4 ms·

I personally subscribe to the idea that week need to kill the self serving two party duopoly[0] Part of the problem is the candidates the parties are fielding.

I personally subscribe to the idea that week need to kill the self serving two party duopoly[0] Part of the problem is the candidates the parties are fielding. I know lots of people who view trump, clinton and biden as corrupt. None of them are good candidates. 0. https://freakonomics.com/podcast/politics-industry/ https://freakonomics.com/podcast/politics-industry/

hobofan 6y ago
From the perspective of a European outsider, I very much agree. A lot of problems seem to stem from the two party system. I'm just wondering if there is a good way for a strong third (and fourth and fifth...) party to form under the current system? Are there any good examples from other countries making that transition, and can they be applied in the US as well?
- antod 6y ago
  New Zealand switched from a mostly 2 party first past the post system to a proportional multiparty (usually) coalition system about 25 years ago. We would also end up with governments that won the most seats but lost the popular vote. IMO we have had much better quality governments since from either end of the spectrum. We had a notorious populist authoritarian in the 70s and early 80s, and I don't see those days coming back.
- PeterisP 6y ago
  The current system is game-theory-stable given the conditions of the USA structure of first-past-the-post. You can look at the historical third parties in USA - a third party can form and gain power (with great difficulty) but then it pretty much immediately displaces one of the two parties, so you're back to a two-party system just with different two parties.
- wolfhumble 6y ago
  > From the perspective of a European outsider, I very much agree. A lot of problems seem to stem from the two party system. I used to think the same way, but many (most?) countries in Europe end up having coalitions anyway, so you end up really having just two blocks. More parties might give you the option to choose a party that is more after your taste, but in reality you (often) end up with coalitions that take most ideas from the strongest party within the coalition. I would assume the same thing would happen within the Democratic/Republican Party in the States as well, i.e. a compromise between the left/right wings within these parties based on what is shared by most members(?)
  - Gwypaas 6y ago
    Not really. The blocks change, especially in close elections without true winners. Then negotiations happen and smaller parties often make concessions on the grand scheme of things to get their key issues through. So, much more compromise than division. This comes back to the voters also. On every divisive topic you have a number of viewpoints instead of two polar opposites.
- NickNameNick 6y ago
  In a "First past the post" electoral system, It's always more advantageous for the 3rd party to merge with the first or second party. New Zealand changed away from First Past the Post to Mixed Member Proportional in order to fix that https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed-member_proportional_representation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed-member_proportional_repr... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electoral_system_of_New_Zealand#MMP_in_New_Zealand https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electoral_system_of_New_Zealan... I'm not sure how you'd implement it, particularly at the senate level.
- secondcoming 6y ago
  The issue with that is that you can end up with ineffective 'rainbow coalition' governments. It can also give Independents far too much power since they can threaten to collapse a coalition at any time.
PeterisP 6y ago
Killing the two party duopoly requires significant constitutional changes to how elections are held. One way to do that would be ranked choice voting as implemented in e.g. Maine (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ranked-choice_voting_in_the_United_States#Maine,_2020 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ranked-choice_voting_in_the_Un...). However, the key point is that such a system would mainly benefit a potential third party, but any changes to the system need to be agreed upon by the current representatives whose interests and reelection would be hurt by such a change.
- 8note 6y ago
  Trudeau lost my vote by not going for this in canada, but the problems did hilight that there's a lot of alternatives and choosing a specific replacement is hard. Most agree that FPTP is bad, but nobody agrees on what to replace it with
  - Dylan16807 6y ago
    Just pick a major one, they're all good in similar ways.
tunesmith 6y ago
Duverger's law has a lot of redundancy in our current system. If you implement something like IRV on the state level for presidential elections without handling the Electoral College, then you've just further increased the odds of Republican presidencies.
- swsieber 6y ago
  Why Republican presidencies?
  - tunesmith 6y ago
    Good question. Because it will increase the probability of Electoral Votes going to third parties. That decreases the probability of any candidate reaching an outright majority of Electoral Votes. A plurality of Electoral Votes is not enough; it has to be a majority. Without a majority, the election is decided by the House of Representatives, where each state delegation gets one vote, where each vote is determined by a majority of that state's delegation. And there, the Republicans have a built-in advantage similar to their Senate advantage, as every state is guaranteed at least one representative regardless of population. Even after the Democratic House victory in 2018, Republicans still had the majority of 26 state federal delegations.

