APSA PRESIDENTIAL TASK FORCE ON POLITICAL PARTIESCHAPTER 12

Toward a Different Kindof Party Government:
Proportional Representation
for Federal Elections
JACK SANTUCCI, Drexel University
MATTHEW SHUGART, University of California, Davis
MICHAEL S. LATNER, California Polytechnic State University San Luis Obispo

AMERICAN POLITICAL SCIENCE ASSOCIATION + PROTECT DEMOCRACY

CHAPTER 12

Jack Santucci, Matthew Shugart, Michael S. Latner

TOWARD A DIFFERENT KIND OF PARTY GOVERNMENT: PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION FOR FEDERAL ELECTIONS

A Different Kind of Party Government
The notion of a system of responsible political parties asarticulated in the 1950 APSA report was one in which theparties would set out a “choice between the alternativesof action” (APSA Committee on Political Parties 1950).
The report specifically, in its very title, understood that tomean two possible courses of action—a responsible twoparty system. The core notion of a “responsible party” is
one that not only sets out a course of action, but is able
to follow through on it if elected to power.
Our contribution to this discussion nearly three quartersof a century later will not be to elaborate on whether
such a model is or ever was desirable. Independent of
its desirability, a responsible party is almost impossible
under a presidential form of government. The separationof executive and legislative electoral processes andthe separate survival of the elected branches (via fixed
terms) provide too many countervailing incentives
for party-policy responsibility to be feasible. Parties
under such conditions are much more likely to be“presidentialized” than responsible. What this means isthat presidential candidates set out their own priorities
to win their separate contests, while legislators cater

ABSTRACTThe old case for a two-party system did
not: (a) fully grapple with ‘presidential’
democracy, (b) foresee the dangers ofpolarization, or (c) give sufficient weight todemands for representation. We therefore
sketch a vision of multiparty presidential
democracy, introducing relevant literature
along the way. This vision rests on reforms
to make multiple parties viable, push thatsystem toward pre-election coalition,and improve descriptive representation
regardless of how many parties there are.
Key features are proportional representation(PR) for U.S. House, then reforms of singleseat offices (like President and Senator)
to let multiple parties compete as parties.
We give some ‘pros and cons’ of three PR
forms: mixed-member proportional, single
transferable vote, and open-list proportional.
We also explain why PR might not lead to thesort of fragmentation that some critics andproponents alike expect.

to localities or interest groups that may have different
priorities from those of the presidential candidate(Samuels and Shugart 2010). Once in office, the absence

government, consistent with the themes of this widerof the parliamentary confidence mechanism meanstask force, that could institutionalize a process ofthere’s little to hold the executive to a collectively agreed

reflecting the diversity of both opinion and socio-

policy platform (see also Azari 2017).

demographic constituencies currently either subsumed
within or left outside of the two-party system.

Thus we do not attempt to reiterate the case forresponsible parties, understood as collective teams

As a starting point, we posit that it would be inaccurateoffering competing governing options. Rather, weto claim that the U.S. party system finally arrived at the

propose a different kind of “responsible” party“responsible two-party system” in the form of today’s

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polarized parties (see, e.g., Mounk 2018). What we

before or after elections. Future elections would offer

have in the American system today is not a variant ofopportunities for voters to shift to different parties if

responsible parties. If anything, parties have become

they were unhappy with the records of their previous

irresponsible. Their nomination and policy-setting

parties. Crucially, that would not mean shifting to theprocesses allow highly organized groups to pull eachsingle party on the other side of the political divide.

party away from the median voter. Yet the polarization1

and unwillingness to compromise seen most especially

It is likely that the presence of the Senate and thein the GOP (Hacker and Pierson 2015) is a far cry frompresidency would encourage parties to form electoral

the model of responsible parties setting out competingalliances (pre-election coalitions). Therefore, in mostprograms of government.

elections, there would continue to be two major suchalliances. With PR for the House (and other rules for

It is not that a wide range of opinions about policy

other bodies that we shall address briefly later) someand ideological options are not already represented

parties would agree to cooperate in elections within the U.S. two parties. However, most voters haveother parties with whom they share basic affinity.

little opportunity to cast an

For instance, “progressive”

effective vote to express theirand “center left” could be

preferred paths, due to winnertake-all contests, including at
the primary nomination stage.
We sketch (and introduce
relevant literature on) a

What we have in theAmerican system today is
not a variant of responsible
parties. If anything, parties
have become irresponsible.

