Comparative Politics The United States Vs France

Comparative Politics The United States Vs. France Essay, Research Paper

Comparative Politics:

The United States vs. France

There are few countries in the world who have very similar electoral systems but continue to have differing amounts of political parties. These similarities and differences are best described in the relationship between France and the United States. Despite similar electoral systems, France has multiple political parties while the United States has only two major parties. I will argue that the United States needs this two party system in order to achieve a smooth flow and continuity of governmental operations, while the people of France do not. France requires a more expansive voice for their widespread concerns and ideals, which accounts for their more pluralist society..

Firstly, the similarities of the two electoral systems in the Unites States and France should be examined briefly. Essentially both countries use a first past the post, winner takes all style of electing their Presidents. The United States uses an electoral college to select a President from available nominees. Each state has a certain amount of electors in the electoral college, this number is equal to the number of Senators and Representatives it is entitled to in Congress. When election time is near, each states political party names electors who are committed to the party’s nominee. American voters actually place ballots for party electors, who in turn vote for the President and Vice-President. In any event, the person with the most votes wins. Similarly, France has a primary system where Presidential nominees are selected. Anyone can run on the first ballot but if a majority has not been decided in the first ballot only those with greater than 12% of the vote go to the second ballot. The person with the most votes on the second ballot wins. With these similarities, why does the amount of parties vary so greatly within these two countries. To do this, I will examine each countries party system discussing their similarities and differences between them. In comparative political analysis, evidence supporting difference is almost always another difference between two comparisons.

The United States has a two-party system where the Democrats and Republicans dominate political culture with little interference from independent parties. This duopoly, as it is referred, has been the essence of American electoral history. There are conditions which have been developed to identify the two-party system:

1. Two parties are in a position to compete for an absolute majority of seats in Congress.

2. One of the parties wins a sufficient majority.

3. One of the two parties controls the presidency.

4. Alteration and rotation in power between the two parties remains a credible expectation. 1

The United States party system follows the above conditions almost flawlessly. The Democrats and the Republicans compete for the majority of seats in congress. At times the state of the governmental process in the United States can have the two houses controlled by the same party, while having the Presidency controlled by a different one. This can lead to gridlock, because the passing of legislature is near impossible in this situation. The two party system can be understood by three general ideologies: institutional, cultural and consensual. These three ideologies can explain how and why the American’s use such a system taken that most first past the post’ systems are two-party systems. With this in mind, proportional representation would result in a multi-party system. This does not follow through in the case of France, as it is a multi-party system which also uses a plurality, winner takes all electoral system. This could not be used as a reason for why the two systems differ. “The American election system offers no reward of office to any but the plurality winner and, so the theory goes, thus discourages the chronic minority parties.”2 Contrasting this with a proportional representation system, the chronic minority party would be facilitated and proliferation would be attainable. On the other hand, France will join coalition parties in order for a larger voice to be heard, in France small parties do flourish and become larger more influential parties. Another institutional reason for two-partyism in the United States are the laws which have been passed by the only two parties in power. These laws attempt to protect the duopoly. The laws themselves outline how a party qualifies to have their name on a state ballot and what amount of federal funding they would qualify for. “To qualify to appear on the ballot many states requires either a specified percentage of the vote to have been obtained in a previous election or the submission of a petition signed by a stipulated number of voters….This can entail obtaining vast numbers of signatures.”3 Obtaining such vast amounts could and would cost millions of dollars, money that most independent parties do not have. Financing parties during elections is a very costly undertaking, restrictions have been put in place that see independent parties limited to a thousand or so dollars per candidate, per donation. With the limited following an independent party would have, this restriction limits the independent party drastically. The individual candidate would essentially be responsible for his own