hobofan 6y ago

From the perspective of a European outsider, I very much agree. A lot of problems seem to stem from the two party system. I'm just wondering if there is a good way for a strong third (and fourth and fifth...) party to form under the current system? Are there any good examples from other countries making that transition, and can they be applied in the US as well?

antod 6y ago
New Zealand switched from a mostly 2 party first past the post system to a proportional multiparty (usually) coalition system about 25 years ago. We would also end up with governments that won the most seats but lost the popular vote. IMO we have had much better quality governments since from either end of the spectrum. We had a notorious populist authoritarian in the 70s and early 80s, and I don't see those days coming back.
PeterisP 6y ago
The current system is game-theory-stable given the conditions of the USA structure of first-past-the-post. You can look at the historical third parties in USA - a third party can form and gain power (with great difficulty) but then it pretty much immediately displaces one of the two parties, so you're back to a two-party system just with different two parties.
wolfhumble 6y ago
> From the perspective of a European outsider, I very much agree. A lot of problems seem to stem from the two party system. I used to think the same way, but many (most?) countries in Europe end up having coalitions anyway, so you end up really having just two blocks. More parties might give you the option to choose a party that is more after your taste, but in reality you (often) end up with coalitions that take most ideas from the strongest party within the coalition. I would assume the same thing would happen within the Democratic/Republican Party in the States as well, i.e. a compromise between the left/right wings within these parties based on what is shared by most members(?)
- Gwypaas 6y ago
  Not really. The blocks change, especially in close elections without true winners. Then negotiations happen and smaller parties often make concessions on the grand scheme of things to get their key issues through. So, much more compromise than division. This comes back to the voters also. On every divisive topic you have a number of viewpoints instead of two polar opposites.
NickNameNick 6y ago
In a "First past the post" electoral system, It's always more advantageous for the 3rd party to merge with the first or second party. New Zealand changed away from First Past the Post to Mixed Member Proportional in order to fix that https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed-member_proportional_representation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed-member_proportional_repr... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electoral_system_of_New_Zealand#MMP_in_New_Zealand https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electoral_system_of_New_Zealan... I'm not sure how you'd implement it, particularly at the senate level.
secondcoming 6y ago
The issue with that is that you can end up with ineffective 'rainbow coalition' governments. It can also give Independents far too much power since they can threaten to collapse a coalition at any time.

PeterisP 6y ago

Killing the two party duopoly requires significant constitutional changes to how elections are held. One way to do that would be ranked choice voting as implemented in e.g. Maine (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ranked-choice_voting_in_the_United_States#Maine,_2020 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ranked-choice_voting_in_the_Un...). However, the key point is that such a system would mainly benefit a potential third party, but any changes to the system need to be agreed upon by the current representatives whose interests and reelection would be hurt by such a change.

8note 6y ago
Trudeau lost my vote by not going for this in canada, but the problems did hilight that there's a lot of alternatives and choosing a specific replacement is hard. Most agree that FPTP is bad, but nobody agrees on what to replace it with
- Dylan16807 6y ago
  Just pick a major one, they're all good in similar ways.

tunesmith 6y ago

Duverger's law has a lot of redundancy in our current system. If you implement something like IRV on the state level for presidential elections without handling the Electoral College, then you've just further increased the odds of Republican presidencies.

swsieber 6y ago
Why Republican presidencies?
- tunesmith 6y ago
  Good question. Because it will increase the probability of Electoral Votes going to third parties. That decreases the probability of any candidate reaching an outright majority of Electoral Votes. A plurality of Electoral Votes is not enough; it has to be a majority. Without a majority, the election is decided by the House of Representatives, where each state delegation gets one vote, where each vote is determined by a majority of that state's delegation. And there, the Republicans have a built-in advantage similar to their Senate advantage, as every state is guaranteed at least one representative regardless of population. Even after the Democratic House victory in 2018, Republicans still had the majority of 26 state federal delegations.