Factional Politics How Dominant Parties Implode or Stabilize [Paperback]

Drawing on theories of neo-institutionalism to show how institutions shape dissident behaviour, Boucek develops new ways of measuring factionalism and explains its effects on office tenure. In each of the four cases - from Britain, Canada, Italy and Japan - intra-party dynamics are analyzed through times series and rational choice tools.List of Tables and Figures Acknowledgements   Introduction 1. The Theory of One-Party Dominance 2. Why Does One-Party Dominance End in Factionalism 3. Majoritarian Democracies: Executive-Dominated Britain and Decentralised Canada 4. Case 1 - The Thatcher-Major Factional Wars Over Europe 5. Case 2 - The Demise of Canadian Liberal Hegemony 6. Non-Majoritarian Democracies: Centrifugal Italy and Consensual Japan 7. Case 3 - Italy's Christian Democrats: How Factional Capture Bred Self-Destruction 8. Case 4 - The Liberal Democratic Party of Japan (1955-2009): End of Hegemony Conclusion: How Parties Succeed or Fail to Manage Factionalism and Stay in Power Notes Bibliography Index  

'Boucek makes an important contribution to explaining the politics of single-party dominance by integrating consideration of both inter- and

intra-party politics. By challenging the unitary actor assumption of

inter-party accounts, she offers a fuller picture of both the maintenance and the decline of single-party dominance. She highlights the importance of institutional incentives and electoral market conditions in shaping the behaviour of factions within a dominant party, and hence its ability to maintain its dominant position.'

- Professor Richard S. Katz, Department of Political Science, The John Hopkins University

'Boucek's study provides a new benchmark for the analysis of how political parties really operate. Its rich comparative analysis of the dynamic relationship between factionalism and party dominance opens new windows into understanding the impolã-