Monday, January 1, 2018

Multi-party political system – strategies and success stories!




A multi-party system is a system in which multiple political parties across the political spectrum run for national election, and all have the capacity to gain control of government offices, separately or in coalition.[1] Apart from one-party-dominant and two-party systems, multi-party systems tend to be more common in parliamentary systems than presidential systems and far more common in countries that use proportional representation compared to countries that use first-past-the-post elections.

Decoding Jargon:
A first-past-the-post (FPTP) voting method is one in which voters indicate on a ballot the candidate of their choice, and the candidate who receives the most votes wins: this is described as winner takes all. First-past-the-post voting is a plurality voting method. FPTP is a common, but not universal, feature of electoral systems with single-member electoral divisions, and is practiced in close to one third of countries. Notable examples include Canada, India, Pakistan, the United Kingdom and the United States, as well as most of their current or former colonies and protectorates.

Proportional representation (PR) characterizes electoral systems by which divisions in an electorate are reflected proportionately in the elected body. If n% of the electorate support a particular political party, then roughly n% of seats will be won by that party.

Argentina, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Croatia, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Lebanon, Mexico, Moldova, Nepal, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, the Philippines, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Tunisia and Ukraine are examples of nations that have used a multi-party system effectively in their democracies. In these countries, usually no single party has a parliamentary majority by itself. Instead, multiple political parties are compelled to form compromised coalitions for the purpose of developing power blocks and attaining legitimate mandate.

- Wikipedia

Fun Fact:
There are only two major political parties in the United States. This is a winner-take-all system because there is no reward for the party or candidate that finishes second. As a result, two political parties usually dominate plurality electoral systems to the disadvantage of smaller third parties, just as the Democrats and the Republicans dominate the American political system.

- Google Search (Why are there only two major political parties in the United States?)
- SparkNotes: Political Parties: The American Two-Party System (http://www.sparknotes.com/us-government-and-politics/american-government/political-parties/section2.rhtml)

Two major levels for political parties in India:

National Party

A registered party is recognised as a National Party only if it fulfils any one of the following three conditions:
  1. The party wins 2% of seats in the Lok Sabha (as of 2014, 11 seats) from at least 3 different States.
  2. At a General Election to Lok Sabha or Legislative Assembly, the party polls 6% of votes in four States and in addition it wins 4 Lok Sabha seats.
  3. A party gets recognition as a State Party in four or more states.
7 Recognised national parties as of 2 September 2016 arranged alphabetically
No.
Name
Abbreviation
Foundation
year
Current leader(s)[D]
Party symbol
Headquarters
1
AITC
1998
Flowers & grass
36G Tapsia Road, Kolkata - 700039, (West Bengal)
2
BSP
1984
Elephant
12, Gurudwara Rakabganj Road, New Delhi - 11000, (Delhi)
3
BJP
1980
Lotus
11 Ashoka Road,
New Delhi - 11000, (Delhi)
4
CPI
1925
Ears of corn and sickle
Indrajit Gupta Marg, New Delhi - 110002, (Delhi)
5
CPI (M)
1964
Hammer sickle and star
Bhai Vir Singh Marg, New Delhi - 110 001, (Delhi)
6
INC
1885
Hand
10, Bishmabhar Marg, New Delhi - 110001, (Delhi)
7
NCP
1999
Clock
10, Bishmabhar Marg, New Delhi - 110001, (Delhi)

State Party

A registered party has to fulfill any of the following conditions for recognition as a State Party:
  1. A party should win minimum three percent of the total number of seats or a minimum of three seats in the Legislative Assembly.
  2. A party should win at least one seat in the Lok Sabha for every 25 seats or any fraction thereof allotted to that State at a general election to the Lok Sabha.
  3. A political party should secure at least six percent of the total valid votes polled during general election to a Lok Sabha or State Legislative Assembly and should, in addition, win at least one Lok Sabha, and two Legislative Assembly seats in that election,
  4. Under the liberalized criteria, one more clause that it will be eligible for recognition as State Party if it secures 8% or more of the total valid votes polled in the State.addition to one seat in any state.
There are 50 recognised state parties as of 5 May 2017 in India. Among them is “Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), founded in 2012, lead by Arvind Kejriwal with recognition in Delhi and Punjab.”

- Wikipedia

Success stories

1. Emmanuel Macron, the President of France (assumed office on 14 May 2017) and founder of political party “La République En Marche! (2016–present)”

Macron founded the En Marche! (English translation: "Forward!", "Onward!", "Working!" or "On The Move!"), a centrist political movement in April 2016. Macron describes La République En Marche! to be a progressive movement, uniting both the left and the right.

Macron founded the independent political party, En Marche!, in Amiens on 6 April 2016. A liberal, progressive political movement that gathered huge media coverage when it was first established, the party and Macron were both reprimanded by President Hollande and the question of Macron's loyalty to the government was risen.

Before resigning from the government in August 2016 to launch a bid in the 2017 presidential election, Macron had held positions like Inspector of Finances, Deputy Secretary-General of the Élysée, Minister of Economy and Finance.

