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Parties and Party Systems: A Framework of Analysis
... High levels of polarization can degrade the quality of democracy (Svolik, 2019;Valentim & Dinas, 2024), trust (Schedler, 2023), and the willingness to reach compromise (Rostbøll, 2025). They can also lead to instability, dysfunctionality, and government inefficiency (Sartori, 2005). ...
... Schedler, 2023). However, in Sartori's latter refinement of the concept, polarization occurs through severe, elite-driven ideological conflict and mutual delegitimating between mainstream and anti-system parties (Sartori, 2005, as cited in Bosco & Verney, 2020). Christian Rostbøll (2025) suggested that this dynamic represents a distinct form of intransigent polarization that is characterized by a refusal to listen to or accommodate political adversaries. ...
... Intransigent polarization concerns the depth of conviction and the acceptable methods for achieving political goals. For illiberal antidemocratic forces, an existential threat justifies any means necessary, including violence (Sartori, 2005). Compromise becomes irrelevant and politics a zero-sum game, with direct democracy serving as its ultimate expression-which reflects the unrestrained will of the majority without protection for minorities. ...
This article examines the dual role of polarization in fostering political mobilization for and against democracy in Central and Eastern Europe. Populist movements in this region often drive democratic decline, yet, notable cases, such as electoral victories in Czechia (2021) and Poland (2023), suggest that civil society can counter these trends. Following Schedler (2023), we perceive polarization as a fundamental democratic conflict about democratic norms and values. This study investigated how varying forms of polarization— ideological, affective, intransigent, and partisan sorting—affected the mobilization dynamics for and against democracy. We highlight that polarization affected mobilization for democracy more strongly than mobilization for autocracy—i.e., civil society successfully mobilized against populism. In a critical case study of limited polarized pluralism in the 2023 Czechia presidential election between populist and anti‐populist candidates, affective and partisan sorting polarization were the strongest predictors of populist support, with anger at the political situation boosting votes for the populist candidate. At the same time, pro‐Ukrainian stances drove support for the anti‐populist candidate. Our findings revealed that affective polarization and partisan sorting significantly shaped mobilization outcomes, thereby impacting democratic resilience and decay. By distinguishing between types of polarization, this study enhances the understanding of their distinct roles in political mobilization, thus underscoring that while polarization can threaten democracy, certain forms can also strengthen civic mobilization against populist movements.
... Bogaards, 2009;Brownlee, 2009;Robertson, 2010;Wigell, 2008). However, the role of opposition party politics in facilitating regime change in a hybrid context remains under-explored, 3 notwithstanding the general consensus that the presence of opposition parties is one of the main pillars of democracy (Sartori, 1976(Sartori, /2005. This paper aims to fill this gap in the literature by conducting a comparative analysis of four countries that evolved into democracies or autocracies after 2000: Mexico, Russia, Taiwan, and Turkey. ...
... Bogaards, 2009;Brownlee, 2009;Robertson, 2010;Wigell, 2008). However, the role of opposition party politics in facilitating regime change in a hybrid context remains under-explored, 3 notwithstanding the general consensus that the presence of opposition parties is one of the main pillars of democracy (Sartori, 1976(Sartori, /2005. This paper aims to fill this gap in the literature by conducting a comparative analysis of four countries that evolved into democracies or autocracies after 2000: Mexico, Russia, Taiwan, and Turkey. ...
... In singleparty regimes, the opposition represents a faction within the party; in hegemonic party systems, opposition parties are merely satellites of the ruling party. In predominant party systems within democracies, the opposition remains free and autonomous, but is largely ineffective (Sartori, 1976(Sartori, /2005. 6 Applying Hirschman's (1978) framework, opposition parties in hybrid regimes have to choose among three options in response to the authoritarian policies of the incumbent: exit, voice, and loyalty. ...
This paper examines the role of opposition parties in regime
change within hybrid regimes. Two cases of autocratization
(Russia and Turkey) and two of democratisation (Mexico and
Taiwan) are selected to illustrate different trajectories of regime
transformation under hybrid regimes. We focus on three key
dimensions of opposition party politics that potentially affect the
speed of regime transformation: a) the relationship between
major opposition parties and the incumbent, b) the relationship
among opposition parties, and c) the extent of opposition
coordination against the incumbent. We posit that each of these
dimensions substantially affects the speed of regime
transformation, whether towards democracy (slow: Taiwan; fast:
Mexico) or autocracy (slow: Turkey; fast: Russia).
... At the beginning of independence, the party system in Kazakhstan underwent a significant change. It moved from a hegemonic party system, represented by the Communist Party under the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic, to an atomized party system and then to a moderate pluralist party system (Sartori, 1976). The party system of Kazakhstan finally stabilized, acquiring hegemonic features in face of the ruling Amanat party during the decade from 2004 -2021, respectively (Sartori, 1976;Pelizzo, 2022). ...
... It moved from a hegemonic party system, represented by the Communist Party under the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic, to an atomized party system and then to a moderate pluralist party system (Sartori, 1976). The party system of Kazakhstan finally stabilized, acquiring hegemonic features in face of the ruling Amanat party during the decade from 2004 -2021, respectively (Sartori, 1976;Pelizzo, 2022). ...
... The main feature of party system literature is its division into a qualitative and a quantitative camp (Pelizzo & Nwokora, 2016). While studies conducted in the quantitative stream of inquiry have been concerned with issues of measurement, studies conducted by qualitative means have focused instead on classification criteria and development party system typologies (Duverger, 1954;Blondel, 1968;Sartori, 1976;Mair, 1997;Rae, 1968;Pedersen, 1979;Nwokora & Pelizzo, 2015). ...
This study attempts to answer the question of how demographic changes shape what a country’s party system is, as little research has been done on youth wing and youth quota. In particular, party system changes and party system stability literature never studied loyalty of young voters and perceived activities of youth wing “Zhastar Rukhy” and youth quota and vice versa. Therefore, this study looks at whether and how youth wing and youth quota, party system stability and party system change relate to one another.
