Center Parties, Party Competition, and the Implosion of Party Systems: A Study of Centripetal Tendencies in Multiparty Systems

Abstract

Centripetal party competition is traditionally associated with the need to capture the median voter in a two‐party system, whereas the existence of center parties is associated with centrifugal party competition. This article argues that the existence of a ‘pivotal center party’ leads to centripetal party competition in multiparty systems. A pivotal center party is so strong in electoral terms that forming a majority either to the left or to the right of it is unrealistic. Therefore, office‐seeking political parties are forced on to a centrist course. This dynamic can be so forceful that the major parties to the left and to the right of the center party decide to govern in a broad coalition, and we may speak of an ‘implosion’ of the party system. The theoretical argument can explain party system developments in the Netherlands and Finland.

Neglected and Unloved: Does the Hinge Party Deserve That?

“…However, we go further to propose that a hinge party may determine the composition of governments without necessarily participating in them; it may prefer to sustain a minority government from opposition as part of a legislative coalition. The tactical leverage a hinge party possesses, moreover, derives not from its size per se (Keman ; Green‐Pedersen ) or legislative dominance (Keman ); nor does it derive from its ideological centrality (Keman 1994; 2002) or mathematical centrality (McDonald et al ). Rather, it is contingent on a position of left‐right in‐betweenness.…”

“…Green‐Pedersen () employs the ‘pivotal centre party’ concept without the ideological element – that is, minus the ‘centrality’ – but retaining the size component. He argues that the dominance of a pivotal centre party in the coalition‐formation process lies in the reality that the only way to govern without it is in a broad coalition leapfrogging the centre and combining parties of left and right.…”

“…The Finnish case also illustrates our earlier point that a centrist party that regularly participates in government, and is necessary for building a minimal winning coalition, is not ipso facto a hinge party (cf. Arter ; Green‐Pedersen ). The Finnish Centre participated in every ‘party political’ government between the election immediately following its change of name in 1965 and 1987 (there were a number of non‐political ‘caretaker cabinets’ drummed up by the president) and minimal winning coalitions could not be built without it.…”

From a Contingent Party System to Party System Convergence? Mapping Party System Change in Postwar Finland

“…Viewed from a legislative party system perspective (the parties in parliament), with its emphasis on office‐seeking, the focus has been on changes in the structure of party competition (Mair 1989). Interestingly, in a recent article, Christoffer Green‐Pedersen (2004) adopts an expressly office‐seeking approach to analysing the direction of party competition and, equally significantly from our viewpoint, includes Finland in his analysis.…”

Back to the Archives? A Critique of the Danish Part of the Manifesto Dataset

“…to analyze political agendas – e.g. Saglie 1998; Green‐Pedersen 2004), it has primarily been used as a proxy for party positions across time and countries. When the CMP data has been used, it is often presented as being remarkably reliable and unproblematic for analysis since this has been done before with a great deal of success.…”