Sartori Reconsidered: Toward a New Predominant Party System
| Author | Zim Nwokora,Riccardo Pelizzo |
| Published date | 01 December 2014 |
| DOI | 10.1111/1467-9248.12078 |
| Date | 01 December 2014 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
Sartori Reconsidered: Toward a New Predominant
Party System
Zim Nwokora
University of Melbourne
Riccardo Pelizzo
World Bank Institute
Despite the success of his party systems theory, Giovanni Sartori’s predominant par ty system is a type that is
consistently avoided by party systems scholars,yet the reasons for this have been unclear.This article exposes the flaws
in Sartori’s predominant party system, but we also argue that it remains a useful concept and,consequently, that the
literature’s rejection of predominance and retreat to the cruder dominance notion is unnecessary. Instead, we amend
predominance to ensure its coherence within Sartori’s typology and consistency with his party systems theory.We
show that our amendments improve the value of predominance as a category for empirical analysis of the effects of
party systems.
Keywords: predominant; dominant; party system; typology; Sartor i
The predominant party system was introduced by Giovanni Sartori to identify party
systems in consolidated democracies that are anchored by only one relevant party.These
characteristics are sufficient to make the predominant party system a ‘type’ alongside the
other types that Sartori proposed in his classic Parties and Party Systems: A Framework for
Analysis (1976). However, while his other democratic party system types – ‘one-party’,
‘hegemonic’,‘two-party’, ‘moderate pluralism’and ‘polarised pluralism’ – became tenets in
the party systems literature, the predominant party system has been largely abandoned.Yet
the reasons for scholars’ discomfort with the notion,and for their retreat to the older notion
of dominance,have been unclear.And there has been no proper assessment of whether their
de facto abandonment of predominance is a better choice than either persisting with
Sartori’s predominance concept or revising it to improve its utility as a category for
empirical analysis. This article addresses these two gaps.
First, we identify the sources of scholars’ resistance to predominance.There are two
serious problems in its conception and elaboration. The first problem is that Sartor i’s
predominant party system is not conceived using the theoretical dimensions that he uses to
construct his other types of democratic party system.The other types are derived using two
criteria: fragmentation and polarisation.These dimensions are not used to derive predomi-
nance, which is instead defined by reference to patterns of power alternation.The result is
that the predominance type is dislocated from his overall framework.The second problem
concerns the structure of the predominance concept. Careful scrutiny of Sartori’s remarks
on predominance reveals that the concept should be understood as a radial category with
an unambiguous core and fuzzy boundaries, but Sartori’s explicit definition uses a classical
mould.The result is that his empirical analysis uncovers only obvious cases of predominance
and neglects the subtle variants that become apparent when its radial structure is unpacked.
Second, in light of the problems with predominance, we assess whether progress in the
study of party systems is more likely by either: (1) abandoning Sartor i’s notion, which has
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doi: 10.1111/1467-9248.12078
POLITICAL STUDIES: 2014 VOL 62, 824–842
© 2013The Authors. Political Studies © 2013 Political StudiesAssociation
been the general tendency among researchers; (2) persisting with Sartor i predominance in
spite of its flaws; or (3) revising predominance to remedy its flaws while retaining Sartori’s
basic intuitions.We argue that the third option is best,for predominance captures essential
aspects of party systems that cannot be captured using dominance or any of Sartori’s other
party system types, and predominance can be reconstructed to remove its liabilities while
remaining true to Sartori’s initial ideas. To show that the choice to revise predominance
offers benefits over abandoning the concept or persisting with it,we present empirical data
that support the idea that predominant party systems have distinctive effects on economic
outcomes, and that our revised predominance concept captures these realities more accu-
rately than does Sartori predominance.
The article is organised as follows. In the next section, we discuss the problems with
Sartori predominance.We then assess whether these problems warrant the abandonment of
the concept and a return to the older notion of dominance, which has been the literature’s
general approach.We argue that this response is both problematic and unnecessary.Instead,
we recommend a recasting of predominance;this is the task of the third part of the article.
We embed predominance within Sartori’s typology by anchoring his framework in power
alternation – the latent dimension in his analysis – instead of ideological polarisation.
Recognising that predominance is a radial concept, we extend its bounds to include the
possibilities of predominant coalitions, interrupted predominance and sub-national pre-
dominance.These subtypes, though absent from Sartori’s elucidation, are shown to exhibit
the essential mechanics of his predominant party system type. In the fourth section, we
consider the practical returns from our theoretical revisions.Using a data set of predominant
party systems, we show that our amendments of predominance improve its utility as a
category in empirical analysis.
The Problems with Sartori Predominance
Incoherence within Sartori’s Typology
Frustrated by the numbers-of-parties approach (e.g. Duverger, 1954),Sar tori (1976, p.125)
proposed a typology of party systems based on multidimensional criteria or ‘attribute
compounds’. He proposed fragmentation, or the number of relevant parties in a party
system,1and polarisation, the ideological spread of the relevant parties, as fundamental
dimensions. His typology, supposedly der ived from these dimensions, comprises six party
system types: one-party, hegemonic, predominant, two-party, moderate pluralism and
polarised pluralism (Sartori, 1976, p. 125).
A predominant party system describes ‘a power configuration in which one party
governs alone, without being subjected to alternation, as long as it continues to win,
electorally, an absolute majority’ (Sartori, 1976, p. 127). To identify predominance in
practice, Sartori outlined three further conditions. He argued, first, that predominance in
seats, rather than election votes, was the relevant criter ion. Second, his majority cr iterion
was relaxed for countries that ‘unquestionably abide by a less-than-absolute majority
principle’ (Sartori, 1976, p. 196).This means that a predominant party system can exist in
countries where ‘minority single-party governments remain a standing and efficient prac-
tice’ (Sartori, 1976, p. 196). Third, Sartori added that party system predominance is
TOWARD A NEW PREDOMINANT PARTY SYSTEM 825
© 2013The Authors. Political Studies © 2013 Political StudiesAssociation
POLITICAL STUDIES: 2014, 62(4)
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