Empirical evidence has been gathered using mixed-method research to study the issue of youth voting in Kazakhstan.
... Much work has already been devoted to typologizing the different functions that parties empirically perform in existing democracies or used to perform when they were more powerful (Epstein, 1967;Sartori, 1976;Mair, 2013: 89;Dalton, Farrell and McAllister, 2013;van Haute and Sauger, 2018: 581-582), yet this is not our aim here. Several of these functions could be taken up by other actors or institutions in alternative political systems. ...
... By keeping elections out of the definitionin opposition to dominant definitions (e.g. Sartori, 1976) or the widely held assumption that they are "inexorably linked" (Katz, 1980: xi), we want to leave open the possibility of having parties without elections (as could happen in a lottocratic model) or elections without parties (as in individual representation). To reduce complexity, we bracket differences between types of parties and party systems and focus our comparison on ideal types of democratic regimes with or without parties. ...
... It is now common knowledge that political parties have always been normatively contested (Scarrow, 2002;Rosenblum, 2008). Historically, the main grievance was that they would dangerously divide the population by promoting private, factional interests at the expense of the general or public interest (Sartori, 1976;Scarrow, 2002;Rosenblum, 2008). Nowadays, this criticism that Kelsen (2013Kelsen ( /1920 had already refuted more than a hundred years ago, has lost most of its past strength. ...
It is received wisdom in political science that parties are indispensable in a large-scale democracy. However, one might think that this belief reflects path dependency or a lack of imagination of alternative democratic systems. The recent theoretical development of new alternatives to traditional forms of representative government such as lottocracy or liquid democracy therefore offers an ideal context for questioning the assumption more thoroughly. The functions usually performed by parties are well-known, but it is less clear which of them could not be taken up by a different institution or body under an alternative arrangement. What would be the deep normative reasons to preserve the party form even in a completely reformed democracy? This is the question addressed in this article by bringing together recent pieces of literature on democratic innovations and the political theory of political parties. We argue that parties allow to mobilise and politicise citizens around a positive ideology, make it easier for citizens to follow political processes, thereby facilitating popular control and accountability, and give more visibility and strength to the opposition. These extremely valuable functions should be put in the balance with their flaws and with the benefits of alternative democratic systems.
... The literature shows that party systems structure competition between Authors are listed in order of contributions. voting behaviour (Dalton 2008) and influencing the formation of coalitions defining the balance of power between government and opposition (Sartori 1976;Lipset and Rokkan 1967;Panebianco 1988). ...
... We propose that analysing party systems can provide such a comprehensive approach and combine research on executive and opposition actions. Party systems structure the competition between individual parties allowing them to develop competing policy positions (for example, economic, religious, and ethnic) and influencing the formation of coalitions (Sartori 1976;Lipset and Rokkan 1967;Panebianco 1988). Party systems have key implications beyond mere party politics. ...
... 3 To maximize our sample, we define absolute authoritarian party systems (that is, PSDI = 0) as those that do not allow any opposition party to run for elections. If and only if applying Equation 1 to aggregate parties' anti-pluralist position at the systemic level fails to find any opposition party and the democratic level (as defined by the electoral democracy index by Coppedge et al. (2024) of that country in a given year is lower than 0.5 (that is, lower than the mean of all country-year in the sample computed by the IRT model in Coppedge et al. (2024, p.32), the PSDI assigns a value of 0. We acknowledge that this value is diverging from Sartori's (1976) definition of party systems. Hence, we recommend users following Sartori's (1976) more stringent definition of party systems to consider excluding values equal to 0 in their analysis. ...
One of the most important global political developments is the current wave of autocratization. Most research identifies this as an executive-led process, while others highlight the role opposition actors play in resisting it. We combine this work into a common framework asking, how (anti-)democratic are party systems? Party-system literature emphasises and measures policy differences, while we conceptualise party systems’ democratic positions highlighting to what extent divergent regime preferences are prevalent across parties. To estimate this dimension, we introduce the Party-System Democracy Index (PSDI), capable of tracking regime preferences across party systems from 1970 to 2019 across 178 countries and 3,151 country-years. We implement well-established content, convergent, and construct validity tests to confirm the PSDI’s reliability. Finally, we also show that the PSDI is an important predictor for regime changes in either direction and that changes in the PSDI can signal a looming regime change. This work provides a new framework for studying regime changes and contributes to the renewal of the party-systems literature.
... Based on ideological commitments and actual practices, political actors can be classified as system, anti-system, and semi-system. Public ideological commitments to democracy and actual democratic practices such as peaceful competition for people's votes, formation of government through a majority votes, willingness of peaceful transfer of power after electoral defeats, defense of democratic systems when they go through crisis times and opposition of the government instead of the existing democratic system itself while in opposition are the main characteristics of system actors (Gunther et al., 1995;Mainwaring & Pérez-Liñán, 2013;Linz & Stepan, 1978;Sartori, 1976). ...
... Anti-system actors make public and categorical commitments to non-democratic systems, oppose the government as well as the existing democratic system, and use violence to achieve political scores (Linz & Stepan, 1978;Sartori, 1976). When they participate in the democratic process, including elections, their main goal is to dismantle the democratic system from within rather than to consolidate it (Capoccia, 2005). ...
Nepal started its democratic journey in 1951. However, King Mahendra ended the journey in 1960. Based on the political actor model of democratization, this article concludes that the monarchy acted as the semi-system actor from 1951 to 1960, as it did not abide by constitutional frameworks and took advantage of weak system actors to terminate democracy. Despite the peaceful participation in the politics during and after the democratic movement, the Communist Party of Nepal wanted to replace democracy with communism and was the anti-system political actor. The party was not politically significant, as it had just five seats in the parliament and was organizationally weak. Therefore, this article also finds that the party did not play an important role for the democratic breakdown of 1960.
