When will we break away from the two party system?

[RC]

I want to know, when do you think we will break away from this 2 party system?

Yes, we have made some small progress in recent elections, (Perot '92 and '96, Ventura in '99, Johnson '12 and '16, McMullin 2016, and as of now, 1 Independent Governor and 2 Senators.) but we have not truly seen the system break permanently for a third option to stay in the competition.

So like I said, my question is... when? When will the system be more fair to third parties? When will they win?

[RaphaelDLG]

When the Constitution is changed from the electoral college to something less winner take all, and when state electoral laws are changed from FPTP to multi-member districts.

Bottom line.

[SteveRogers]

When the sun rises in the west and sets in the east. When the seas go dry and mountains blow in the wind like leaves.

[(Still) muted by Kalwejt until March 31]

The tenth of never.

[Goldwater]

Never, at least as long as we have FPTP winner take all.

[The_Doctor]

Never. The Constitution is pretty clear on requiring 270 electoral votes and given that the system encourages two broad coalitions to fight it out… so it'll happen never.

[ag]

I want to know, when do you think we will break away from this 2 party system?

Yes, we have made some small progress in recent elections, (Perot '92 and '96, Ventura in '99, Johnson '12 and '16, McMullin 2016, and as of now, 1 Independent Governor and 2 Senators.) but we have not truly seen the system break permanently for a third option to stay in the competition.

So like I said, my question is... when? When will the system be more fair to third parties? When will they win?

When you change the constitution to abolish the presidency and/or introduce a PR component to the electoral system for legistlatures. Until then, it could only happen temporarily, in a transition to a new two-party system.

[ag]

When the Constitution is changed from the electoral college to something less winner take all, and when state electoral laws are changed from FPTP to multi-member districts.

Bottom line.

Electoral college, actually, is not to blame that much. The presidency itself, and the FPTP for congress, of course, are.

[Blue3]

1. Not in our political system


2. We shouldn't. Two parties mean that governing coalitions are clear and chosen by voters. In multi-party systems, it's more undemocratic, with the governing coalitions being chosen after elections with backroom dealing.

[Heisenberg]

1. Not in our political system


2. We shouldn't. Two parties mean that governing coalitions are clear and chosen by voters. In multi-party systems, it's more undemocratic, with the governing coalitions being chosen after elections with backroom dealing.

Pretty good response, I can generally agree.
And, yes, there are two Independent Senators, but both of them are clearly waaaayyyy closer to one side than the other.

[Figueira]

Never. The most that can happen is another party showing up and replacing one of the major parties, but that is highly unlikely to happen and would probably be more of a shift in name only (e.g. all prominent Democrats join the new Progressive Party).

[Vosem]

I'm very surprised nobody's ever run for President on the populist platform of "give you more choices" promising to call an Article V Convention, change the system, and break the duopoly. More than 60% of people weren't satisfied with their two choices in 2016, and thought they deserved better. It could be a winning issue.

[Vcrew192]

Statewide proportional representation would increase third-party representation. In this system, the voter votes for a party and each party's voter share is added up as a percentage. Party candidates are then placed in office in accordance to their percentage. This would increase third-party representation since a candidate in Illinois, for example, would only need to win 6% of the popular vote to get a seat in congress but it's also somewhat undemocratic and takes power away from local government.

I think a better idea would be to require a candidate to garner a majority of the vote in order to win rather than a plurality. We already have this in several states and it works very well. It essentially works like this: the candidates run a regular campaign up until election day. The votes come in and nobody gets a majority since there were third-parties distracting the vote. The top two vote-earners now compete in a second runoff election. This empowers third-parties because the two major-party candidates now depend on them to be the swing vote and has to campaign to them and bring their issues to the forefront.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

Hopefully some day we can have something epic like the 1993 Canadian election.

[Vcrew192]

I'm very surprised nobody's ever run for President on the populist platform of "give you more choices" promising to call an Article V Convention, change the system, and break the duopoly. More than 60% of people weren't satisfied with their two choices in 2016, and thought they deserved better. It could be a winning issue.

The parties establishments don't want third parties for obvious reasons. They receive the lion's share of contributions from PACs and others because people like their money to go to a winner. If a candidate wants a serious chance of winning they have to please the party establishment in order to get that money and campaign infrastructure. Look at this election season when the debates were first starting, Johnson was only a few percent away from the minimum required to sit at the debates and there was a lot of pressure to let him in. The Commission on Presidential Debates is run by representative of the GOP and DNC so there was little chance of reform. Neither candidate said anything about it because, although it would have looked good to the people, they didn't want to anger their respective parties.

[OSR stands with Israel]

to me Kasich/Bloomberg could have thrown the election to the house where they would have won

[pbrower2a]

When

(1) one of the two Parties simply implodes from incompetence, and the surviving Party becomes unwieldy (think of the death of the Federalist and Whig parties)

(2) The United States adopts a parliamentary or semi-parliamentary  system with proportional voting

[Rjjr77]

to me Kasich/Bloomberg could have thrown the election to the house where they would have won

What state would they have won?

[Ronnie]

When we have a de-facto or de-jure one-party system under Trump and the Rethuglicans.

Am I kidding?  Probably.

[Meclazine for Israel]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-07/cory-bernardi-formally-quits-liberal-party/8247402

Australia has a brand new political party today.

Notice the "Make Australia Great Again" hat. So he has 6 years left to run on his senate position, so undoubtedly will inspire more candidates.

In the USA, can a Congressman leave the Republicans and/or Democrats and start their own individual party?

[The Ex-Factor]

I suppose, what are realistic scenarios for the breakup of the Democratic vs. Republican duopoly on political power? Surely this party system can't last forever, can it?

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Most new parties in america originate as machines to run for president with.

The trouble is not only FPTP (India, Canada and the UK all use that stupid system, and have multi party systems although the lack of PR does cause weird results) although that certainly doesn't help, but the peculiarity of the American party system (a political party in Australia, Japan, Norway or Brazil works very differently to the dems and reps do); the extreme presidentialism of the politics and the majoritarian structure of how the legislature works (for example, in the senate you basically have to cacus with the majority or the minority, or you risk being essentially useless).

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

I suppose, what are realistic scenarios for the breakup of the Democratic vs. Republican duopoly on political power? Surely this party system can't last forever, can it?

In the near future: Trump and the republican party fallout, he purges the White House of GOP allies and he announced he is starting a new party. that's my most realistic scenario, and I don't consider it very realistic. The democrats will survive, and change to fit the time (honestly the party must have the weirdest history in the western world).

[politics_king]

I think eventually you can see a third party called the "Moderate Party" which would consist off Centrists and Establishment types or you could see a "Populist Party" rise up as a third party.

[Mercenary]

This election proved itll never happen. If people didnt break from Trump and Clinton of all people they never will.