This post is a response to a question posed in its complete format: “Which type of party system is best for a country, one party system, two party system or multiple party system?”
The more parties, the more broad the representation of the people.
The more parties, the less polarized the people are by ideology.
The more parties, the less gridlock on issues preventing progress on their resolution.
The more parties, the less able the plutocrats are to manipulate groups of public representatives to corrupt the entire system.
The fewer the parties, the more prone a system becomes to internal conflicts and widespread instability.
The fewer the parties, the more prone a system is to authoritarian control of the people.
The fewer the parties, the more prone the system is to civil unrest and the factors leading to a systemic collapse.
The fewer the parties, the more prone the entire system becomes to corruption at all levels, from the leadership down to the core units of society.
The fewer the parties, the more prone the people become to developing a sociopathic fragility and a callous disregard for the social contract.
The more parties, the more prone people are to cooperative negotiations in a culture of mutual respect for the social contract.
The more parties, the more democratic the system and the more egalitarian the people become.
The fewer the parties, the more prone the system becomes to toxic competitiveness that corrodes the natural goodwill of the people toward each other.
You’ve been watching it in action for a couple of decades now.
Whatever one party initiates, the other dismantles.
The fine arts of negotiation and compromise no longer exist because one party views that as submission while the other regards that zero-sum game attitude toward cooperation as toxic and prone to counterproductive and even destructive initiatives that create problems without solving any.
For example, there is no rational justification for abortion restrictions. The entire issue is a non-issue stoked up to an irrationally unhinged fervour based on two misanthropic lies, that abortions are a lazy excuse for birth control by whores, and that they are acts of murdering babies. Neither perception resembles anything remotely true or anywhere near accurate renditions of reality.
They are lies stoked for the simple reason of creating political alignments on the vector of hating one’s fellow citizens. Since about 80% of the population is against abortion legislation, it’s been hijacked by the tyranny of a minority and leveraged as a power grab for a political party. The overblown abortion issue is a political wedge and a fundamental betrayal of a democratic system. This would not be possible in a multiparty system.
A two-party system is a recipe for conflict. In contrast, multiparty systems have been denigrated as being incapable of progress. The reality is that multiparty systems encourage negotiation and compromise among varying ideologies that more accurately reflect the expressions of individual beliefs than the aggregated pools of power occurring within a duopoly.
Another major disadvantage of a two-party system is that it limits the spread of investments the ownership class requires while choosing campaigns to finance. It’s a win-win system for them because it’s the cheapest way to hedge their bets. They can’t afford to spread their campaign investments to many parties in a multiparty system. So, their influence in politics is significantly diluted, and the will of the people is much more accurately represented by the diversity of ideological voices in Congress.
A further, much more subtle, and arguably the most profound impact on society is the homogenization of public thinking through aggregating issues into bundles. All nuance is bred out of each issue as it becomes incorporated into a party package to be accepted wholesale — like a cable deal where you can’t opt for individual strategies or solutions. It’s an all-or-nothing approach to addressing political issues that pressures the electorate to reduce the political process to the level of cheering for one’s party, like a sports team.
A two-party system cannot but lead a nation toward escalating internal strife as party positions become increasingly polarized. One party may successfully drag the other party into its ideology. However, that flexibility and willingness to accommodate the other can only go so far before the opposing party must run backwards in the opposite direction. That’s where the DNC is now, after decades of capitulating to a fascist rightwing leadership banking the complete corruption of a democratic system on the corruptibility of their opposition.
thotbag 