The Dominant Party System

Using country-specific case studies, top-rank analysts in the field focus on the lessons that dominant parties might learn from losing and the adaptations they consequently make in order to survive, to remain competitive or to ultimately re-gain power.

This book asks why dominant political parties emerge in some authoritarian regimes, but not in others, focusing on Russia's experience under Putin.

Why have dominant parties persisted in power for decades in countries spread across the globe? Why did most eventually lose? Why Dominant Parties Lose develops a theory of single-party dominance, its durability, and its breakdown into fully competitive democracy. Greene shows that dominant parties turn public resources into patronage goods to bias electoral competition in their favor and virtually win elections before election day without resorting to electoral fraud or bone-crushing repression. Opposition parties fail because their resource disadvantages force them to form as niche parties with appeals that are out of step with the average voter. When the political economy of dominance erodes, the partisan playing field becomes fairer and opposition parties can expand into catchall competitors that threaten the dominant party at the polls. Greene uses this argument to show why Mexico transformed from a dominant party authoritarian regime under PRI rule to a fully competitive democracy.

This book examines dominant parties in both established democracies and new democracies and explores the relationship between dominant parties and the democratic process. Bridging existing literatures, the authors analyse dominant parties at national and sub-national, district and intra-party levels and take a fresh look at some of the classic cases of one-party dominance. The book also features methodological advances in the study of dominant parties through contributions that develop new ways of conceptualizing and measuring one-party dominance. Combining theoretical and empirical research and bringing together leading experts in the field - including Hermann Giliomee and Kenneth Greene - this book features comparisons and case studies on Japan, Canada, Germany, Mexico, Italy, France and South Africa. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of political science, democracy studies, comparative politics, party politics and international studies specialists.

In this collection of original essays, thirteen country specialists working within a common comparative frame of reference analyze major examples of long-term, single-party rule in industrialized democracies. They focus on four cases: Japan under the Liberal Democratic party since 1955; Italy under the Christian Democrats for thirty-five or more years starting in 1945; Sweden under the Social Democratic party from 1932 until 1976 (and again from 1982 until present); and Israel under the Labor party from pre-statehood until 1977.

This is a path-breaking study by leading scholars of comparative politics examining the internal transformations of dominant parties in both authoritarian and democratic settings. The principle question examined in this book is what happens to dominant political parties when they lose or face the very real prospect of losing? Using country-specific case studies, top-rank analysts in the field focus on the lessons that dominant parties might learn from losing and the adaptations they consequently make in order to survive, to remain competitive or to ultimately re-gain power. Providing historical based, comparative research on issues of theoretical importance, Political Transitions in Dominant Party Systems will be invaluable reading for students and scholars of comparative politics, international politics and political parties.

Is the dominance of one political party a problem in an emerging democracy, or simply an expression of the will of the people? Why has one-party dominance endured in some African democracies and not in others? What are the mechanisms behind the varying party-system trajectories? Considering these questions, the authors of this collaborative work use a rigorous comparative research design and rich case material to greatly enhance our understanding of one of the key issues confronting emerging democracies in sub-Saharan Africa.

Democracies derive their resilience and vitality from the fact that the rule of a particular majority is usually only of a temporary nature. By looking at four case-studies, The Awkward Embrace studies democracies of a different kind; rule by a dominant party which is virtually immune from defeat. Such systems have been called Regnant or or Uncommon Democracies. They are characterized by distinctive features: the staging of unfree or corrupt elections; the blurring of the lines between government, the ruling party and the state; the introduction of a national project which is seen to be above politics; and the erosion of civil society. This book addresses major issues such as why one such democracy, namely Taiwan, has been moving in the direction of a more competitive system; how economic crises such as the present one in Mexico can transform the system; how government-business relations in Malaysia are affecting the base of the dominant party; and whether South Africa will become a one-party dominant system.