On June 19, the new government of Nova Scotia, controlled by the New Democratic Party, announced the new cabinet. See this story. The New Democratic Party won the Nova Scotia provincial elections on June 9 for the first time, defeating Canada’s two major parties, the Liberals and the Progressive Conservatives.
I sent the author an e-mail begging him to reconsider and not take away my right to vote in November for the party of my choice. I provided him a number of examples of California 3rd parties getting upwards of 18% of the vote.
First Nova Scotia, next California! (The New Democratic Party of Canada is a member Party of the Socialist International.) The Socialist Party USA is very close in politics to the New Democratic Pary of Candada.
Phil Sawyer wrote (in an earlier post):
June 14th, 2009 at 7:14 am
Speaking of the Socialist Party [SPUSA], on June 5th, 2009, I rejoined the Socialist Party USA. It is my hope, that by setting a personal example, I can convince other State Central Committee members of the Peace and Freedom Pary of California to steer the Party in the direction of affiliating with SPUSA (an almost identical Party) – rather than to continue its misguided plan to organize on a national level itself.
Philippe L. Sawyer, Member
State Central Committee
Sacramento County Central Committee
Peace and Freedom Party of California
Also a Member of:
Amnesty International USA
Coalition for Free and Open Elections
Communist Party USA
Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)
Socialist Party USA
United Public Employees, Local #1
Veterans For Peace
“First Nova Scotia, next California! (The New Democratic Party of Canada is a member Party of the Socialist International.) The Socialist Party USA is very close in politics to the New Democratic Pary of Candada.”
No, not at all.
As a chronic third party member you should realize just using the word “socialist” does not imply ideological closeness.
The Socialist International is mostly ruling or major opposition parties that would probably be viewed as far, far too moderate by members of the SPUSA if they lived in those countries.
That said, the NDP is a bit further to the left than your average Socialist International member, but it’s still closer to the Democratic Party than it is the SPUSA.
Also, the SPUSA is not itself a member of the Socialist International.
One more EVIL and VICIOUS gerrymander minority rule regime in a province in Canada — carried over from the U.K. in the 1700s.
Standard plurality winners in a bare majority of the gerrymander districts for control by the party hacks of 1 party.
Even worse due to mixing legislative and executive powers in the same persons = 2/3 TYRANNY.
P.R. and A.V. NOW.
The July 1 issue of the print edition of Ballot Access News describes the NDP as a minor party. I believe this is misleading. The NDP has formed governments in enough provinces during the course of its history to be considered a major party. In fact, Canada has four major parties — Conservative, Liberal, NDP and Parti Quebecois. The PQ must count as major in spite of the fact that it’s support is concentrated in one province, because of its importance in the national legislature.
As Richard also says in the print article, Canada’s ballot access laws are much better than the U.S. and that plays some role in sustaining a multi-party system in spite of winner-take-all elections. But larger roles are played by (1) the regional concentration of political views (the PQ is just the extreme example of this), which gives small parties a real chance in provincial elections; and (2) the parliamentary rather than presidential form of government.
Some years ago, I combed through libraries, looking for dictionaries and social science reference books that define “two-party system”. There was a clear consensus that a two-party system is one in which only two particular parties at any time have a realistic chance of getting a majority in the national legislative body. By that classic definition, Canada only has two major parties. No one ever dreams that the New Democratic Party would ever get a majority of the Canadian Parliament; and the Bloc Quebecois don’t even run for a majority of seats.
There’s a different approach to characterizing party systems in the political science literature. It’s based on the percentage distribution of either votes or seats, plus some algebra, and produces an “effective number of parties”. In 1985,for example, the effective number based on votes was 2.0 in the U.S. and 2.8 in Canada. In countries with proportional voting methods this number is usually in range 3.0 to 6.0 with a few outliers.
See Rein Taagepera and Matthew Shugart, Seats and Votes (Yale UP, 1989), pp. 70-91 and 259-260.