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This study develops and tests theoretical formulas for linking country size and party system characteristics. For countries using one-seat electoral districts or nationwide districts, the averages of the largest seat-share, effective number of assembly parties and mean duration of cabinets can be predicted based solely on population. For countries allocating seats by PR in multi-seat districts, the averages of these characteristics can be predicted based on population and district magnitude. We show that first-past-the-post countries of less than one million tend to have highly dominant largest parties and one-and-a-half party assemblies, rather than a balance of two parties. For larger countries, and PR countries of any size, population is not destiny, as far as party system is concerned. © The Author(s) 2012.

This study joins two existing logical models and tests the resulting predictions of mean cabinet duration (C). One of these models predicts C based on effective number of parties (N): C = k/N2, where k is found to be around 42 years. The other predicts N on the basis of number of seats in the assembly (S) and district magnitude (M). The new combined model leads to a prediction for the mean cabinet duration in terms of these two institutional factors: C = 42 years/(MS)1/3. Three-quarters of the actual mean durations agree with the prediction within a factor of 2. For the purposes of institutional engineering, the model predicts that doubling the district magnitude would reduce the mean cabinet duration by 21 percent ceteris paribus. © 2010 SAGE Publications.

Western Europe has recently experienced the emergence of successful new parties, but while single parties or countries have been extensively studied, insufficient attention has been devoted to this phenomenon from a comparative and long-term perspective. By relying on an original data set covering 20 countries and 344 parliamentary elections, this article presents the first analysis of West European 'genuinely new parties' (GNPs) across time, countries and party families. We hypothesize that the parties differ not only in terms of their short- and long-term success but have a range of distinct development paths. Through a latent growth model, we provide a classification of GNPs in terms of their breakthrough and initial performance. According to the specific trajectory followed by new parties in the first five elections they contest, the model suggests five different classes of new parties in Western Europe: 'explosive', 'meteoric', 'contender', 'flat' and 'flop'. The article discusses the implications of these findings also regarding the ability of the model to produce estimates and predictions about the future electoral performances of GNPs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We propose a new three-dimensional approach to party newness and an interval index of party congruence/novelty. Building on this, we also propose a split-vote-by-congruence (SBC) approach to electoral volatility that employs the index. Four elections from different countries that exhibited different forms of party change are used to illustrate the approach. The congruence/novelty index corresponds to our qualitative case knowledge, and the SBC approach leads to meaningful volatility scores. Ad hoc coding of parties as new/old or singular successors/predecessors can seriously over- or underestimate volatility that explains divergence among volatility scores in literature. By eliminating the need for dichotomous and often controversial coding decisions, the SBC approach allows for a substantially more reliable calculation of volatility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While parties in many new democracies frequently split, merge, change labels, and make and break electoral alliances, comparative systematic research on how these changes are related to each other is limited. This study addresses this gap by conceptualizing change as a result of intra-party conflicts, conflicts in or consolidation of existing electoral alliances, and the formation of new alliances and mergers. We develop measures for each type of change using an original dataset that covers almost 800 party-electoral term dyads in 11 countries in Central and Eastern Europe in the period between 1990 and 2015. Our findings contradict the idea of party change as a uni-dimensional phenomenon. Instead we find that exits from existing electoral alliances, their consolidation through mergers, and the formation of new alliances and mergers are moderately related to each other, but not with intra-party splits. Our findings suggest that parties and their alliances structure political competition in Central and Eastern Europe relatively well. Moreover, negative consequences of party change on representation and accountability are limited, as under the relative absence of multiple and nearly simultaneous changes in party identity the electorate should be able to follow party evolution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses a new group of parties that we term anti-establishment reform parties (AERPs), which combine moderate social and economic policies with anti-establishment appeals and a desire to change the way politics is conducted. We analyse the electoral breakthroughs of AERPs in central and eastern Europe (CEE), the region where AERPs have so far been most successful. Examples include the Simeon II National Movement, Movement for the European Development of Bulgaria (GERB) (Bulgaria), Res Publica (Estonia), New Era (Latvia), TOP09 and Public Affairs (Czech Republic) and Positive Slovenia. We examine the conditions under which such parties broke through in nine CEE states in 1997–2012 using fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA). We find five sufficient causal paths combining high or rising corruption, rising unemployment and party system instability. Rising corruption plays a key role in most pathways but, unexpectedly, AERP breakthroughs are more closely associated with economic good times than bad. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]