Comment by md_
5 years ago
The primary attribute of American politics that encourages a two party system is what’s known as “first past the post” elections.
America’s two main parties have changed over the years (remember the Whigs?), so the existence of a two-party system cannot be attributed purely to control exerted by the current two parties.
First past the post doesn't explain Canada's four main parties. There is something preventing additional parties in America
Yes - it’s the fact that the race for the presidency is a winner-takes-all game. When Clinton lost, she didn’t get a diminished, minority, but still proportional say in the running of the government - she was completely out and Trump got everything.
The US system wasn’t engineered with the possibility of coalitions and compromise governments in mind (at least not in the Executive).
There are other countries, like France, where presidential elections have (obviously) a single winner which have nevertheless multiple parties.
If the US president was elected by the Congress would that end bipartidism? I don’t know.
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I thought the original setup where the vice president was whoever got the second most votes was going for that.
Every Canadian government but for one has been from one of the two main parties.
The other parties popular support determines which of those two parties wins.
When you have more than two you could end up in a minority government where a smaller parties decide issues by supporting a big party.
Provinces have had other parties become the government.
Another, often overlooked part, is that competing in an American election requires very expensive media and outreach campaigns.
Clinton spent $1.2B in 2016 and Trump spent $680B. These are formidable sums for non-establishment parties. Bernie spent $230M in a primary.
To give a rough comparison, the UK limits spending per constituency, so the upper limit a party is allowed to spend in the UK is 19.5 GBP.
> Clinton spent $1.2B in 2016 and Trump spent $680B. These are formidable sums for non-establishment parties.
I was going to write a comment about how shocked I was that Trump outspending Clinton by a factor of 500 didn't see any media coverage, but it looks like that's supposed to be 680M.
my bad, before the morning coffee and now it's too late to edit the comment.
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> Trump spent $680B
I think this is not true.
> the upper limit a party is allowed to spend in the UK is 19.5 GBP
I'm pretty sure they spend more than that, as well.
the B is a typo, should be M.
> I'm pretty sure they spend more than that, as well.
As per the BBC: https://www.bbc.com/news/election-2019-50170067
> In the 2017 general election, 75 parties and 18 campaign groups reported spending more than £41.6m between them. The Conservatives spent most at £18.6m. It fielded 638 candidates, winning in 317 constituencies. Labour came in at £11m and the Liberal Democrats at £6.8m.
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> Clinton spent $1.2B in 2016 and Trump spent $680B.
I'm not an expert but those numbers sound like total crap.
> Trump spent $680B.
Surely you mean $680M?
my bad, before the morning coffee and now it's too late to edit the comment.
Other countries with first-past-the-post have many parties. So FPTP does not cause two-parties - that's clearly nonsense.
Mathematically it makes sense for a two-party system to emerge, after the smaller parties are weeded out after some years of running unsuccessfully. Most people will accept compromise of their ideals to "fight some greater evil".
Hey Chris,
Maybe tone doesn't come across well in written communication, but dismissing this as "clearly nonsense" without bothering to engage with the merit of the claim or, seemingly, even read the link seems disrespectful, to say the least.
Do you want to rephrase? :)
Because there’s sooo many counter-examples. People see the word ‘law’ and they think it’s like physics but it isn’t like that.
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> Other countries with first-past-the-post have many parties
Which ones do you have in mind? The one's I'm thinking of have two main parties, and then strictly regional parties which displace them entirely in their regions.
> So FPTP does not cause two-parties - that's clearly nonsense.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law
For example the UK. A few elections ago a minor but national party was in government.
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The counterexample of other countries is not sufficient to rule it out as a causal factor, that's just faulty logic.