The two-party system and The Dictator Theorem

When I was a young idiot, I used to believe the nonsense that we should have many political parties, like Israel or Europe. I thought it was antidemocratic to have just two. But the whole point of having two parties is like.... it’s sort of like marriage.... no, not really. Well, maybe. I know that in Europe, they also don’t take the two-party marriage seriously, and men are almost expected to have mistresses.

Obviously, having a two-party system works counter to the extreme factionalism we see in Europe. If America were like Germany, we would have dozens of parties--a Randian Objectivist Party, A Pro-Life Party, an Anti-gun Party, and a party of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgendered, Queer, Questioning, Intersexed, and Curious, all having proportionate representation in the government.

So the two-party system makes for some strange bedfellows. But when you think about it, there does seem to be some kind of deep psychological structure that determines one’s surface political attitudes. In other words, it’s probably only half-correct to say that the major parties artificially lump all of these disparate political viewpoints together. Rather, it is clear to me that there is a strong element of personality style, temperament, or “inclination” involved. posted by Gagdad Bob at 7:33 AM 10 comments

wildiris said... Bob, regarding the question of two-party systems, you should take a look at Arrow's Theorem, which is also known as "The Dictator Theorem." It's from an area of mathematics called choice theory. You can prove mathematically that in a party system with more than two parties, it is possible for a dictator to emerge. That is, there will be an individual or small minority of voters that are capable of swinging the outcome by their particular choice, such that the candidate with the least overall approval rate could end up being the winner. 6:02 PM