The eighteenth century was long deemed ‘the classical age of the constitution’ in Britain, with cabinet government based on a two-party system of Whigs and Tories in Parliament, and a monarchy whose powers had been emasculated by the Glorious Revolution of 1688–1689. This study furthers the work of Sir Lewis Namier, who, in 1929, argued that no such party system existed, George III was not a cypher, and that Parliament was an administration composed of factions and opposition. George III is a high-profile and well-known character in British history, whose policies have often been blamed for the loss of Britain's American colonies, around whom rages a perennial dispute over his aims: was he seeking to restore royal power or merely exercising his constitutional rights? This is a chronological survey of the first ten years of his reign through power politics and policy making.
Chap 11 19/8/02 11:50 am Page 237 11 Conclusion: factions or parties? The old concept of a two-party system of Whigs and Tories does not survive detailed knowledge of mid-eighteenth-century politics.1 By 1760 less than one hundred MPs could be deemed Tories even by a generous definition, and in the ensuing decade they split asunder, being variously attached to the Court or to factions, or remaining independent of all connections. The ministry at George III’s accession was a coalition of all the Whig groups, but soon fell apart. The next five ministries were
Introduction Jocelyn A. J. Evans The French party system Introduction In the more recent literature on European party systems, emphasis has been placed squarely upon the notion that the overall cross-national trend is one of convergence and, by extension, stabilisation. Where new parties have appeared, they tend to have been absorbed into existing structures and very few have actually superseded older parties. Increasingly, European systems which had stretched from the two-party system of Britain to the polarised pluralism of Italy are coming to resemble each
historic two-party system, made up of the Australian Labor Party on the one hand and a conservative coalition of various political parties on the other, has been diluted by the appearance of minor parties and Independents holding the balance of power, both at Commonwealth and at state and territory levels of government. This development has been facilitated by the use of proportional representation in six of Australia’s houses of parliament, but has not been restricted to chambers elected in this way. The first Australian Women’s Adviser was appointed by Labor Prime
of Commons fails to make government properly accountable. Two groups have maintained implacable opposition to electoral reform. These have been the Conservative party and most elements of the traditional left wing of the Labour party. The Conservatives take a pragmatic view. First-pastthe-post guarantees a two party system and governments with decisive parliamentary majorities. This means stability and certainty, key aspects of Conservative philosophy. Traditional sections of the Labour party have set great store by the power of the state. This power, they have
Social Democracy: Cultural and Ideological Problems of the Golden Age (Manchester: Manchester University Press). Aylott, N. and Bolin, N. (2007) ‘Towards a two-party system? The Swedish parliamentary election of September 2006’, West European Politics, 30 (3). Bäckström, U. (2007) ‘A-kassan behöver konkurrens’, Svenska Dagbladet, 22 October. Bergström, H. (2007) ‘Handelns jubel’, Dagens Nyheter, 14 April. Burkitt, B. and Whyman, P. (1995) ‘Lessons from Sweden: full employment and the evolution of Keynesian political economy’, Renewal 3 (1). Callaghan, J. (2000) The
confused by Sir Lewis Namier himself, the historian who destroyed the notion of a two-party system for this period. Namier constructed a much-cited but misleading list of 113 Tory MPs returned at the general election of 1761.7 But this was put together from Parliamentary lists compiled by or for Newcastle between 1754 and 1766, and for the Duke ‘Tory’ was a generic term for politicians who always opposed him. Scrutiny of the list shows that at least twenty were Whig by any test, followers of Bedford or Leicester House or simply new MPs who sided against the Duke from
of the Maastricht Treaty. For the first time in the history of the Second Republic, labour representation was not involved from the outset, but only after they had expressed considerable protest against the new procedures. Yet extrapolating from this experience, a more general assumption about the end of Austrian corporatism might turn out to be an exaggeration. The most impressive change in Austrian institutions appears to relate to the party system. Yet, here again a cautionary tale has to be told in that the erosion of the two-party system owing to the growth of
the Saarland, but they are not represented in any of the parliaments in the new Länder. In contrast, the PDS is the third party in the new Länder and even the second strongest party in Thuringia, Saxony, and Saxony-Anhalt, while it has no representation in any Land parliaments in western Germany. The radical right parties are represented in two Land parliaments, with five seats in Brandenburg and one in Bremen (Bremerhaven). Thus there are two party systems at the Land level: a four-party system in the old Länder, consisting of the larger CDU (CSU in Bavaria) and
generalize from previous experience. In some respects, Berlin has become a microcosm of the two-party systems described above, i.e., one party system in the former West Berlin, another in the former East Berlin. From 1946 to the 1970s, the SPD was the dominant party in West Berlin. Starting in 1975, the CDU gained at first a small lead over the SPD, and then an ever-larger lead until 1989, when the two parties received virtually the same percentage of the vote. The decline in support for the SPD was due in large part to the rise of the Greens, whereas the CDU suffered a