the current two party system in the united states is defined by republican and democratic parties.
the current two party system in the united states is defined by republican and democratic parties.
the current two party system in the united states is defined by which pair of parties?
republican and democratic parties
during the third party system, the republican party was the dominant political faction, but the democrats held a strong, loyal coalition in the solid south. during the fourth party system, the republicans remained the dominant presidential party, although democrats grover cleveland and woodrow wilson were both elected to two terms. in 1932, at the onset of the fifth party system, democrats took firm control of national politics with the landslide victories of franklin d. roosevelt in four consecutive elections. other than the two terms of republican dwight eisenhower from 1953 to 1961, democrats retained firm control of the presidency until the mid-1960s. since the mid-1960s, despite a number of landslides (such as richard nixon carrying 49 states and 61% of the popular vote over george mcgovern in 1972; ronald reagan carrying 49 states and 58% of the popular vote over walter mondale in 1984), presidential elections have been competitive between the predominant republican and democratic parties and no one party has been able to hold the presidency for more than three consecutive terms. in the election of 2012, only 4% separated the popular vote between barack obama (51%) and mitt romney (47%), although obama won the electoral vote by a landslide (332–206).
two-party system
a so-called "third party" in the united kingdom are the liberal democrats. in the 2010 election, the liberal democrats received 23% of the votes but only 9% of the seats in the house of commons. while electoral results do not necessarily translate into legislative seats, the liberal democrats can exert influence if there is a situation such as a hung parliament. in this instance, neither of the two main parties (at present, the conservative party and the labour party) have sufficient authority to run the government. accordingly, the liberal democrats can in theory exert tremendous influence in such a situation since they can ally with one of the two main parties to form a coalition. this happened in the coalition government of 2010. yet in that more than 13% of the seats in the british house of commons are held in 2011 by representatives of political parties other than the two leading political parties of that nation, contemporary britain is considered by some to be a multi-party system, and not a two-party system. the two party system in the united kingdom allows for other parties to exist, although the main two parties tend to dominate politics; in this arrangement, other parties are not excluded and can win seats in parliament. in contrast, the two party system in the united states has been described as a duopoly or an enforced two-party system, such that politics is almost entirely dominated by either the republicans or democrats, and third parties rarely win seats in congress.
two-party system