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... Existe una profusa literatura que discute qué es un partido, en el sentido moderno del término. En su definición más básica, aportada hace ya medio siglo por Giovanni Sartori (1976), un partido es un grupo político que se identifica con una denominación (una «etiqueta») y que se presenta a la competencia electoral con el fin de obtener cargos en alguna de las ramas electivas del gobierno. De allí en más pueden agregarse atributos que completan la definición y que permiten distinguir distintos tipos de partidos. ...
... NSR har ved de fleste valgene vaert partiet med flest representanter i Sametinget, de har for det meste vaert hovedaktøren i dannelse av sametingsråd («regjeringen»), og de har formet den samepolitiske dagsordenen andre aktører har måttet forholde seg til (Falch & Selle, 2018). Dette er sentrale kjennetegn på ettpartidominans i et flerpartisystem (Boucek & Bogaards, 2010;Pempel, 1990;Sartori, 1976). Likevel kan man også si at selv om NSR har vaert størst og dominerende, har Arbeiderpartiets historiske posisjon, med høyest oppslutning i 2005 og 2009 samt to sametingspresidenter (2007-2013 og 2016), gjort at samepolitikken også kan forstås som et topartisystem. ...
The Norwegian Sami Association (NSR) has dominated Sámi politics since the establishment of the Sámi Parliament in 1989. NSR has often been the leading party, shaping the political agenda and forming most of the Executive Councils of the Sámi Parliament (‘governments’). This dominance, characterized as the dominant party in a two-party system, has been challenged recently by the emergence of the People of the North Party (Nordkalottfolket – NKF). The new political competition introduces significant changes, potentially ending NSR’s long-standing influence. NSR’s ability to adapt to demographic shifts and maintain its role as a cultural and political institution will be critical. Despite these challenges, NSR remains the central political party in the institutionalization and internationalization of Sámi rights, particularly regarding land and self-determination. The evolving political landscape suggests an increasing fragmentation, yet NSR’s historical and organizational strengths may help sustain its dominant position.
... Kecerdasan ideologis sangat penting dalam masyarakat saat ini untuk menjaga kohesivitas sosial dan mencegah pergeseran ideologi atau ekstremisme yang dapat membahayakan stabilitas nasional (Heywood, 2019). Selain itu Sartori (2005) juga mengemukakan bahwa ideologi adalah sistem konsep yang diarahkan pada tindakan politik dan sosial yang memberikan arahan bagi orang atau kelompok dalam memahami realitas. ...
Penelitian ini bermaksud untuk menyelidiki strategi untuk meningkatkan kecerdasan ideologis dan yuridis dengan menggunakan perspektif teologis dan historis. Latar belakang utama dari penelitian ini adalah memudarnya pemahaman terhadap ideologi Pancasila dan hukum konstitusional di tengah pergolakan digital dan globalisasi. Jenis penelitian ini yaitu kepustakaan dengan menggunakan pendekatan analisis isi terhadap berbagai sumber literatur ilmiah terkait adalah metodologi yang digunakan. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa memasukkan prinsip-prinsip spiritual dan sejarah perjuangan negara ke dalam kebijakan publik dan sistem pendidikan dapat meningkatkan kecerdasan ideologi dan hukum, karena metode historis menyoroti pentingnya belajar dari dinamika sejarah hukum dan ideologi nasional, sedangkan pendekatan teologis menekankan pentingnya kualitas moral dan spiritual dalam memahami ideologi dan hukum. Selain itu mereformasi pendidikan, mempromosikan literasi hukum, memperkuat kurikulum pendidikan Islam, dan kolaborasi dengan organisasi Islam maupun para cendekiawan Islam dapat membentuk generasi yang berideologi kuat dan taat hukum.
... This also allowed us to use the same control variables in the relevant analyses-aside from the measure of threat sensitivity we used in Study 2, which was not in the EVS data. Western European countries have multiparty political systems unlike the United States, but the wide consensus is that the parties in these systems can still be classified along a left-right axis (Sartori, 2005;Van der Brug & Van Spanje, 2009). We classified individuals as left or right wing on the basis of the ideology of the political party that they declared feeling closest to. ...
The prevailing view among scholars has been that the preference for strong leaders is an idiosyncratic feature of right-wing individuals. However, it is unclear whether this inference is accurate given that prior research has largely overlooked the role of ethnicity. We analyzed data from the United States and Western Europe ( N = 34,443) and found that ethnic minorities (and right-wing individuals) preferred strong leaders to a greater extent than Whites (and left-wing individuals). Notably, ethnic minorities across diverse ethnic and political backgrounds were closer to right-wing Whites on strong-leader preference than to left-wing Whites. Our work also provides some evidence, using both measurement-of-mediation (Studies 1–4) and experimental mediation (preregistered Studies 5 and 6), that generalized trust helps explain group differences in strong-leader preference. In sum, our research illustrates the unique nature of left-wing Whites’ leadership preferences, and highlights the importance of testing social science theories using diverse participant samples.
... rente a la democracia, se debe considerar definiciones como las de Schedler (2023) o Sartori (2005), que describen la polarización política como un conflicto intenso sobre ideas, intereses o valores que genera una profunda tensión entre rivales. Esta no se limita a la mera discrepancia, sino que implica choques agudos que trascienden la competencia democrática ordinaria, derivando en bloqueos institucionales o incluso en violencia. ...
Daniel Noboa asumió la presidencia de Ecuador en noviembre de 2023, tras ganar un proceso electoral anticipado. Su gestión, enmarcada en un contexto de transición, se centró en combatir la inseguridad con estados de emergencia y militarización, logrando reducir homicidios, aunque generando críticas por violaciones a los derechos humanos. Los principales desafíos enfrentados por la administración actual están relacionados con reformas limitadas, un crecimiento estancado y una crisis energética que golpeó la aceptación del presidente. El proceso político, que confluye en el proceso electoral, ha sido un proceso desprovisto de propuestas y dominado por la polarización que se refleja en una campaña marcada por la confrontación entre Daniel Noboa y Luisa González, con un escaso debate programático y una confrontación que eclipsa soluciones estructurales para el país. El presente artículo analiza la campaña electoral que, si bien comenzó el 6 de enero de 2025, se fue gestando meses atrás, tras el período de transición. Examina además cómo el proceso, liderado por el presidente de la República y los asambleístas, derivó en una polarización profunda, reduciendo la contienda a dos candidaturas principales: la liderada por el propio presidente y la representante del correísmo. Ello pese a la inscripción de 16 binomios.