different way of representing

distinct parties within abroad left alliance, and social
conservatives and economic
conservatives could be distinct
parties but would cooperate
in a broad right. Or, whencircumstances called forthe diversity of ideological and policy preferences ofsomething different (like a ‘pro-democracy alliance’),American voters. This alternative relies on a form of

the institutions we describe might help bolster that.

proportional representation (PR) for the U.S. House,

Such a model can offer voters more voice in the setting

combined with other reforms for bodies where PRof policy direction, without sacrificing the building

is not practical due to the election of single offices,of electoral majorities. In fact, alliances of this sortsuch as the presidency and Senate (absent major

are common in existing PR systems (Carroll and Cox

constitutional amendment).

2007; Ganghof 2015; Golder 2006), and PR generally
is more favorable to ensuring legislative majorities

Contra some critiques of PR (see below), we see it asthat reflect a majority of the electorate (Lijphart 1997;

a potential contribution to responsible multiparty

McDonald and Budge 2005; Powell 2000).

politics. We mean “responsible” in a similar way as
the 1950 report: voters signaling policy direction

In a sense, this notion of alliance-facilitating PR could

via their party choices. However, the “responsibility”

harness the best of the current U.S. party system, yet

for implementing policy would rest with coalitions

marginalize that system’s worst features. The currentof parties. Those coalitions could emerge either

system sees progressive and center-left actors in the1

We mean “median voter” in the multidimensional sense (Huber and Powell 1994, 293; McGann and Latner 2012, 831). In the U.S., this person might be ‘operationally’ liberal and ‘symbolically’ conservative(Cayton and Dawkins 2020; Ellis and Stimson 2012; Grossmann and Hopkins 2015).

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Democratic Party, while the Republican Party hosts

A PR system might expand the menu, allowing different

both economic conservatives and authoritarians.

parties to reflect different “alternatives of action.”

Consider the observation of Henry Droop (2012

It also, as we shall discuss, allows for a given party to[1869]) on two-party politics and “majority voting”

have multiple candidates, whose personal attributes(i.e., winner-take-all):reflect different socio-demographic groups, placed
before the voters. At present, the only opportunities

As every representative is elected to represent

voters have to select from among policy options andone of these two parties, the nation, as

candidate attributes within these broad left and right

represented in the assembly, appears to consist
only of these two parties, each bent on carryingout its own programme. But, in fact, a large
proportion of the electors who vote for the
candidates of the one party or the other reallycamps is at presidential primaries—and even then, often
only for voters who happen to be in early states on the
primary calendar when a plurality of voices are stillcompeting for delegates.2 A PR system for the House

care much more about the country being honestly

would permit this sort of competition to take place

and wisely governed than about the particularin forging the main majority-seeking caucus options

points at issue between the two parties; andinside the House of Representatives instead of just at

if this moderate non-partisan section of thethe quadrennial party conventions (and only for someelectors had their separate representatives in the

primary voters). It therefore gives voters a chance toassembly, they would be able to mediate between
the opposing parties and prevent the one party
from pushing their advantage too far, and theother from prolonging a factious opposition.
With majority voting they can only intervene atweigh in at general elections for Representatives and not
only at the candidate-selection stage. It also does notpresent them with the stark choice at present, which iseither to swallow their disagreements with the dominant

general elections, and even then cannot punish

tendencies in their preferred parties or cross party lines

one party for excessive partisanship, without(an untenable option for many voters, at least at present).

giving a lease of uncontrolled power to their rivals.

PR and Fragmentation
We do not have to believe a strict interpretation ofWhat many readers think of when PR comes up is

Droop’s words—that most voters are “moderate”—

party fragmentation, difficulty building governing

to understand the value to current conditions of the

majorities, and amplification of fringe voicesprescription he offered more than a century and a half

(Hermens 1941). However, these concerns are mostly

ago: a proportional system. The problem of one party

caricatures of real-world PR systems. To the extent“pushing their advantage too far” is an even greaterthat these concerns contain grains of truth, they

problem in an era of two-party polarization, as isare largely irrelevant to the U.S. context. Or they are

the inability of voters who are less aligned with themostly problems of elite will to compromise (Lijphartmainstream of their preferred party to rein it in other2013; Rosenfeld 2020; Santucci 2020; Ziblatt 2017).

than by voting for the opposing party that they likely
find unacceptable. The larger point is that the country

From a strictly technical perspective, there are atconsists of more options than any given voter has placed

least two reasons why any realistic version of PR for

before her by the candidates of the two dominant parties.

the U.S. House would be unlikely to foster ‘excessive’

2 And it is well worth remembering that this competition for delegates takes place within a form of proportional representation in the Democratic Party, and also does so in several states (especially those earlyin the calendar) in the Republican Party (Jones, McCune, and Wilson 2020).

