I’ve been thinking about this for a while. On one hand, I can see how two or more political parties can give people more of a choice when elections are conducted (when compared to a one-party state).
On the other hand, it’s easy to see how political parties can really divide people, even friends. I’ve seen people passionately argue for one party vs another and it got pretty bad.
So what do you think? Are political parties good or bad for a country?
41 comments
I think political parties are good so long it’s not just a two party system
One party states are terrible. Look at all the countries that are one party states and you’ll see that.
I think it really depends on the system in which the parties operate. They can be tools of oppression as easily as they can be vehicles for good political action
I don’t really think they can represent people’s values. For instance, what if someone believes in strong social safety nets and most often sides with Dems, but is pro-life. Or, what if someone owns a small business and wants less government regulations and most often sides with Republicans, but feels more should be done to protect the environment.
I think it’s divisive and stamps people into ideological conformity.
Political parties are inevitable.
So are idiots who make identifying with them as part of their personality.
I’m not sure how you can avoid political parties without going full Orwellian. Political parties are the natural consequence of freedom of association. When there is no freedom of association these “parties” of like-minded individuals become secret. Whether political parties are good or bad almost does not matter, you can’t prevent them any more than you can prevent people from having political opinions.
Bad
Parties are inevitable in a democracy.
They’re useful; but to attribute good/bad to them is not.
Most definitely bad.
They have created cult mindsets on Americans and basically indoctrinated their ideologies so they can better align them with one of the two major political philosophies.
The two party system is bad as it is. If things don’t change, Americans will literally have to choose between a communist party and a fascist party and I don’t think either one even remotely resembles America’s core values.
And even if we get rid of the two party system in favor of a more multi party system, it will still serve as essentially a two party system where only two real parties have a chance of winning elections.
I think we should abolish ALL political parties, have everyone run as an independent, and implement ranked choice voting in general elections. This way, the person chosen is TRULY representative of the people rather than the parties’ interests.
I think political parties are a good thing, they just need the right ***system*** to operate in to work properly. The Parliamentary system, for instance, has a lot of advantages that the current American political structure lacks.
Identifying with them seems particularly bad.
I mean I know we have the party registration to be eligible to vote in primaries, but I suspect it makes us think ‘I AM republican’ or ‘I AM democrat’ instead of ‘I am a person who can take in new info and decide on the basis of that what I want’
There’s got to be a better way
Parties are good because it means people of like-minded politics can work together to achieve their policy goals.
Is it always going to look nice? No. But the alternative is *not* being allowed to to work together to achieve shared policy goals. What does that sound like?
Political parties are a natural outgrowth of freedom of association, people having different opinions, and people being able to vote for representatives
It’s just natural and reasonable that people with the same or at least similar views would band together to advocate for those views and support politicians with similar views
If the parties seem very divided, that’s a sign of the population itself being divided on the hot button issues of the day. One of the big aspects of political polarization in the US has been the parties shifting to being more ideologically defined, and basically standing for more in the way of coherent ideas and values. Removing political parties wouldn’t really change much
Absolutely the worst, aside from corruption our duopoly is the problem with our country. I know in parliamentary systems that it’s different but our system is set up by and for the wealthy, normal people have no representation
A small number of Parties are necessary for democratic republics to exist. A one party state becomes tyrannical and meaningless (communism) and an infinite number of parties becomes anarchic and meaningless and opens the door to a one party solution (Weimar republic).
Maybe good in theory, but bad in practice.
Oh hey Jefferson is that you
Literally the only reason they exist is for the people behind the politicians to consolidate power. You don’t need a party platform for a candidate to have positions. And if you accept the individuals responsibility to to know what you’re voting for, you learn about what they actual candidate wants instead of just voting with whatever party represents what you remember it representing when you first got introduced to politics.
If it wasn’t a 2 party system it would have merit & if people didn’t choose party over policy
Competing ideas and factions that take up those ideas are inevitable as they serve as a tool to combine resources to advance a particular agenda.
There has always been division between parties and paranoia about how each side is going to destroy the country if they win. However, what is remarkable about the American system is that the federal government is slow to implement changes and the gridlock that occurs with impactful legislation. Less change means less potential damage if a policy fails. The federal system means that there are laws that the federal government can’t make. And probably one of the most unique aspects is the bit of individuality that members of the House and Senate have since voters vote for the person, not the party.
An Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez or a Rand Paul could not exist in a parliamentary system, or at least only for one term before they are booted out of the party. It fragments power even if a party has a super majority, which is something that keeps in line with how our government was designed to be.
I really wish we had PR in this country. The big tent parties just fuel polization into us v them. I’m a Communist, I hate the Democrats as much as Republicans but for different reasons. In reality we probably have 4-5 parties in America, a White Nationalist party, a Business focused Centrist party (which would socially liberally fiscally moderate, slightly right) a Green party, and a small leftist party.
The Big two are just doing everything badly to fuck up this country and create asinine polarization.
Its been said that Govt cant do anything more than piss off the side who’s not in power, and that seems to be very true
Terrible.
parties are better than party. the more options citizens have to choose from when voting is a lot better than having 1 style of government.
Bad
Clearly bad. I’m reading the thread looking for positives but it seems like the biggest positive being put forward is ‘they’re inevitable unfortunately’.
Parties are good. Valuing the Party over the Policy is when it becomes bad.
Good. Both parties are bad in my opinion, but having only one in control is even worse
Generally bad. If, like me, you have views that are in both parties, then you are forced to vote for someone who also aligns with views you don’t share. I really dislike the “you have to be for everything party A stands for” bs.
Bad, all they do is make people vote for the candidate who has the same favorite color as them instead of voting for the genuinely better candidate
I can only think of a couple of ways to avoid political parties.
One is to have an absolute ruler who squashes every group who tries to form. Many dictators don’t have power absolute enough to do that squashing effectively, so even a dictatorship can have political parties.
The other is if everybody disagreed on absolutely everything, but that can only happen in a very small, very unpleasant community. Otherwise, you’ll get people to join together based on their beliefs and they’ll try and get others to join their way of thinking, and if this is a democracy where those people are allowed a say in their government, you’ll have a political party.
It’s not the parties that divide people, it’s the different beliefs. And you get the beliefs even without the parties.
They’re inevitable because people always group up at some point.
Also groupthink is a problem.
Also dominant parties keeping others out of the race is a problem.
Also, ironically, the wider the tent, the less it represents the values and needs of everyone in the tent.
All simultaneously.
There are pros and cons to political parties.
I wish that the American system would open itself up to more options. While other parties exist, the main 2 are so dominant that candidates from other parties don’t stand a chance, so voting for them feels like a wasted vote.
I also think that we are currently seeing a lot of “far right” and “far left” and fewer moderates. Also, people who are so die hard in their party, that they will vote for their party’s candidate NO MATTER WHO it is.
I think they just rile up and divide people. Republicans and democrats probably agree on almost everything but media/news and the parties themselves try to divide the people. Really it’s the people vs gov/corps because nothing really gets done that benefits most taxpayers.
I can’t speak for other countries, but the USA was meant from the start to have, in essence, a political party for each state. Representatives were meant to represent the people of their state and their state’s individual ambitions and interests, now they just represent whatever party owns them.
I hate our 2-party system and what it does to people, and I resent the big media outlets for exploiting and reinforcing that division between Americans for money.
I think they’re bad for the country. They create a sense of group identity that people latch onto and attach extreme importance to. They also stifle people’s ability to think and reason independently. I cannot tell you how many times I have encountered people who clearly don’t think about different issues for themselves and instead simply adopt their views of whatever “their team” thinks. This isn’t just limited to normative questions like “should there be stricter gun control laws?” or “how high should the top income tax rate be?” It often bleeds over into empirical questions which are supposed to be factual, like “did Brett Kavanaugh try to rape a woman?” or “did Hunter Biden effectively take a bribe from the Ukrainian government in 2014?”
Nobody seems to think that their tribe can do any wrong or that the other tribe should be given the benefit of the doubt. It’s idiotic and it’s unhealthy. If it was up to me, there would not be political parties.
Having two or fewer parties is bad. The American election system unfortunately tends to push third parties out of the running.
When they are willing to work together then they are great. When they forego diplomacy and resort to shady tactics of tipping the scale on democracy and extremism then they are dangerous.
More like necessary evil. I’d like more then two and defunded though.
Overall, I’d say bad. Turning governing into a team sport sets the population into “us and them” really fast. Creating a cultural identity around party affiliation makes it far worse and creates/worsens tensions, with the added bonus of removing any reason for the parties to actually represent the interests of the citizenship.
I feel like as they’re a necessity they’re inherently positive.
They could be improved and diversified, but it ain’t like we wouldn’t have them anyway.
People will associate and then label their association.