autocratic Regime ◽  
Autocratic Regimes

This chapter reviews recent political science literature on the role of political parties and party systems in regime transition processes. The first part focuses on parties as collective actors, discussing the effects of different regime and opposition party strategies on the liberalization and breakdown of autocratic regimes. It also notes how such strategies may be shaped by autocratic regime subtypes and the internal organization of political parties. The second part goes on to consider party systems as an institutional arena that constrains party interactions. It examines arguments linking democratization to the institutionalization and type of autocratic party system, with an emphasis on competitive and hegemonic autocratic regimes. Directions for further research are provided in the conclusion.

Strategic Voting Under Conditions of Uncertainty: A Re-Evaluation of Duverger's Law

2007 ◽  
Vol 37 (2) ◽  
pp. 313-332 ◽  
Author(s):  
EMILY CLOUGH
Keyword(s):  
Party System ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Strategic Voting ◽  
Third Party ◽  
Agent Based Model ◽  
Agent Based ◽  
Number Of Parties ◽  
Duverger's Law ◽  
The Way

Political scientists have long recognized that the number of parties in a country influences the way that interests are represented in that country. One explanation for the number of parties in a system relies on the idea of strategic voting, i.e. voters may not want to ‘waste a vote’ by voting for a third party. However, work in this area does not address the role of an important factor that may affect party systems through strategic voting: information. Without polls, how could voters know which parties were likely to win, and hence how to vote strategically? Using an agent-based model, this article assesses the role that information plays in shaping the party system through strategic voting. The results of this model demonstrate that, contrary to Duverger's Law, more than two parties may emerge in single-member plurality systems, even when all voters are strategic.

scholarly journals A Comparative Study of the Effects of Electoral Institutions on Campaigns

2017 ◽  
Vol 49 (1) ◽  
pp. 381-399 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Sudulich ◽  
Siim Trumm
Keyword(s):  
Comparative Study ◽  
Political Competition ◽  
Political Engagement ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Electoral Institutions ◽  
Parliamentary Elections ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
First Order ◽  
Electoral Mobilization

A long tradition of studies in political science has unveiled the effects of electoral institutions on party systems and parliamentary representation. Yet their effects on campaign activities remain overlooked. Research in this tradition still lacks a strong comparative element able to explore the nuanced role of electoral institutions in shaping individual-level campaigns during first-order parliamentary elections. This study uses data from a variety of national candidate studies to address this lacuna, and shows that the structure of electoral institutions affects the electoral mobilization efforts put in place by candidates. Candidate-centred electoral systems incentivize more intense and complex mobilization efforts, and shift the campaign focus towards individuals rather than parties. By directly addressing the effects of electoral institutions on campaign behaviour, this study contributes to the wider debate on their role in promoting political engagement and mobilization. These results indicate that electoral institutions affect political competition much more than previously thought.

The role of political parties in shaping citizens’ political preferences for the territorial organization of the state: the Spanish case

2013 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 477-502 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mariano Torcal ◽  
Fabiola Mota
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Party System ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
The State ◽  
Systems Dynamics ◽  
National Party ◽  
Political Preferences ◽  
Territorial Organization ◽  
The Individual

This article discusses how nationalist regional and state-wide parties, responding to different sub-national party systems dynamics, contribute similarly to interregional and individual public opinion disagreements about the model of the state in new, successfully decentralized democracies. Using individual survey data and other regional-level aggregate measures to perform a multilevel analysis in the 17 Spanish regions, we will show that both types of parties (non- and state-wide parties), following certain sub-national party system dynamics, are a very important influential and conditional factor in explaining the individual preferences adopted by citizens regarding the model of the state, despite the generally positive evaluation of the performance of new decentralized institutions by a large majority of Spaniards. These different positions are producing a persistent inter-individual conflict among Spaniards that have also a strong interregional component.

Parties, Partisanship, and Public Policy in the Pennsylvania Legislature

1954 ◽  
Vol 48 (2) ◽  
pp. 450-464 ◽  
Author(s):  
William J. Keefe
Keyword(s):  
Voting Behavior ◽  
Party System ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Legislative Process ◽  
Party Organizations ◽  
State History ◽  
Fruitful Research ◽  
American Party ◽  
The Impact

A significant result of the report “Toward A More Responsible Two-Party System” has been the marked growth of interest in the American party system. It is nevertheless true that our knowledge about the way in which party systems function is far from complete. An area promising fruitful research and presenting many hypotheses susceptible of systematic inquiry is that of the role of party organizations in the legislative process.It is the purpose of this article to examine the legislative role of political parties in the Pennsylvania General Assembly; more precisely, to measure their influence in the formation of the state's public policies in one session of the legislature. The most recent completed session at the time of this study was that of 1951—the longest session in state history.In order to evaluate the impact of party upon legislation, the concept of a “party vote” has been used. This is merely an operating definition by which to measure differences in party attitudes on questions subjected to roll-call votes on the floor. The assumption was made that the interests of the parties can be established best by analyzing the voting behavior of their membership. Questions to which partisan significance is attached will find the parties aligned against each other.

The Shrinking Elephants: The 2009 Election and the Changing Party System

2010 ◽  
Vol 28 (3) ◽  
pp. 25-46 ◽  
Author(s):  
David P. Conradt
Keyword(s):  
Social Structure ◽  
Political System ◽  
Party System ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Supply Side ◽  
The Future

While the 2009 election resulted in a familiar governing coalition, the dealignment of the party systems continued. Support for the once-major parties dropped to historic lows as did turnout. This article delves into the factors underlying this dealignment process. In addition to familiar demandside variables—social structure, values, and interests—particular attention is given to the supply side of the dealignment equation: the role of the parties, their leaders, strategies, and policies. The consequences of these changes for the future of the party and political system are then discussed in a comparative context.

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