Parties

Question 1

What are the four goals for electing representatives

Answer 1

1. Authorisation of legitimate government
2. Retrospective accountability
3. Mirroring the range of options (diversity within parties)
4. Mirroring the range of identities

Question 2

Define a political party

Answer 2

A group identified by name and ideology that fields candidates at elections in order to win public office and control government

Question 3

What are the five types of political party

Answer 3

1. Mass party: ideologically committed and power of the party lies outside the parliamentary party
2. Cadre party: pragmatic, gaining power more important than ideological purity
3. Catch-all party: median-voter pursuant
4. Electoral-professional party: median voter pursuant based on polls
5. Cartel party: collude to exclude parties who challenge

Question 4

Why parties? 5 reasons

Answer 4

1/ helping voters make informed decisions
2/ Sites of accountability
3/ Governability: making it easier to pass laws
4/ Elimination of spoilers ( factions )
5/ political socialisation: makes politics easier to follow?

Question 5

What is divurger’s law

Answer 5

Essentially,

Major parties = number of local representatives + 1

Question 6

Tell me about one Australian party national trend since 1901 and one state trend

Answer 6

Liberal National coalition have held national power about 2/3 of the time since 1901

However, there are states eg NSW where Labour traditionally dominates