It’s called the spoiler effect and it’s an issue of the voting system of “First Past the Post”.
Imagine you have 4 parties, A,B, C and D. Let’s say A, B, and C largely align on issues and D is the outlier. While 70% of the population wants either A,B, or C, if the vote gets split evenly then we see D wins despite on wining 30% of votes.
C says “Not cool man. I’m giving up and telling all my voters to vote for B”. Now you have a three party system.
D isn’t dumb and so he throws propaganda and budget to draw voters to A despite not agreeing with their policies at all. They are incentivized to split the vote because of how the system is designed. Voters get split between A and B again making 33% the victory threshold. D ekes out another win despite not reaching a majority. A and B decide to join forces to never let D win again and boom two party system.
Numbers are hyperbolic for demonstration but this is how it works. It’s why sometimes third party campaigns get backed by the political parties least in alignment with them.
You will never solve the two party system without changing voting to one that negates the spoiler effect.
You will never solve the two party system without changing voting to one that negates the spoiler effect.
And you will never change voting to one that negates the spoiler effect while the two party system is in effect, because the two parties with power both benefit from it being the way it is.
“Never” is a long time. If this were just a game theory world, then yes. If people always did the optimal move, then a multi-party system would eventually become a two-party system, and once it became a two party system, there would be no way to change it because every change is non-optimal.
People sometimes don’t behave rationally. In Canada in the 1990s the Progressive Conservative party had a majority government and seemed unstoppable. But, the leader Brian Mulroney became incredibly unpopular. At the end of his time in office, he was so unpopular that everybody knew that his party was going to be destroyed in the next election. But, at that point Canada was effectively a 2-party country, Liberals and Progressive Conservatives. Even though the Liberals were going to take power, it was just a matter of time before it swung back to the Progressive Conservatives. So, the smart move for the PC party would have been to just bide their time.
Instead, the party split in two. Half stayed PC, the other half joined a new party called Reform. But, because of first-past-the-post voting, the conservative votes were split, half went to the Reform party candidate, half went to the PC candidate. As a result, the PC party was destroyed in the election. They went from 169 seats to Liberals’ 83 to only having 2 seats. They were the 5th biggest party, after the Bloc Quebecois, Reform, and NDP. They nearly lost official party status.
These days there is no PC party anymore, The split party eventually reformed and dropped the “Progressive”, now they’re just the Conservative party. And, they’re again part of the duopoly. Whenever the Liberals lose, the Conservatives win, and vice versa. But, for a while things changed because humans are not always rational.
It’s theoretically possible for humans to be irrational in a good way too. A well meaning and honest party could gain power and then pass legislation that hurt itself and helped democracy, like getting rid of first past the post. But, to do that, they’d need to feel massive pressure from voters. Even if the politicians want to do it, they need to show that the people are forcing their hand.
It’s called the spoiler effect and it’s an issue of the voting system of “First Past the Post”.
Imagine you have 4 parties, A,B, C and D. Let’s say A, B, and C largely align on issues and D is the outlier. While 70% of the population wants either A,B, or C, if the vote gets split evenly then we see D wins despite on wining 30% of votes.
C says “Not cool man. I’m giving up and telling all my voters to vote for B”. Now you have a three party system.
D isn’t dumb and so he throws propaganda and budget to draw voters to A despite not agreeing with their policies at all. They are incentivized to split the vote because of how the system is designed. Voters get split between A and B again making 33% the victory threshold. D ekes out another win despite not reaching a majority. A and B decide to join forces to never let D win again and boom two party system.
Numbers are hyperbolic for demonstration but this is how it works. It’s why sometimes third party campaigns get backed by the political parties least in alignment with them.
You will never solve the two party system without changing voting to one that negates the spoiler effect.
And you will never change voting to one that negates the spoiler effect while the two party system is in effect, because the two parties with power both benefit from it being the way it is.
Some people think that those in power will put the option to remove their power on a ballot. That’s always been confusing, and hilarious to me.
“Never” is a long time. If this were just a game theory world, then yes. If people always did the optimal move, then a multi-party system would eventually become a two-party system, and once it became a two party system, there would be no way to change it because every change is non-optimal.
People sometimes don’t behave rationally. In Canada in the 1990s the Progressive Conservative party had a majority government and seemed unstoppable. But, the leader Brian Mulroney became incredibly unpopular. At the end of his time in office, he was so unpopular that everybody knew that his party was going to be destroyed in the next election. But, at that point Canada was effectively a 2-party country, Liberals and Progressive Conservatives. Even though the Liberals were going to take power, it was just a matter of time before it swung back to the Progressive Conservatives. So, the smart move for the PC party would have been to just bide their time.
Instead, the party split in two. Half stayed PC, the other half joined a new party called Reform. But, because of first-past-the-post voting, the conservative votes were split, half went to the Reform party candidate, half went to the PC candidate. As a result, the PC party was destroyed in the election. They went from 169 seats to Liberals’ 83 to only having 2 seats. They were the 5th biggest party, after the Bloc Quebecois, Reform, and NDP. They nearly lost official party status.
These days there is no PC party anymore, The split party eventually reformed and dropped the “Progressive”, now they’re just the Conservative party. And, they’re again part of the duopoly. Whenever the Liberals lose, the Conservatives win, and vice versa. But, for a while things changed because humans are not always rational.
It’s theoretically possible for humans to be irrational in a good way too. A well meaning and honest party could gain power and then pass legislation that hurt itself and helped democracy, like getting rid of first past the post. But, to do that, they’d need to feel massive pressure from voters. Even if the politicians want to do it, they need to show that the people are forcing their hand.