4 ms·

> But creating two extreme positions, and then lumping everyone into those positions, is called politics American politics. The amount of bipartisan countries

• mlindner 6y ago
  America is certainly not the only country that divides things into "us vs them". I can think of several notable events in the past few years in various European countries that were exactly "us vs them" subjects. Even when there are multiple political parties in European politics the parties still tend to split into one of two major coalitions and those coalitions cause the people who support people in those coalitions to also divide.
  • spurgu 6y ago
    Sure, fair enough. But then again those coalitions aren't generally static, but formed around circumstances, and thus don't necessarily create the same kind of blind team mentality that we see in sports for example. And the parties within the coalitions are still aware of their internal differences, they just choose to work together for a common cause, for a period of time.
    • jordan_curve 6y ago
      That’s how it works in the U.S. as well. The political parties are made up of coalitions of voters and over time certain groups shift or change affiliation.
      • howlgarnish 6y ago
        In Europe, you have coalitions of parties. This means voters have many choices along multiple spectra, as opposed to the US where it's one of R or D.
        • vinay427 6y ago
          At least where I've voted in the US, there are rarely only two viable choices for a state or national legislature position. Some states resolve this using primaries for D/R candidates, and a few use stricter runoffs where there are frequently several D/R candidates. At least in the towns where I've lived, there were noticeable policy differences between many of these candidates within each party, although I will readily admit that I doubt this holds for most of the US. Also, it's still generally not as widely varying in views as in countries with 3+ parties (if made viable through proportional or similar voting) instead of the multiple rounds system popular in the US. Going back to the original point someone made in this thread, I think this two-party multiple-views system in the US actually helps a bit to drive polarization. Seemingly disparate views are drawn together under a banner of [party] with an obvious (not actually clear or cohesive) enemy in the [other party].
      • commentrix 6y ago
        Quick @dang, come in! People are talking politics on HN, shut it down! /s
  • zachrose 6y ago
    America is one of maybe half a dozen countries in the world with a two-party system. The others are Malta, Zimbabwe, Jamaica, and a few other Caribbean countries.
    • philwelch 6y ago
      What's your source? That seems extremely specious to me, for two reasons. First, the US does not technically have a two-party system. If your standard is how many parties have seats in the national legislature or parliament, the US has three parties represented since Justin Amash is now affiliated with the Libertarian Party, as well as a few independents. Secondly, many countries only have two parties that really matter in terms of having a realistic chance of forming a government--the UK and Canada are two examples that spring to mind. The third largest parties in those countries are the SNP and Bloc Quebecois, respectively--parties who want some specific part of the country to have greater autonomy if not independence. If your complaint is that the US doesn't have a Texas Independence Party winning seats in Congress, weird flex but okay. Virtually every polity that uses a first-past-the-post voting system will end up with a two-party system. That's Duverger's Law. The primary counterexamples only prove the point, because they more or less replace one of the two national parties on a local level. (I used to live in Seattle, and while Seattle politics are officially non-partisan, Seattle has actually developed a de facto two-party system between mainstream Democrats and socialists.) I personally favor multiparty systems with proportional representation, but that's no guarantee of anything. Israel (which somehow still ends up with a de facto two party system anyway) and Belgium have both notoriously failed to form majority governments for long periods of time.
      • jeromegv 6y ago
        The typical third party in Canada is NDP, which has had support between 15-25% of the vote within the last decade depending on the election. Which is quite different and quite more than the Libertarian party in the USA which has a very negligible influence. They also have been in power within a few provinces quite frequently. I don't think Canada was your best pick to make your point.