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fragmentation. First, the sort of PR system that could

remain the only realistic options (again absent major

be reasonably adopted in the U.S. is a moderate

reform for the Senate7). Thus parties competing withversion. With 435 House seats—or even a plausible

distinct party labels in proportional contests (for U.S.

increase to say 600—and 50 states, an extremelyHouse seats) could have incentives to present joint (orproportional system is not in the cards.3“fusion”) candidacies for these other offices. In turn, theincentive to present joint candidacies might hold down

We assume the multi-seat districts required for any

fragmenting tendencies in the proportional contests.8

PR system could not span state lines.4 That is, a state“at large” by a proportional method). Quite likely, theDescriptive Representation andInstitutional Design

larger states would be subdivided into multiple districts,

The political representation of racial, ethnic andin order to avoid excessively large numbers elected

linguistic minorities is a perennial issue in American

per district. Most advocates of PR in the U.S. indicate

politics. Resolutions have taken several forms

a preference for a range of district magnitude (theover the years: disenfranchisement (Valelly 2016),

could serve as a multi-seat district (electing members

number of seats per district) of no more than 5 or 7.

5

incorporation on dominant-group terms (Shefter

Such a PR design prevents the extreme fragmentation1986), the post-Voting Rights Act (Davidson andassociated with PR in countries such as the Netherlands

Grofman 1994) settlement on single-seat districts(with its single nationwide district of 150 seats) or(SSD), and recent attempts to use that law to reduce

Israel (with its single district of 120). Moreover, thedescriptive representation (Latner et al. 2021).

seat product—the assembly size
times mean district magnitude,
which is a strong predictor of
the shape of a party system(Shugart and Taagepera 2017;2020; Taagepera 2007)—would
be modest.

6

The second reason, aside from aSingle-seat districts (SSDs) have

In a sense, this notion ofalliance-facilitating PR could
harness the best of thecurrent US party system,
yet marginalize that system’s
worst features.

relatively low district magnitude

proven capable of representing
some groups more-or-less inproportion to their numbers(Collingwood and Long 2019;
Davidson and Grofman
1994; Lublin et al. 2009).
Substantively, representation
via SSDs has reduced economic

and modest seat product, why a U.S. PR system might

inequality, at least in jurisdictions that the VRA used

not be fragmenting is the presence of the Senate andto cover (Aneja and Avenancio-León 2019; Cascio andpresidency, for which plurality and majority systems

Washington 2014; but see Eubank and Fresh 2022).93 See Hermens (1936, 412-3) for an example of “extreme” proportionality. The interwar German electoral law set up several ‘layers’ of nested districts, so that very few votes would be ‘wasted.’
4 That is, nationwide proportionality is out of the question, including systems of “compensation” where there might be local districts, but proportionality would be determined by pooling votes across districts(Elklit and Roberts 1996) and thus across all states or groups of states. We assume such designs are non-starters because the Constitution states that House seats are apportioned to states, which implies
they can’t be effectively shared between states.
5 For states with as few as three Representatives, PR is still feasible. For states with two, PR means that most of the time each of the top two parties would earn one seat from the state. For states with just one,
PR is impossible. This need not doom a PR system as a whole; some existing PR systems have a few districts that elect just one member. Solutions such as expanding the House can minimize the number ofsuch states, or a minimum of three per state could be set (tolerating some degree of malapportionment of states in exchange for proportional representation of voters). These are complicated questions that
we shall not attempt to resolve here, but which need not detain us from evaluating the potential effects of the sort of moderate PR system sketched here.
6 The current seat product of the US House is 435 (the number of seats in the House times district magnitude which is 1). If a PR system had a mean magnitude of 4, for example, the seat product would be 1740—
a bit smaller than the modest PR systems of Spain or Sweden and a far cry from the values of really extreme PR systems like Israel (14,400) or the Netherlands (22,500).
7 One “major reform” might give each state three Senators, elected at the same time.
8 Again, the incentive to coalesce depends on pre-existing will to compromise; as noted earlier, such pre-election coalitions are common in many existing PR systems.
9 The Supreme Court invalidated the VRA ‘coverage formula’ (Section 4) in 2014.

