Proportional representation and party fragmentation in electoral autocracies

ABSTRACT What is the relationship between the type of electoral system and the degree of party fragmentation in electoral autocracies? According to Duverger’s hypothesis, proportional representation (PR) is positively associated with party fragmentation. This study investigates whether this hypothesis holds true in non-democratic political systems that hold elections. I propose that, unlike in democracies, PR is negatively correlated with the level of party fragmentation in electoral autocracies. To test this hypothesis, I utilize panel data encompassing 37 non-democratic nations that held elections from 1975 to 2010. The results demonstrate that PR is inversely linked to both the number and size of political parties. The effective number of parties (ENP) is employed as a measure of party fragmentation, estimating the weighted size and quantity of political parties.

• Publication year

  2024

• Venue

  Democratization

• Publication date

  2024-01-15

• Fields of study

  Not labeled

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.1080/13510347.2023.2298343
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar

• No claims are published for this paper.

• No concepts are published for this paper.

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