The Washington Post has this analysis of what is wrong with political parties in the U.S. The writer quoted many well-informed sources. However, no one points out that political parties outside the United States are thriving and exist in every free country with a population of at least 100,000. Other free countries do not regulate political parties nearly as much as the United States does. As a result, in the typical free country in the world, the people are free to form new parties, run their own parties without much government interference, nominate their candidates according to their own procedures, and generally run the campaigns for their own nominees.

Naturally, in the freer environment in other countries, multi-party systems are the rule. Although in Great Britain and Canada two parties are much bigger than all the other parties (which is the original definition of a “two-party system”), they are still multi-party systems because five or more parties have representation in Parliament and win many local partisan elections.

In the United States, parties are tightly constricted in their ability to carry out their duties. This is especially true for parties other than the Democratic and Republican Parties. Thanks to Rick Hasen for the link.