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Yet limits to the SSD remedy are well known: it works

that larger parties run more inclusive slates under PR

where groups are geographically concentrated(Latner and McGann 2005; Shugart and Taagepera

and where there are relatively few ‘communities of

2017, 76-77, 89-90). PR permits dispersed groups tointerest’ to represent (Abott and Magazinnik 2020;

aggregate their votes over larger geographic areas. It

Gimpel and Harbridge-Yong 2020; Leib 1998).

also might permit groups less attached to establishedProtecting more geographically dispersed or internallyparties to form new ones if they so desired.10

heterogeneous groups (e.g., Latino and Asian voters)
has proven more difficult under SSDs (Kogan and

Yet PR is not a panacea. Even in proportional systems,

McGhee 2012). Moreover, ascribing protected classes

candidate-centered ballots permit voters to withhold

to a single constituent interest can foster “tokenism”

support from minority candidates (Negri 2017; Protsyk

and weaken coalition policymaking capacity (Guinierand Sachariew 2012; Sipinen and Söderlund 2022).

1992; Lublin and Voss 2000).

Some forms (like MMP below) may not be viablewithout constitutional amendment. Others requirePartisanship also increasingly matters. The electoral

extensive voter education and elite coordination“capture” of voters of color by the Democratic Party(Pildes and Donoghue 1995, 270-2). More generally,

makes it possible to take majority-minority districts

those who have fought for generations to securefor granted and focus resources onto “swing” votersrepresentation under current rules have good reason(Frymer 2010). It also gives Republicans in state

to look skeptically at changing those rules.

legislatures an incentive to undermine the VRA
by packing targeted groups into uncompetitive

What type of PR?

Democratic districts (Keena et al. 2021; Levitt 2013).

This section gives some ‘pros and cons’ of three

Meanwhile, the U.S. Supreme Court is increasingly

common PR forms. One of them, mixed-member

calling into question any use of race-conscious

proportional (MMP), combines two kinds of seats:

districting, referring to the case law as “notoriously

one ‘tier’ elected in single-seat districts, then a second

unclear and confusing.” (Merrill v. Milligan 2022, 6).

tier from party lists from which seats are allocated so

If the Court further insulates state legislatures fromthat parties’ final seat shares are proportional to theirfederal voting rights protections, alternatives to thevote shares.11 Another is single transferable vote (STV),

SSD regime will likely be in higher demand.

recently dubbed ‘proportional ranked-choice voting.’12
A third is open-list proportional representation

Proportional representation is one possible response(OLPR), which permits voters to set party-list order byto these challenges. The argument that PR improveschoosing among candidates.13 A vote then helps electminority representation typically rests on the ability

a candidate and their party. For space considerations,of racial and ethnic parties to win seats throughwe do not cover closed-list PR (in which voters choose

lower ‘thresholds of exclusion’ (Lijphart 2004; Norris

among parties only).14

2004; Reynolds 1995). Yet it also rests on evidence

10 See Dyck and Johnson (2022) on how party identification varies over time for some groups in the U.S.
11 For details on MMP, see Shugart and Wattenberg (2001) or the explainer offered by the New Zealand Electoral Commission:
https://elections.nz/democracy-in-nz/what-is-new-zealands-system-of-government/what-is-mmp.
12 For an introduction to ‘pure’ STV, see C.G.P. Grey’s video explainer: https://www.cgpgrey.com/blog/politics-in-the-animal-kingdom-single-transferable-vote. ‘Pure’ means without mechanisms like ticket voting.
13 See Kosar and Santucci (2021) for an explainer.
14 Moreover, many see closed-list PR as a non-starter for U.S. conditions due to its lack of candidate choice. Eberhard (2018) gives focus-group results to this effect.

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Mixed-Member PR (MMP)

list vote for its decoy. When this happens, instead of

Political scientists who specialize in electoral

Party X getting its district seats and only whateversystems typically rate MMP as among the very best

number of list seats it needs to compensate for

options (Bowler and Farrell 2006; Carey et al. 2013).

disproportionality arising from the district tier,

Recent research confirms its ability to balance

it gets those district seats plus a fully proportional

national expertise-based policymaking with local

share of the list seats for its decoy. This practice canresponsiveness (Shugart et al. 2021). MMP also might

be avoided only by having a nationwide electoral

not disrupt race-conscious (single-seat) districting

administrative agency overseeing list registration(although we have noted other problems with that).

