Let's face it. It's probably never going to happen BUT

[Person Man]

- What is a likely near future scenario that could unfold where one of the parties disbands and what would the system and culture out of it look like?

My take it is that one of the parties will start to unravel if they begin to consistently underperform. An example of this would be if the Democrats never recovered in 2006 or something along those lines. Yes there were times where a party was deeper and longer in the wilderness, but when you look at the context of having one of your own ending a popular presidency and leaving the opposition with the country cruising and then there's war, weak economy, ect cetera, ect cetera, and then still your party doesn't win. At that point, there just doesn't appear to really be a way forward. My guess is that we may have come close to this before in the past. Who was Strom Thurmond, Ross Perot, Robert LaFollette?

- Could we have a "Democracy" with a one party system? 
Could you just have a system where everybody just votes in the ruling party's primary? Couldn't having a one party system just be the same as having no parties?

[Person Man]

Democrats didnt disband despite losing all but the post-Watergate election between 1968 and 1988 (and mostly in landslides). They also had no real chance of victory with a solid south and west against them.

Republicans didnt disband despite winning only one (+reelection) between 1932 and 1964. And that one was somebody  both parties recruited for the nomination.

So, I'd agree with what precedes the BUT in the foreseeable future.

Yeah but Democrats lost a war and held Congress except for 6 years where they didn’t hold the senate. And the Republican drought...that was really bad. Where do we have a time when a party is locked out without an obvious reason?

Going 12 years without winning something when the last guy you put up there wasn’t considered a failure would be unique.

1896-1912 was interesting because both parties started that period with very conservative reputations and by the end of it, both had more liberal reputations.

[Person Man]

?

Not much. A Christian Democrat is usually "socially moderate" and takes a more decentralized approach to welfare programs, typically prioritizing the state, local, or neighborhood church level. Assuming the country is in such bad shape that a party has collapsed there's probably some consensus around bigger government to solve those problems. Most of you have probably heard of Social Democracy but Christian Democracy is an idea that hasn't really come to the Anglosphere yet.

I come from the Italosphere, so I am pretty used to the idea of Christian Democracy. At the same time I know that it is not really part of the Anglosphere. Indeed what animated my questions is that I don't really see much space for Christian Democracy in the American Democratic Party.

I can see it as a far future evolution of the populist and progressive ideas being thrown around right now with input from Latin American immigrants. Localism was an element in historical American politics that disappeared because of industrialization, but those sentiments are starting to stir again in the post-industrial age. Americans have already become more insular.

OK That makes more sense to me. So the "Christian Democrat" faction would be primarily composed of Latin Americans?

I think so, but in general I'd expect Social Democrats to do better in the cities and Christian Democrats in rural areas. Like a more balanced version of the First Party System. Mexican-American communities along the Rio Grande and the Deep South Black Belt might vote for the more conservative option than those who left for the cities, where economic and political centralization is in their interest and neighborly charity doesn't cut it.

This being America, "socialism" is a bad word unlike in Europe (although neither seem to understand what it actually is, *ahem* the workers owning the means of production), so expect socialized anything to come under a different name embracing the rugged individualist tradition. I don't think these parties would actually be called Social Democrats or Christian Democrats, but that would be the idea. Welfarists of varying degrees. God forbid we actually cure the problem instead of just treating it.

"Populist Party" vs. "Progressive Party"

or maybe one of them is called the "People's Party".

Another spin of a country with a similar situation could be the "People's Party" LoC Establishment) vs. big tent center-right alliance "The American Alliance".

[Person Man]

The most likely of impossible scenarios, IMO, would be racial polarization dooming an unbudging GOP to control only a small part of the Midwest. Eventually, we would get Social Democrat and Christian Democrat factions.

Eh, even under huge racial polarization, the GOP would control much more than that. Here is how a hypothetical election would look like if suddenly race was the only thing that mattered, and Republicans only won states that are both at least 66% or more non-hispanic white and that voted for Trump in 2016:

Dem: 365
GOP: 173

While a crushing defeat, this map is roughly on par with what the GOP got in 2008, so it's not "permanent majority" territory either. Plus this map is kind of a "best case scenario" for Dems. An slightly more realistic map under intense racial polarization is this (adding tossups this time for places I am not 100% sure about):

Dem: 292
GOP: 199
Tossup: 54

So while Dems would have the advantage, it would not be permanent majority territory, not even close; though polarization also means that elections would be very inelastic.

Fun fact, under this scenario, there would be 22 states voting GOP, so they'd only need 4/9 tossup states to get the Senate.

I could see it where it does come completely balanced after DC and PR are given representation.