Dynamics of New Party Formation in the Czech Republic 1996-2010: Looking for the Origins of a Political Earthquake
TL;DRAbstract
The stable and closed nature of the party system and the failure of most new political parties were among the most salient features of Czech democracy over the past two decades. The results of the 2010 parliamentary elections seemed to mark a break with this pattern: support for two main parties slumped to historically low levels and two new parties, TOP 09 and Public Affairs (VÄci veĹejnĂŠ), entered parliament. This article seeks to put the 'political earthquake' of 2010 into perspective by mapping the development of new parties in the Czech Republic over the past two decades and relating them to comparative literature and typologies of new party emergence. It concludes that, of the two successful new parties in 2010, Public Affairs was by far the more novel and important phenomenon.
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The stable and closed nature of the party system and the failure of most new political parties were among the most salient features of Czech democracy over the past two decades. The results of the 2010 parliamentary elections seemed to mark a break with this pattern: support for two main parties slumped to historically low levels and two new parties, TOP 09 and Public Affairs (VÄci veĹejnĂŠ), entered parliament. This article seeks to put the 'political earthquake' of 2010 into perspective by mapping the development of new parties in the Czech Republic over the past two decades and relating them to comparative literature and typologies of new party emergence. It concludes that, of the two successful new parties in 2010, Public Affairs was by far the more novel and important phenomenon.
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