(as in Germany and New Zealand) or by having only

Two issues nonetheless raise questions about viability ina single vote for both tiers (which however vitiates

the U.S. context: how to construct the ‘compensation

key advantages of MMP).16

tier,’ and the potential for ‘decoy lists’ in that tier.

Single Transferable Vote
Achieving proportionality under MMP requires

STV is theoretically compatible with nonpartisan

compensation via the party-list tier. It would work

elections and permits electoral coalitions that defy

best with a much larger U.S. House. MMP often has

party grouping (Lakeman and Lambert 1970: 111;

50% of seats in single-seat districts and 50% from

Richie 2022). These properties make it popular but

compensation lists. It can deliver a high degree ofraise questions about longevity, given parties’ likely

proportionality with a lower share (perhaps as low as

responses. For a sense of administrative issues, which25%) but only on condition that the compensation

include voter education, see Anthony et al. (2021).

regions be relatively large—ideally nationwide.
We assume that nationwide or multi-state regional

Where STV has been stable, various mechanisms

compensation is a nonstarter in the U.S. It likely

exist for tempering its nonpartisanship (Bowler andis unconstitutional on its face. The Constitution

Grofman 2000; Clark 2020; Farrell and Katz 2014).

stipulates that seats are apportioned among states,

These include disciplined multi-party politics (Ireland),not shared among them. Thus only state-level

rules to give first-choice votes outsized importancecompensation is doable, leaving even a significantly(Malta), and a ticket-voting option so widely usedlarger House insufficient for proportionality.15

that the system works effectively as closed-list PR(Australian Senate).17

The second problem is the possibility of large parties
defeating the compensation mechanism via decoy

In the U.S., by contrast, STV historically has not beenlists. These are possible under ‘two-vote’ MMP (whichstable. It was adopted in 22 cities from 1915-47,

would be necessary if reformers sought to inducethen repealed in all but one by 1962.18 Reasons for

multiparty politics). Party X directs voters to votethis trajectory include: frustration with vote counts

for Party X candidates in districts, but to cast theirand election results (Harris 1930), bipartisan

15 In current House apportionment, thirteen states have 1 or 2 members, and MMP arguably requires four (perhaps three) in a state as an absolute minimum for compensation to work. Even with a House of 600 seats,
several states would have fewer than three members. MMP nonetheless may be viable for state legislatures (Nagel 2014). On the possibility of expanding the House, see Drutman, et al. (2021).
16 Regulation might be done on a state-by-state level, but this would empower one or a few states to undermine a national election’s integrity by turning a blind eye to decoy lists.
17 Since 2016, Australian voters have had the option of ranking parties rather than either voting for one party ticket or else having to rank all candidates on their Senate ballot (McAllister & Muller 2018). This new option
is still more akin to closed-list PR than to any other system, except that it allows the vote to transfer from one party to another.
18 This figure does not include two federally administered towns with advisory councils or two more former single-tax colonies.

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opposition from party elites (Amy 1996; Weaver 1986),

racist/sexist parties mean racist/sexist outcomes.

and weak party discipline due to party change

Cultural attitudes also matter (Valdini 2012), but again(Santucci 2022, Ch. 7).

these may shape nomination practices (Hirczy 1995).
Quotas also seem to shape party behavior in the long

Open-List PR

run (Barnes and Holman 2020).

We have arrived at OLPR by working through what it
might take to implement MMP, taking seriously some

Reforms for Single-Seat Offices

challenges associated with STV, and looking for a

How might results of U.S. Senate and Presidential

reasonable alternative. We are not the first to haveelections be aligned with those to the House? One

followed such a path (Lien 1925; Gosnell 1939).

possible reform is cross-endorsement ballot fusion,

19

which permits multiple parties to endorse the same
OLPR systems come in many ‘flavors,’20 and a ‘one-

candidate.21 This would be compatible with allowing

vote’ version may be easiest to implement. It would

OLPR (for the House) to feature joint lists (Shugart

not make new demands on voters or election officials.

and Taagepera 2017, 92-5). Another possibility for

It just means each voter’s vote is for both a candidate

these offices is single-seat STV, also known as ‘instantand the list as a whole. In this way, the system might

runoff’ or the Alternative Vote.22

offer the advantages of PR, while remaining relatively
familiar to stakeholders.

