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Title Duverger's law of plurality voting : the logic of party competition in Canada, India, the United Kingdom and the United States / Bernard Grofman, Andre Blais, Shaun Bowler, editors
Published New York, NY : Springer, ©2009

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Description 1 online resource (viii, 165 pages) : illustrations
Series Studies in public choice, 0924-4700
Studies in public choice.
Contents Introduction: Evidence for Duverger's Law from Four Countries -- Voting Strategically in Canada and Britain -- Neither Representative nor Accountable: First-Past-the-Post in Britain -- Strategic Voting in the US -- Mechanical Effects of Duverger's Law in the United States -- Canada: The Puzzle of Local Three-Party Competition -- Party Inflation in India: Why Has a Multi-Party Format Prevailed in the National Party System? -- Does the United Kingdom Obey Duverger's Law? -- The United States: A Case of Duvergerian Equilibrium
Summary Maurice Duverger is arguably the most distinguished French political scientist of the last century, but his major impact has been largely in the English-speaking world. His book, Political Parties, first translated into English in 1954, has influenced both the party politics literature (which continues to make use of his typology of party organization) and the electoral systems literature. His chief contributions there deal with what have come to be called in his honor Duverger's Law and Duverger's Hypothesis. The first argues that countries with the plurality rule will tend to become two-party systems; the second argues that countries using proportional representation (PR) will tend to become multi-party systems. Duverger also identifies specific mechanisms that will produce these effects, conventionally referred to as "mechanical effects" and "psychological effects." However, while Duverger's Hypothesis concerning the link between PR and multipartism is now widely accepted, the empirical evidence that plurality voting results in two-party systems is remarkably weak--with the U.S. the most notable exception. The chapters in this volume consider national-level evidence about Duverger's law in the world's largest, longest-lived and most successful democracies of Britain, Canada, India and the United States. One set of chapters involves looking at the overall evidence for and against Duverger's Law in these countries; the other set deals with evidence about the mechanical and psychological effects predicted by Duverger. The result is an incisive analysis of electoral and party dynamics that will appeal to researchers, academics, students, policymakers, and policy watchers around the world. Sponsored by the Center for the Study of Democracy, University of California, Irvine
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references and index
Notes Print version record
In Springer e-books
Subject Duverger, Maurice, 1917-2014
SUBJECT Duverger, Maurice, 1917- cct
Duverger, Maurice, 1917-2014 fast
Subject Election law -- Cross-cultural studies
Comparative government.
Political parties -- Cross-cultural studies
Voting -- Cross-cultural studies
POLITICAL SCIENCE -- Political Process -- Political Parties.
Political parties.
Voting.
Election law.
Comparative government.
Sciences sociales.
Sciences humaines.
Comparative government
Election law
Political parties
Politics and government
Voting
Canada.
India.
Great Britain.
United States of America.
Elections.
Election law.
Political parties.
Political systems.
Democracy.
SUBJECT Canada -- Politics and government. http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85019334
India -- Politics and government. http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85064936
Great Britain -- Politics and government. http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85056868
United States -- Politics and government. http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85140410
Subject United States -- Politics and government.
Canada -- Politics and government.
India -- Politics and government.
Great Britain -- Politics and government.
Canada
Great Britain
India
United States
Genre/Form Cross-cultural studies
Form Electronic book
Author Grofman, Bernard.
Blais, André, 1947-
Bowler, Shaun, 1958-
ISBN 9780387097206
0387097201
0387097198
9780387097190