... The lower the participatory level within the system, the less democratic (competitivepluralistic) and the more authoritarian (hegemonic) it is likely to be. A form of hegemony 9 /authoritarianism that is important in the South African situation, according to Bratton and Van de Walle (1998:78), Sartori (1976) and Schumpeter (1942), is oligarchy. Oligarchy is defined by Bealey (2003:30) as governance by an elite group "who in some way are superior to the rest of the community. ...
The important question now is Where is the second transition (in other words the post-Polokwane epoch) taking South Africa? Is the country moving away from polyarchy and approaching "a type of hegemony" as part of a larger regime transition to a possible oligarchy? The terra incognita of 2010 and further has to be explored urgently. With this in view a deductive theoretical model will indicate the direction of the second regime transition. Central concepts and structures to be included in this part of the article are complex systems, parties and party systems, as well as neopatrimonialism. The theoretical model will secondly be applied to the post-Polokwane South Africa.
... pod naslovom "Understanding pluralism". Ne bismo naravno pogrešili pri tvrdnji da se sama reč pluralizam unutar političkih nauka vezuje za njega i za njegovu definiciju polarizovanog pluralizma kao partijskog sistema u kome akteri (partije i poslanici) pomeraju svoje stavove ka ekstremnijim polovima (Sartori, 2005). Naime, pomenuti esej predstavlja prepisku Sartorijevog predavanja i, premda je svakako ispunjen klasičnom sartorijevskom odbranom liberalne demokratije, za koju je pored ostalog verovao da je jedan jedinstveni model demokratije, Sartori nam pruža na par mesta zanimljiva razmatranja o važnosti tolerancije kao vrednosti u sklopu liberalnih demokratija današnjice. ...
Tolerancija kao liberalna vrlina svakako je prešla dug put od religijskih nesuglasica do toga da postane okosnica današnjih demokratskih sistema vladavine. Premda se koristi kao a priori pozitivan ideal koji uspešno rukuje sa razlikama naših postmodernih društava, primetno je da ona kao takva neuspešno rešava određene napetosti i binarnosti u društvu poput "pojedinac-zajednica" odnosa. Namera rada jeste da pre svega ispita sam pojam tolerancije kroz pojmovno-kritičku dimenziju, ispitujući njegove veze sa ostalim pojmovima sa kojima se često susreće, poput pluralizma. Nakon analize, autor na kraju iznosi alternativnu koncepciju tolernacije. Autor daje odgovor na krizu pojma tolerancije tako što iznosi koncepciju tolerancije koja je u tesnoj vezi sa demokratskim idealima solidarnosti i brige, pozivajući se na sociološke teorije i teoretičare radikalne demokratije.
Ključne reči: Pojmovno-kritička analiza; tolerancija; liberalizam; pluralizam; solidarnost.
... The concept of one-party dominance is very much an area of contestation as scholars tend to observe the phenomenon from various perspectives. However, there is a widespread consensus that a party is considered dominant based on two primary criteria: its longterm presence in power and its ability to secure a significant number of parliamentary seats to establish the government after elections (Duverger, 1954;Sartori, 1976;Pempel, 1990). Contrary to the widespread consensus, there exist variations regarding the duration of a dominant party's tenure in power and the magnitude of the victory required for the party to be considered dominant. ...
UMNO's electoral defeat in 2018 and 2022 facilitated a transformation in the Malaysian political landscape. While the party’s defeat could be ascribed to conventional factors, including narratives of elite corruption linked to its leadership and internal factionalism; however, another significant factor that contributed to UMNO’s remarkable downfall was the cleavage structure that shifted away from the party which therefore eroded their political support. The article seeks to demonstrate the erosion of UMNO’s influence among the Malay electorates, particularly in its traditional strongholds of rural parliamentary constituencies in Peninsular Malaysia due to modifications in the cleavage structure. The analysis of the 2013, 2018, and 2022 general elections indicated that UMNO ceded votes to the Islamic party, PAS and the newly formed Malay party, BERSATU, which were partners of the Pakatan Harapan opposition coalition in 2018. The outcomes of the 2022 general elections revealed a further decline in support for UMNO among Malay electorates, attributed to the merger between PAS and BERSATU, to establish a perceived Malay-Muslim coalition in Perikatan Nasional. This article argues that UMNO lost its monopoly among the Malay electorates due to the strengthened convergence between the two cleavage structures of ethnicity and religion. The convergence was facilitated by UMNO's promotion of Islamisation, its normalisation of political cooperation with PAS, and the party’s inability to compete effectively with BERSATU which ended UMNO’s one-party dominance in Malaysia.
... In line with a long research lineage in political sociology, I pose that the national-level character of the relationships between political parties and citizens provides an important determinant of mass belief structure (Converse 1969;Inglehart and Klingemann 1976;Dalton 2013;Gordon and Segura 1997;Carroll and Kubo 2018;Gonthier and Guerra 2022;Keskintürk 2022). In representative democracies, political parties assume a key function in mediating political positioning between citizens and elites (Schattschneider 1942;Campbell et al. 1960;Sartori 1976;Cohen 2003;Slothuus and Bisgaard 2021). In this role, parties facilitate the transmission of ideologically consistent issue attitudes through at least two mutually re-enforcing mechanisms: First, from a top-down vantage point, politicians have incentives to convey more coherent political attitudes to citizen if they can rely on stable, disciplined, programmatic, and ideologically distinguishable parties as organizational vessels for electoral competition and legislative politics (Mainwaring and Zoco 2007;Kitschelt and Wilkinson 2007;Levendusky 2010;Carroll and Kubo 2018). ...
