Political Parties - Party Systems

Question 1

Dominant-party system

Answer 1

• where only one party has a realistic change of winning
• could be because of electoral fraud, exploitation of state resources or genuine popularity (in Japan the Liberal-democrats party has been in power almost continually since 1955)

Question 2

Single-party system

Answer 2

• only one party exists and all others are banned
• complete control over political system (The Democratic peoples republic of North Korea has a single-party system)

Question 3

Two-party system

Answer 3

• here only two parties have a chance of success at an election and so power shifts between those two parties
• FPTP is most likely in these systems
• eg USA has a two-party system with the Democrats or the Repuplicans winning

Question 4

Two-and-a-half-party systems

Answer 4

• two main parties, but a third smaller party challenges the dominance of the two main parties
• in the 2010-15 coalition the Lib Dem’s could be argued to be a half party

Question 5

Multi-party systems

Answer 5

• where more than two parties have the possibility of inning an election or being able to take up a role in power
• eg Germany is a multi-party system, where coalitions are formed to govern the country

Question 6

What is the UK’s Party system?

Answer 6

• traditionally two party system as Labour and conservatives take up a large % of the popular vote and their party membership is still the highest
• dominant party system - can be argued for conservatives from 1979-1997 and Labour from 1997-2010
• two-and-a-half-party-system - can be argued in 2010-2015 with the coalition with Lib Dem’s and conservatives