GOVT-040 Lecture Notes - Party System, Plurality Voting System, Divided Government
Document Summary
Presidential democracies are more vulnerable to break down than parliamentary democracies. In the history of the modern world four presidential democracies have survived for more than 41 years: the united states, costa rica, venezuela and colombia. All of them have two party systems, meaning that they elect presidents and have something known as plurality voting. The scott mainwaring reading argues that a two party system helps to get rid of at least some of the problems associated with presidentialism. He argues that in a two party system presidents are much more likely to have legislative majorities and this reduces the likelihood of a divided government, reduces the likelihood of executive, legislative gridlock and conflict. Mainwaring also argues that two party systems are less likely to polarize than the multi party systems. So, for mainwaring, the problem isn"t presidentialism per se, but the combination of presidentialism and multi party systems.