Although public opinion research has made tremendous progress in identifying the conditions under which citizens adopt coherent political beliefs, comparatively little attention has been paid to the role of national political context in shaping mass belief system coherence. Using dedicated statistical network models built from representative surveys conducted across 38 European countries between 2002 and 2020, this article demonstrates that national-level attitude systems vary substantially and systematically in overall constraint. Drawing on both a novel, network-derived measure of belief system coherence and node-level centrality metrics, this paper further shows that political systems characterized by programmatic linkages between citizens and political parties sustain far more coherent mass beliefs than those in which party-citizen interactions typically involve personal favors. Furthermore, just under one third of the belief-structuring effect of party-citizen relations is mediated by the relative centrality of citizens’ symbolic ideological attachments within national-level belief systems. Abstract ideological summary positions are not central to all belief systems, but where they are, mass beliefs tend to be more coherent overall.
... The impact of polarization on democratic stability has been extensively analyzed in comparative political studies. Sartori's (1976) greater initial strength of the middle classes in these countries resulted in an alignment between burghers and throne, an alignment which preserved the monarchy, and thus facilitated the legitimation of democracy among the conservative strata" (Lipset 1959, p. 85). ...
This study explores the dynamics of democratic systems under the threat of backsliding into "rigged" democracies. Democratic systems, even when mature, remain vulnerable to the interplay of rising polarization, institutional erosion, and uneven electoral processes. This paper develops a theoretical model integrating three core variables: (1) Institutional integrity. signifying the resilience and impartiality of democratic institutions; (2) electoral balance, capturing the fairness of electoral competition; and (3) polarization, gauging societal and ideological divisions. Such integration can be valuable as the literature so far has heavily focused on case studies or specific thematic aspects. The paper proposes a system of differential equations to assess how polarization intensifies institutional decay, how strong institutions bolster free elections, and how equitable electoral processes, in turn, moderate polarization. A stability analysis-drawing on the Jacobian matrix determinant and eigenvalues-reveals tipping points where democracies can shift from stable governance toward rapid decline.
... [32][33]. Giovanni Sartori in his research on party systems, in which he tracks the differences of systemic and anti-systemic parties, points out that an extremist approach is not accused of being disloyal to the state or system but of disloyalty towards democracy (Sartori, 1993b). ...
This work tries to point out the risks of creating false ideas that ignore the fact that people will always live in an uncertain world. Attention is also paid to critical thinking and the responsibility of a person for his opinions, decisions and deeds.
... Received: 1 August 2024; Accepted: 29 January 2025; Notes 1 On the contrary, scholars argue that voters in multiparty contexts have more information about parties than voters in single-party contexts (Dahlberg, 2013;Gordon & Segura, 1997) because there are more confrontational issues among multiple parties (Sartori, 1976). Based on the range effect theory in cognitive psychology, recent works on projection bias suggest that the entrance of extreme candidates may reshape voters' perceptions and preferences of the existing candidates (Simonovits, 2017;Waismel-Manor & Simonovits, 2017;Wang & Chen, 2019). ...
Can corruption scandals change voters’ perceptions of candidates’ ideological positions? While it is well established that competence shocks, such as corruption scandals, influence voters’ affective attachment to political elites and their perceived capacity to address social issues, this study explores how such shocks may also lead voters to perceive some candidates as more ideologically extreme. This phenomenon, known as the contrast effect, occurs when voters interpret signals of low competence as indicators of greater ideological distance from their preferred positions. This study focuses on a major corruption scandal in South Korea and examines its impact on voters’ perceptions of presidential candidates’ ideological positions. The findings reveal that during the election period, voters’ negative emotions towards the ex-president’s corruption led them to perceive greater ideological distance from certain candidates. Specifically, most centrist voters and those from one side of the political spectrum perceived the ‘corrupt’ party as moving further from their own ideological positions. This study highlights the importance of considering emotional responses to political events in shaping voters’ ideological perceptions and subsequent electoral choices.
... Como evidencia as informações do Quadro 1. Fonte: elaboração própria com base nos dados da revisão da literatura (Sangreman et al., 2008;Nóbrega 2015) Entre as principais questões geradoras da instabilidade democrática destaca-se a própria Constituição do país, pois, embora tenha definido independência e interdependência entre o Presidente da República, o Parlamento, os tribunais e o governo, atribui ao Presidente poderes extraordinários que implicam instabilidade do sistema político, que adiante vamos explicar. Figura 1 -Resultado de eleições presidenciais na Guiné-Bissau, primeiro e segundo turno Fonte: elaboração própria com base nos dados de: Guiné-Bissau CNE (1994, 1999, 2005, 2014b, 2019b No que refere às eleições presidenciais, as disputas são mais competitivas. Diferentemente das eleições legislativas, onde apenas os partidos podem concorrer, nas eleições presidenciais candidatos independentes podem disputar, ou seja, aqueles que concorrem sem estarem vinculados aos partidos, e podendo ser suportados por vários partidos. ...
Este artigo estuda dois processos importantes do cenário sociopolítico guineense: primeiro, os processos da institucionalização da democracia na Guiné-Bissau, com o enfoque especial em reformas institucionais e seus efeitos na estabilidade política. Em segundo lugar, analisa a transição democrática, objetivamente o papel desempenhado pela sociedade civil na construção da democracia e a sua contribuição para a estabilidade do governo. O estudo utiliza a revisão bibliográfica sistemática como o seu método principal, com respaldo no estudo de caso qualitativo e insights da literatura relevante sobre as transições democráticas na Guiné-Bissau. Como resultados, concluímos que as reformas políticas ocorridas durante a transição democrática neste país resultaram na institucionalização de uma democracia frágil, que gerou conflitos entre as elites políticas e os militares. No que refere ao papel da sociedade civil na construção do regime democrático, como resultado, concluímos que no contexto guineense, as pautas das organizações da sociedade civil são diversas, atuando em diversas esferas da sociedade: social, cultural e política. Desempenhando várias funções, como mediador de conflitos, participando ativamente nos debates públicos e o envolvimento nas questões políticas.
