The Origins of New Parties: Genuinely New or Party Fission?

In the study, I provide an analysis of new parties and the determinants of their origin. I investigate the conditions for establishing new parties and distinguish parties that form out of existing parties from genuinely new parties. A focus on the origin of new parties in elections allows us to better understand mechanisms of democratic accountability, party system change and sources of partisan dealignment. New parties may either results from frictions in established parties or reveal electoral demand that was not covered previously. Hence these new parties inform us about problems of democratic accountability by established parties. My study focuses on the operationalization of new political parties and the causes of party fission. In an empirical study, I investigate which parties are likely to split. My results show that cabinet membership is an important predictor for party fission and that parties in cabinet are more likely to split. In addition, the results demonstrate that the age and size of a party have an impact on their stability. Older political parties are less likely to split and larger parties are more likely to split. In the study, I look at established Western democracies and the emergence of new parties for the entire post-war period (1945-2017). This design allows me to compare decades of relative party system stability in the post-war period to recent decades with more volatile party systems. The study is based on original data about the origin of new parties and allows distinguishing splinter parties from parties that are genuinely new more carefully. My analysis provides a comprehensive perspective of party system change by looking at new parties.