Comment by overfeed
1 day ago
2-party electoral systems (likely to bear >50% majority governments) are also not very democratic, in a way. There's no perfect system, but I prefer minority governments to a 2-party duopoly. YMMV.
1 day ago
2-party electoral systems (likely to bear >50% majority governments) are also not very democratic, in a way. There's no perfect system, but I prefer minority governments to a 2-party duopoly. YMMV.
The UK has been effectively a two party system anyway within living memory (Labour and Tories). Only rarely (e.g. 2010) does the token third party, the Lib Dems) get to be in coalition, and I think no one else has won anything since 1910.
In a monkey's paw moment for everyone who dislikes only having effectively two parties to choose from, this may soon be changing as Reform is poised to overtake the Tories.
> The UK has been effectively a two party system anyway within living memory
> ...this may soon be changing as Reform is poised to overtake the Tories.
How long has the Farage-shaped tail been wagging the dog? It probably was before 2010. He managed notch many wins without winning a majority government by getting the 2 major parties - especially the Tories - to adopt his parties' positions.
Technically 2017-19 was a minority government where a party in Northern Ireland sold its votes for about £100k/mp/vote to prop up May.
It's a two party system in the sense that only two parties have a chance of winning any given UK general election, but the popular vote is quite widely distributed among parties. In the last election, 33.7% of people voted Labour and 23.7% people voted for the second largest party (the Conservatives):
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1478478/uk-election-resu...