What is a Party?

A party is a group of people with similar ideological views that try to promote issues consistent with those views. In the United States we have a two party system; two large parties and several small parties. In other democracies around the world there are multiparty systems where several small parties vie for more votes than the other parties. The benefit of our two party system over other multiparty systems is that when a candidate representing one party is elected over half of the people who voted chose that candidate. In two party systems one party needs to gain a majority of votes over the other party in order to win an election. In multiparty systems it is possible for less than half of the people voting to elect their candidate; because, it is not necessary to gain a majority of votes. The French presidential election of 2007 is a good example of how multiparty systems handle this issue. There were two rounds of voting. In the first round of voting Nicolas Sarkozy won with 31% of the vote allowing him to move on to the second round of elections. Right behind him with 26% of the vote Segolene Royal also moved to the second round of elections. Sarkozy won the second election with over half the votes. In some ways this system could be seen as beneficial because it allows for a more diverse assortment of parties. Each party can be more specific about its views and people are more likely to find a party to identify with. In two party systems like ours, politics are split into liberal and conservative, democrat and republican; and although someone may agree with some conservative policies they may also have liberal viewpoints. Such polarity makes it difficult for a candidate to please everyone in their party.