... A tenor de lo anterior, la polarización política se asimilaría con la percepción de enfrentamiento y crispación entre actores políticos. Sin embargo, entendiendo que la discrepancia y la discusión son consustanciales a la democracia, conviene considerar la definición de la polarización política de Schedler (2023) o Sartori (2005), que remite a un conflicto intenso sobre ideas, intereses o valores en el seno de un Estado y a una profunda tensión entre rivales. No se limita a la mera divergencia o desacuerdo, sino que denota relaciones de agudo choque que van más allá de los límites de la competencia democrática ordinaria y amenazan con el bloqueo o, incluso, la violencia. ...
La polarización ha evolucionado de ser un concepto utilizado en ciencias sociales para definir un fenómeno político, a convertirse en una preocupación social significativa en España. Por ello, se hace imperativo estudiar cómo la prensa de referencia española construye este problema, considerando que el periodismo es un agente fundamental en la creación y difusión de los encuadres de la realidad que alimentan a la opinión pública.Este estudio analiza las menciones a la polarización en ABC, El Mundo y El País entre 2016 —año en que Donald Trump ganó las elecciones presidenciales estadounidenses y se produjo el Brexit— y 2024, mediante un análisis de contenido predominantemente cualitativo, asistido por inteligencia artificial. Los resultados demuestran que la referencia a la polarización política se utiliza para encuadrar un problema presente principalmente en España y Estados Unidos, pero también en gran parte de América y Europa. Sin embargo, su significado oscila entre la polarización entendida como afectiva —que activa emociones negativas hacia grupos opuestos— y la existencia de un clima político crispado. Según la prensa analizada, los principales inductores del fenómeno son las élites y los partidos políticos.
... One answer is that the dynamic of party competition and the specific features of veto players weakened the potential for policy change, precluding social assistance reform. The dynamic of party competition during the postwar era in Italy was marked by significant ideological polarisation between the main left-wing and right-wing partiesthe Italian Communist Party (PCI) and the Italian Social Movement (MSI), while the Christian Democracy (DC) was located at the centre of the ideological space (Sartori 1976). In this context, the DC garnered the majority of moderate voters, and remained constantly in power until 1992, excluding opposition parties from government coalitions. ...
This article analyses the political determinants of antipoverty policy in Italy between 1948 and 2022, providing a long-term analysis of the Italian minimum income scheme. We look for an explanation of that evolution drawing on three theoretical perspectives: veto players, gradual institutional change, and party competition. Our methodology is process tracing which involves the examination of ‘diagnostic’ pieces of evidence for our broad political-historical analysis. We argue that the so called ‘neglect’ phase until 1992 can be explained by the veto players theory, the period after 1992 by gradual institutional change, whereas the final introduction of a minimum income scheme in 2018 is the result of competitive dynamics. The main lesson is that a case study analysis of the politics of anti-poverty policy offers fresh insights into a major challenge in capitalist systems, combating rising poverty trends.
... The intricacy of electoral systems, especially in proportional systems and multi-member districts, requires us to explore the various nuances of electoral competition (Sartori, 2016). Each electoral system has unique mechanisms and contexts that shape the interpretation of "non-competitive elections" differently. ...
This article explores patterns and trends in 111 prior studies regarding uncontested elections and their implications for the quality of democracy from 1965 to 2024 in the Scopus database. Since the first article was published in 1965, the topic has attracted noteworthy academic attention, especially in the last decade. Although the number of publications yearly fluctuates, scholarly interest remains consistent, with an average of 40.94 citations per document. Most research comes from the United States, but contributions from other countries such as Canada, Japan, and Germany are also remarkable. In sum, I provide a comprehensive insight into the development of uncontested elections, the significant contributions of various authors, and the thematic trends that have developed over time. 44 questions identified as future research directions open opportunities for further exploration to understand the factors supporting or hindering competitive elections.
Tras las crisis que se han ido sucediendo en España y la gestión que los diferentes gobiernos del sistema bipartidista han hecho de las mismas, el panorama político ha ido cambiado a través de la entrada de nuevos partidos que, a través de un discurso populista, han logrado alcanzar el poder en las diferentes instancias de representación. Pero dicho discurso también ha contribuido a polarizar y crispar a la población. Por ello, este trabajo se dirige a examinar como se concreta la estrategia populista y cuáles son los elementos que definen tanto a estos movimientos como a sus discursos, con la finalidad de entender la relación entre populismo y polarización política en España.
Radical parties’ electoral surge has intensified debates about their inclusion in government coalitions. This article presents the most extensive analysis of ministry allocation to date, covering data from 555 coalitions from 33 OECD countries since World War II. While Gamson’s Law suggests coalition participants receive ministries proportional to their parliamentary seats, both coalition formation theory and ministry allocation theory imply that radicalism weakens bargaining power. Additionally, empirical research links radical parties to prioritisation of policy payoffs. I propose a theoretical model distinguishing between types of radicalism, identifying distinct mechanisms leading to ministry undercompensation. My findings show that radical parties systematically receive fewer ministries, primarily due to reduced bargaining power rather than because of payoff preferences. Moreover, I demonstrate that the factors facilitating coalition entry are closely linked to those shaping ministry allocation. Using selection bias-robust modeling, this study offers new insights into the constraints radical parties face in government formation.
The article examines the influence of electoral and political party legislation parameters on the state and quantitative dynamics of the Russian party system from 2012 to 2024. The aim of the study is to develop an approach to the periodization of the development of parties and the party system of the Russian Federation, based on the proposed fundamental characteristics of the party system and a description of the stages of its configuration during the period from 2012 to 2024. The research methodology is based in a comprehensive analysis of both theoretical and practical aspects of the functioning of the Russian Federation’s party system during the studied period. The methods used in the study include extensive analysis of statistical data, as well as scientific, historical, and news publications from various time periods. Based on the analysis, it is concluded that the Russian party system has reached a qualitatively new level of development, characterized, on the one hand, by a multiplicity of participants, and on the other, by a naturally established balance of supply and demand in the competitive market of political projects.
