Classifying party patterns and party systems
Alan Siaroff · 2018
Duration is a scholarly criterion when establishing (pre)dominant party systems, but not apparently other types of party systems. In two-and-a-half-party systems there is a relevant ‘half’ consisting of one or more smaller parties. This party or these parties are clearly much smaller than the main two, but its/their strength is often or usually enough to produce a hung parliament. In a moderately multi-party system, much depends on whether there is a predominant or dominant party, or conversely whether the parties are balanced in terms of size. Even when there is a hung parliament, if there is a dominant party this is normally the central force in government formation. In Wales, the Labour Party has done both. A third, but much rarer scenario, is for all of the other parties to “gang up” together in government so as to exclude the dominant party. In moderately multi-party systems with a balance amongst the parties there is rarely such a sense of unipolarity.