Political fragmentation is the division of the political landscape into so many different parties and groups that the governance might become inefficient. Political fragmentation can apply to political parties, political groups or other

political organisation A political organization is any organization that involves itself in the political process, including political parties, non-governmental organizations, and special interest advocacy groups. Political organizations are those engaged in politic ...

s. It is most often

operationalized In research design, especially in psychology, social sciences, life sciences and physics, operationalization or operationalisation is a process of defining the measurement of a phenomenon which is not directly measurable, though its existence is i ...

using the effective number of parliamentary parties.

Effects of political fragmentation

Scholars, journalists, and politicians have theorized about a number of potential effects of political fragmentation. For example, it has been argued that higher fragmentation allows voters to better represent their

political spectrum A political spectrum is a system to characterize and classify different Politics, political positions in relation to one another. These positions sit upon one or more Geometry, geometric Coordinate axis, axes that represent independent political ...

of political positions. The length of government coalition formation has also been argued to increase with number of parties and decreases with preexisting

political groups This is a list of political groups by country. A political group, also known as a political alliance, coalition or bloc, is cooperation by members of different political parties on a common agenda. This usually involves formal agreements between ...

. The strength of these effects has been hypothesized to depend on whether it is the government or the opposition that are fragmented. However, the political fragmentation of parliaments has little causal effect on a number of dimensions of the quality of democracy. The

veto player ''Veto Players: How Political Institutions Work'' is a book written by political science professor George Tsebelis in 2002. It is a game theory analysis of political behavior. In this work Tsebelis uses the concept of the veto player as a tool ...

theory predicts that higher fragmentation relates to

gridlock Gridlock is a form of traffic congestion where continuous queues of vehicles block an entire network of intersecting streets, bringing traffic in all directions to a complete standstill. The term originates from a situation possible in a grid ...

, but other literature does not observe increased gridlock. While

one-party state A one-party state, single-party state, one-party system or single-party system is a governance structure in which only a single political party controls the ruling system. In a one-party state, all opposition parties are either outlawed or en ...

s are

authoritarian Authoritarianism is a political system characterized by the rejection of political plurality, the use of strong central power to preserve the political ''status quo'', and reductions in democracy, separation of powers, civil liberties, and ...

dominant-party system A dominant-party system, or one-party dominant system, is a political occurrence in which a single political party continuously dominates election results over running opposition groups or parties. Any ruling party staying in power for more tha ...

s can be democratic.

Factors affecting level of political fragmentation

The political fragmentation, represented by effective number of parties, is roughly estimated with the seat product model, and increases with district magnitude and assembly size. The political fragmentation tends to move towards an equilibrium, depending on the voting system.

Duverger's law In political science, Duverger's law ( ) holds that in political systems with single-member districts and the first-past-the-post voting system, as in, for example, the United States and Britain, only 2 powerful political parties tend to control ...

predicts majoritarian elections with

district magnitude An electoral (congressional, legislative, etc.) district, sometimes called a constituency, riding, or ward, is a geographical portion of a political unit, such as a country, state or province, city, or administrative region, created to provi ...

of one favor a two-party system and

proportional representation Proportional representation (PR) refers to any electoral system under which subgroups of an electorate are reflected proportionately in the elected body. The concept applies mainly to political divisions (Political party, political parties) amon ...

increases the number of parties. In proportional representation, higher electoral thresholds tend to reduce the number of parties since voters voting for smaller parties have a higher risk of having their votes wasted. Strong autocrats can prefer a fragmented political system, while weaker autocrats can prefer a low level of party fragmentation.

References

Sources

* {{cite book, last=Pildes, first=Richard H., chapter=Political Fragmentation and the Decline of Effective Government, title=Constitutionalism and a Right to Effective Government, series=Comparative Constitutional Law and Policy, doi=10.2139/ssrn.3868421 , chapter-url=https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3868421 , publisher=

Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press was the university press of the University of Cambridge. Granted a letters patent by King Henry VIII in 1534, it was the oldest university press in the world. Cambridge University Press merged with Cambridge Assessme ...

, pages=235–246, year=2022, ssrn=3868421 , editor1-first=V.C., editor1-last=Jackson, editor2-first=Y., editor2-last=Dawood Voting theory