The relationship between party system fragmentation and voter turnout is a long-standing phenomenon, the form of which has not yet been precisely defined. Using data from the Round 10 of European Social Survey (2020–2022), this article attempts to investigate the relationship across European democracies. Consistently with previous research, association between party system fragmentation as well as increase in number of parties between elections and turnout seems to be negative but rather weak. However, as could be expected based on a rational choice theory and cognitive overload, the effect depends on several individual and context level characteristics. The results suggest that negative effect of fragmentation may be attenuated by a high degree of partisanship. On the other hand, it may be strengthened in the context of an unanchored party system, as demonstrated in the case of Eastern and Central Europe compared to Western Europe, or by lower levels of political polarization.
Los partidos políticos cumplen la tarea fundamental de consolidar los sistemas democráticos. Debido a ello, en los Estados modernos el financiamiento de los partidos políticos se torna necesario. En el plano internacional se observa la adopción de distintos modelos de financiamiento: público, privado y mixto. Todos estos sistemas suponen riesgos de corrupción y afectación del funcionamiento del sistema democrático. El objetivo del presente trabajo es analizar la problemática del financiamiento ilegal de los partidos políticos y la legitimidad de la intervención del derecho penal para hacerle frente. Metodológicamente, este documento constituye una investigación de las legislaciones y la literatura especializada. La relevancia de esta investigación es haber evidenciado la insuficiencia de la regulación administrativa para hacer frente a las prácticas de financiamiento indebido y proponer la intervención del derecho penal para la sanción de este delito. Como resultado de la investigación se concluye que la intervención del derecho penal es legítima, debido a la insuficiencia de la regulación administrativa, la autonomía del bien jurídico protegido y a la imposibilidad de abarcar las conductas de financiamiento indebido a través de otros tipos penales.
Giovanni Sartori is considered one of the leading figures in Italian, European, and global political science. The year 2024 marks the centenary of his birth, providing an opportunity to revisit the early career of this scholar in Italy. Drawing on Sartori’s writings and previously unexplored archival material, this article revisits his personal trajectory. It illustrates how a distinguished academic career was built, beginning with his personal path as a student, and later, from the 1950s to the mid-1970s, as a professor at the Faculty of Political Science at the University of Florence, during a time when political science was, in effect, non-existent. The article outlines his intellectual influences, their political context, his struggle for the recognition of political science within the Italian academic system, and his continual commitment to internationalisation. These elements collectively provide a fascinating illustration of the emergence of modern political science in Europe.
Osmanlı Devleti’nin 1878’de idaresini fiilen İngiltere’ye bıraktığı Kıbrıs, Birinci Dünya Savaşı’nın çıkmasıyla İngilizler tarafından ilhak edilmiş, Lozan Anlaşması ile de İngiliz egemenliğine ait bir toprak olarak kabul edilmiştir. Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, İkinci Dünya Savaşı’ndan sonra gündeme gelen self determinasyon ilkesi bağlamında adada yaşayan Türklerin durumu ile bağlantılı olarak Kıbrıs meselesinin tarafı hâline gelmiştir. Türkiye’de büyük bir kamuoyu desteğinin ortaya çıktığı bu süreçte Kıbrıs meselesi, politik duruşu birbirinden çok farklı kesimlerin üzerinde uzlaştığı ulusal bir davaya dönüşmüştür. ABD ve garantör devletlerin çabalarıyla 1960’ta kurulan Kıbrıs Cumhuriyeti’nin işlemez hale gelmesi sonrasında Kıbrıs Türkleri, Türkiye’nin de desteğiyle kendi devletlerini kurabilmiştir. Bağımsızlık sonrası dönemde her alanda ambargoya maruz kalan Kuzey Kıbrıs Türk Cumhuriyeti, yarım asrı aşan devlet tecrübesi boyunca genel itibarıyla Türkiye yanlısı yönetimlere sahip olmuş, dünya ile olan bağlarını da Türkiye üzerinden kurmuştur. Bu çalışma ortak bir kaderi paylaşan ve iç siyasal yapıları itibarıyla demokratik niteliklere sahip olan Türkiye ile Kuzey Kıbrıs Türk Cumhuriyeti’nin siyasal sistem bağlamındaki benzerlikleri ve farklılıklarını ele almaktadır. Bu çerçevede çalışma hükümet, seçim ve parti sistemleri gibi siyasî sistemi oluşturan unsurları siyaset bilimi literatürü bağlamında tarafların anayasaları ve ikincil kaynaklar üzerinden karşılaştırmalı olarak irdelemektedir.
Our paper explores the organisational and leadership strategies of new anti-establishment parties in Czechia and Italy. The electorally volatile party systems in the countries of Central-Eastern and Southern Europe are associated with the constant emergence of new parties. Czech and Italian party systems are great examples of this phenomenon. Whilst many newcomers make electoral breakthroughs, only some outlive their initial electoral success. Organisational survival and the role of party leaders often precede the parliamentary survival of these parties.
We compare the organisational and leadership strategies of four such parties. Our case studies include Forward Italy/Forza Italia (FI), YES2011/ANO2011 (ANO), Brothers of Italy/Fratelli d'Italia (FdI) and Freedom and Direct Democracy/Svoboda a přímá demokracie (SPD). All four emerged running on the anti-establishment ticket. Simultaneously to being formed as anti-establishment challengers, the former two are considered the pioneers of entrepreneurial parties. The latter two, represent the most successful far-right parties in their respective countries.
Analysing their statutes and organisational affairs, we explore the internal decision-making and positions of party leaders. Leader's decision-making capacity, interventions to the autonomy of territorial structures, and parties´ policy towards membership form the basis of our comparative analysis.