In November 2016, Macron declared that he would run in the election under the banner of En Marche!, a centrist political movement he founded in April 2016.
Macron won the election on 7 May 2017 beating the Front National’s Marine Le Pen by a landslide 66.1% of the second-round vote.

Political positions:
Macron has been described by some observers as a social liberal and by others as a social democrat. During his time in the French Socialist Party, he supported the party's centrist wing, whose political stance has been associated with "third way" policies advanced by Bill Clinton, Tony Blair and Gerhard Schröder, and whose leading spokesman has been former prime minister Manuel Valls. Overall Macron is largely seen as a centrist.

Decoding Jargon:
Centrism:
In politics, centrism, the centre or the center (American English) is a political outlook or specific position that involves acceptance or support of a balance of a degree of social equality and a degree of social hierarchy, while opposing political changes which would result in a significant shift of society either strongly to the left or the right.

Left-wing politics:
Left-wing politics supports social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy and social inequality.

Right-wing politics:
Right-wing politics hold that certain social orders and hierarchies are inevitable, natural, normal or desirable,[1][2][3] typically supporting this position on the basis of natural law, economics or tradition. Hierarchy and inequality may be viewed as natural results of traditional social differences or the competition in market economies. The term right-wing can generally refer to "the conservative or reactionary section of a political party or system".
The political terms "Left" and "Right" were first used during the French Revolution (1789–1799) and referred to seating arrangements in the French parliament: those who sat to the right of the chair of the parliamentary president were broadly supportive of the institutions of the monarchist Old Regime. The original Right in France was formed as a reaction against the "Left" and comprised those politicians supporting hierarchy, tradition and clericalism. The use of the expression la droite ("the right") became prominent in France after the restoration of the monarchy in 1815, when it was applied to the Ultra-royalists. The people of English-speaking countries did not apply the terms "right" and "left" to their own politics until the 20th century.



2. Arvind Kejriwal (born 16 August 1968) is an Indian politician and a former bureaucrat who is the current and 7th Chief Minister of Delhi since February 2015.

In 2012, he launched the Aam Aadmi Party, and the party won in the 2013 Delhi Legislative Assembly election. Following the election, he took office as the Chief Minister of Delhi on 28 December 2013. He resigned 49 days later, on 14 February 2014, stating he did so because of his minority government's inability to pass his proposed anti-corruption legislation due to a lack of support from other political parties.

In 2015, his party won the 2015 Delhi Assembly elections with a majority, obtaining 67 out of 70 assembly seats. On 14 February 2015, he was sworn in as Chief Minister for a second term after his party's victory in the Delhi Legislative Assembly election.


3. Bernie Sanders (United States Senator from Vermont (Incumbent) Assumed office on January 3, 2007)

Bernard Sanders (born September 8, 1941) is an American politician serving as the junior United States Senator from Vermont since 2007; he is the longest-serving independent in U.S. congressional history. Since his election to the House of Representatives in 1990, he has caucused with the Democratic Party, which has entitled him to congressional committee assignments and at times given Democrats a majority.

A self-described democratic socialist and a New Deal-era American progressive, Sanders is pro-labor and emphasizes reversing economic inequality. Many scholars consider his views to be more in line with social democracy.

Sanders was born and raised in the Brooklyn borough of New York City and graduated from the University of Chicago in 1964. While a student he was an active protest organizer for the Congress of Racial Equality and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee during the Civil Rights Movement. After settling in Vermont in 1968, Sanders ran unsuccessful third-party campaigns for governor and U.S. senator in the early to mid-1970s. As an independent, he was elected mayor of Burlington—Vermont's most populous city of 42,417 in 2010—in 1981, by a margin of ten votes. He went on to be reelected as mayor three times. In 1990, he was elected to represent Vermont's at-large congressional district in the U.S. House of Representatives, where he co-founded the Congressional Progressive Caucus in 1991. He served as a congressman for 16 years before being elected to the U.S. Senate in 2006. In 2012, he was reelected with 71% of the popular vote.

Sanders announced his campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination on April 30, 2015. Initially considered a long shot, Sanders won 23 primaries and caucuses and approximately 43% of pledged delegates to Clinton's 55%. His campaign was noted for its supporters' enthusiasm, as well as for his rejection of large donations from corporations, the financial industry, and any associated Super PAC. On July 12, 2016, Sanders formally endorsed Clinton in her unsuccessful general election campaign against Republican Donald Trump, while urging his supporters to continue the "political revolution" his campaign had begun.

Decoding Jargon:
Democratic socialism: is a political ideology that advocates political democracy alongside social ownership of the means of production with an emphasis on self-management or democratic management of economic institutions within a market socialist or decentralized socialist planned economy.

Means of production:
In economics and sociology, the means of production are physical, non-human and non-financial inputs used for the production of economic value: raw materials, the facilities, machinery and tools used in the production of goods. In the terminology of classical economics, the means of production are the "factors of production" minus financial capital and minus human capital.

Social ownership:
A form of collective ownership in which the control and organization of an industry, company, etc., are shared, especially by its workers or by the community at large.


Social ownership refers to the various forms of ownership for the means of production in socialist economic systems; encompassing public ownership, employee ownership, cooperative ownership, citizen ownership of equity and common ownership. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nNy6-mVtVTo)


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