Conclusion: Potentially More Than
Two Parties

Descriptive Representation in STV and OLPR

PR adoption in the United States far from guarantees

Space constraints prevent an extended discussion

a multiparty system. It is important to recognize thatof how these systems might shape racial andthe U.S. already has a smaller number of parties thangender representation. This is an active researchit ‘should have’ given the fundamentals of its current

area. Key issues include: the extent to which voters

House electoral system. Even electoral systems‘shun’ candidates from target groups (Crowder-consisting only of winner-take-all SSDs should be

Meyer, Gadarian, and Trounstine 2023; Protsyk

expected to have more than two parties if they haveand Sachariew 2012; Sipinen and Söderlund 2022),

hundreds of districts (see Shugart and Taagepera,

whether parties field such candidates in the first place

2017; 2020; Taagepera, 2007). The experiences of(McGing 2013), and whether the need to maximize

Canada and even the United Kingdom show that SSDs

party vote share leads party leaders to nominate fewerwith plurality rule are compatible with multiparty

such candidates (Valdini 2012). How do different

politics. Thus SSDs are not the only factor constraining

forms of PR compare to one another in terms ofthe number of parties. Other constraining factorsdelivering descriptive representation? Comparison

would persist even if the House were elected by PR.

of closed lists with STV and OLPR suggests closed
lists outperform both (Dhima et al. 2021). A tentative

One such constraint is the Senate (with its coequalconclusion might be that nominations matter—

powers). A body for which, at any given election,

19 MMP did not ‘exist’ when those studies were published. However, the broad conclusion in each was that simple ballot formats might not have provoked adverse reactions by voters and election officials.
20 For instance, “flexible” lists are not truly “open” but are sometimes conflated with them: voters have votes for candidates but these votes alter party-set list order only when a candidate’s votes cross some threshold.
“Free” lists permit voters to cast multiple votes for candidates on more than one list.
21 Cross-endorsement fusion stands in contrast to cross-filing, whereby one candidate may declare multiple party designations. See Masket (2009) on cross-filing as an anti-party reform.
22 Getting inter-party coordination under instant runoff might mean requiring voters to rank all candidates (Reilly and Maley 2000; Reilly 2021).

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only 33 or 34 seats are being filled in such a high-because some states (e.g. Georgia) hold runoffs or use

population country suppresses the emergence of

the Alternative Vote (e.g. Maine). Rather, the U.S. hasadditional parties.

an unusual two-round system in which the first roundwinnows the field. This usually is at the intraparty level,

Another constraint is ‘unit-rule’ allocation of

although sometimes it is without regard to party

presidential electors, which may lead voters to ‘desert’(e.g. in Alaska and California). Some of that winnowing-

minor-party candidates. The reforms we proposedround competition might become interparty at thefor single-seat offices might alleviate voters’ incentive

general election if PR were in place. On the other hand,to desert. Or they might lead to fewer ‘spoiler’

it is perhaps difficult to imagine total abolition ofcandidacies overall.

primaries, and if they were to remain, new-party entry

23

24

might remain more limited than otherwise expected.
Finally, we should not discount the role of primaries.
When we look at the range of countries with first-past-

In sum, adopting PR for the House of Representatives,the-post (FPTP) elections (given no primaries), none

particularly a model in which district magnitude iswith an assembly larger than Jamaica’s (63) has atypically not much higher than five, might notstrict two-party system. These countries include theproliferate parties as much as its critics fear and some

United Kingdom and Canada (where multiparty

proponents desire. We nonetheless hope to havecompetition is in fact nationwide). Whether the U.S.

sketched (and introduced scholarship on) how ashould be called ‘FPTP’ itself is dubious, and not only

responsible multiparty system might work.

23 Presidentialism per se is not the reason for a lower than expected number of parties in the USA. Shugart and Taagepera (2017) show that the seat product model of how party systems are connected to the assembly
electoral system is just as reliable in a large dataset of elections around the world when a system is presidential as when it is parliamentary.
24 Fusion, instant runoff, and other single-seat reforms do not fully obviate ‘spoiler’ candidacy. The key issue is whether the putative ‘spoiler’ otherwise would be part of some larger coalition (Riker 1982, 765).

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CHAPTER 12

Jack Santucci, Matthew Shugart, Michael S. Latner

TOWARD A DIFFERENT KIND OF PARTY GOVERNMENT: PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION FOR FEDERAL ELECTIONSCHAPTER 12—REFERENCES
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CHAPTER 12—COVER PHOTOS
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