It allows us to determine what they have in common in regards to the studied variables, and if these play any role in their survival. Centralised hierarchy combined with a strong position of party leaders are expected to influence it. The similarity between the studied cases helps to empirically test these expectations.
The article focuses on the intellectual legacy of Giovanni Sartori, describing this figure as the “screenwriter” of an innovative project for Italian and European political science. Retracing the stages of Sartori’s journey as an author, academic leader, and scientific organizer, it highlights how other scholars have been able to build upon his work, showcasing the enduring impact of his vision. The article also provides data describing the scale and profile of the scientific community in Italy, since the phase of consolidation of political science, until nowadays. The analysis stresses the persistence of the original project designed by Sartori and sheds a light on the responsibilities of the “middle generation” of scholars in the dissemination of the discipline toward the new generations.
Serbia’s democracy has been in a state of continuous erosion since the Serbian Progressive Party and Aleksandar Vučić came to power in 2012. Vučić exploited his popularity as a self-proclaimed defender of the Serbian nation to gain full control of the party and initiate democratic backsliding through “legislative capture.” Vučić’s capture of the parliament and its appointment powers made possible a subsequent capture of many democratic institutions. The rest, mindful of Vučić’s broad electoral appeal, deferred to the executive. Challenges to Serbia’s democratic backsliding were attempted through popular mobilizations and electoral resistance, but they have not been successful. There are several reasons for such an outcome: the uneven playing field, a fragmented and ideologically heterogeneous opposition, a misguided choice of resistance strategies, the absence of an alternative political platform that addressed the issue of Kosovo—the antecedent condition that precipitated backsliding, and insufficient support from external prodemocracy actors.
While rebels’ electoral participation has become a focal point of scholarship on post-conflict development, the drivers and process of rebels’ organizational transformation into political parties have remained elusive. Organizational theory provides a novel, yet critical, point of entry to understanding rebel-to-party transformation and the actors at the heart of it. I look inside rebels’ wartime organizations and identify a set of subdivisions (in some groups) that mirror the key structures of political parties: governance wings, political-messaging wings, and social service wings. I argue that variation in rebels’ wartime organizational structures gives rise to different party-building mechanisms with distinct prospects for success. To test this theory, I use intra-organizational comparative process tracing of the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN) in El Salvador. Drawing on hundreds of archival documents, I create suborganizational biographies and trace their evolution from inception to transformation. This approach allows me to exploit systematic differences in the organizational structures of the FMLN’s subgroups—while holding equal other key variables like ideology, prewar networks, and state context—to demonstrate how the construction of proto-party structures during wartime facilitates party-building at the war’s end.
The most surprising phenomenon in the 2024 General Election is the failure of the United Development Party (PPP) to the House of Representatives of the Republic of Indonesia (DPR RI) as it failed to break the parliamentary threshold. As the Islamic party, the PPP’s failure in this election is certainly a disaster for Indonesian Islamic politics. However, two other Islamic parties still survive and qualify for parliament: the National Awakening Party (PKB) and the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS). Both parties are not only able to survive but also get electoral bonuses. Why should the party founded in 1973, ultimately fail in the 2024 elections? This study analyzes the institutionalization factors in the PPP’s failure and the PKB and PKS's success in the 2024 Election. This study analyzes the institutionalism factor that led to the PPP’s failure in the 2024 elections. This study uses the theory of institutionalization to explore the answers to the research formulation. The relevancy of the theory lies in the problem of the PPP in articulating the party's functions and institutions well in the ever-changing contestation of Indonesian democracy. Meanwhile, PKB and PKS are considered to be able to optimize the functions of political parties which shows the maturity of both compared to PPP.
Enmarcado en la creciente polarización política peruana, se explora las mediaciones entre la comunicación política y la interactividad digital en procesos electorales polarizados. Mediante un enfoque analítico de carácter cualitativo, se recoge un conjunto de percepciones que ofrecen una representación matizada sobre la confrontación política. Los resultados revelan una dinámica compleja de percepciones durante la segunda vuelta electoral, destacando el impacto significativo de las interacciones digitales en la percepción pública y el compromiso digital. En este contexto, se evidencia la importancia crucial de las plataformas digitales en la configuración de la percepción y el desarrollo de la polarización política durante eventos electorales.
TTurkish Republic of Northern Cyprus was established in the north of Cyprus after the intervention carried out by Türkiye in 1974, called the Cyprus Peace Operation, and declared its independence in 1983. The state, which is subjected to an international embargo in almost every area, especially in economics, politics, sports, and transportation, and therefore establishes its ties with the world through Türkiye, has had all the instruments that a democratic state should have in its domestic politics since its independence. This study deals with the political system of Northern Cyprus, which has not yet been studied comprehensively, and aims to fill an important gap in the literature. The study considers Northern Cyprus’ constitution, principle of separation of powers, form of government, ongoing democratic elections, electoral system, and party system in the context of political science literature. Utilizing historical narrative and constitutional review methods, as well as the effective number of parties (ENP) formulated by Laakso and Taagapera, the study examines the political system of Northern Cyprus together with its political history and culture.
This chapter explores Alan Angell’s extensive contributions to the study of Chilean politics, emphasising his role in understanding the nation’s political evolution from pre-coup democracy through the Pinochet dictatorship to the post-1990 democratic re-establishment. It highlights Angell’s comparative approach, drawing parallels between Chilean and European political developments, which provided him with a broader perspective often missed by scholars focused solely on Latin America. The chapter analyses Chile’s transition to mass politics, key elections (particularly 1958 and 1964), and political and electoral competition dynamics, demonstrating how these shaped Chile’s party system and political landscape. It concludes by reaffirming Angell’s profound insights into Chile’s political transformations, underscoring his legacy as a leading scholar in this field.
Os media nos países lusófonos: quadro normativo e contextos de mercado - Capítulo aborda o panorama mediático nos oito países de língua oficial portuguesa.
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