Patterns of party change in Central and Eastern Europe 1990-2015

While parties in many new democracies frequently split, merge, change labels, and make and break electoral alliances, comparative systematic research on how these changes are related to each other is limited. This study addresses this gap by conceptualizing change as a result of intra-party conflicts, conflicts in or consolidation of existing electoral alliances, and the formation of new alliances and mergers. We develop measures for each type of change using an original dataset that covers almost 800 party-electoral term dyads in 11 countries in Central and Eastern Europe in the period between 1990 and 2015. Our findings contradict the idea of party change as a uni-dimensional phenomenon. Instead we find that exits from existing electoral alliances, their consolidation through mergers, and the formation of new alliances and mergers are moderately related to each other, but not with intra-party splits. Our findings suggest that parties and their alliances structure political competition in Central and Eastern Europe relatively well. Moreover, negative consequences of party change on representation and accountability are limited, as under the relative absence of multiple and nearly simultaneous changes in party identity the electorate should be able to follow party evolution

Patterns of Party Structural Change in Central and Eastern Europe, 1990-2015

While parties in many new democracies frequently split, merge, change labels, and make and break electoral alliances, comparative systematic research on how these changes are related to each other is limited. Literature on political parties often treats different forms of party change as manifestations of a singular and single-dimensional phenomenon of party instability. This study examines the dimensionality of party structural change in 11 countries in Central and Eastern Europe. We apply Multiple Correspondence Analysis to an original dataset that differentiates between five types of party structural change and examines 780 party-electoral term dyads. Our findings contradict the idea of party structural change as a uni-dimensional phenomenon. Instead we distinguish between two types of change: temporary change (entry to and exit from electoral coalitions and changes in electoral labels) and permanent change (splits and mergers). A more fine-grained classification also discerns between change that brings about party system aggregation and fragmentation. These findings imply that different types of party structural change cannot be accounted for by the same factors

Does switching pay off? The impact of parliamentary party instability on individual electoral performance

Members of parliament who change their parliamentary party group (PPG) affiliation can be motivated by a variety of factors but the desire to improve their electoral prospects is often argued to be the among the most important. But does switching PPG affiliation improve or damage the electoral performance of those involved? We study the changes in electoral performance of Polish MPs involved in parliamentary party instability since the mid-1990s using an original dataset on all instances of switching compiled by the INSTAPARTY (Party Instability in Parliaments, https://instapartyproject.com) project. In addition to analyzing whether the MPs run for the parliament again in the following election, we zoom in on their electoral performance in terms of personal preference votes. We consider the electoral dividends of different types of switching and find that the effect of switching on personal electoral performance depends on the type of switching MPs were involved in

Independence versus Affiliation: What Determines Entry into Parliamentary Party Groups?

Political parties are often considered essential for structuring parliamentary decisionmaking in democracies. However, many MPs experience spells of being non-affiliated with any parliamentary party group (PPG), either because they were elected as independent candidates or left their PPGs earlier in the legislative term. Whether such non-affiliation periods end with an entry to a PPG, which PPG the legislator enters and how long they remain independent before the entry, as well as the reasons for these patterns, remains relatively unknown. This paper addresses these under-researched questions by examining PPG entry in three Central and Eastern European countries (Lithuania, Poland, and Romania) in the last two decades. We build and test an argument that electoral, office and policy concerns of both the MPs considering the entry and the potential receiving parties play an important role in driving entry. Our findings suggest that legislators’ electoral incentives as a key explanation for their PPG affiliation decisions

Understanding the Complexity of Party Instability in Parliaments

We propose a new typology of parliamentary party switches (switching events) that focuses on three dimensions: (1) the number of MPs and the degree of coordination, (2) the origin of switchers and (3) the destination of switchers – a parliamentary party group (PPG) or independent status. We further distinguish between switches with single and multiple destinations. Our approach sheds new light to party instability in various ways. We elucidate types of party instability to emphasize the complexity of party instability that have eluded the conceptual toolset available thus far. For example, “collective defection” (coordinated movement from one PPG to another), “collective exit” (MPs exiting their parliamentary group to become independent MPs) and “multi-PPG split” (coordinated moves from several PPGs to form a new PPG). Using preliminary data compiled for Instaparty (Party Instability in Parliaments) project from (mostly) Poland and Ireland, we find rich diversity in the forms of parliamentary party instability. While individual defections are much more common than group defections, they are clearly more dominant in Ireland than in Poland; furthermore, switches between PPGs (rather than between PPGs and independent status) have been more common in Poland. Our typology is illustrated by the analysis of the 8th Polish Sejm that provides examples of nearly all single-origin switching events and of most multiorigin ones. The new typology presents the first step of our inquiry into the patterns, causes and consequences of party switching in eight democracies (Estonia, Ireland, Italy, Lithuania, Norway, the Netherlands, Poland and Romania) from 1960s/1990s to early 2020s

Tensile deformation accommodation in microscopic metallic glasses via subnanocluster reconstructions

International audienc

Three-Dimensional Model for Planar Assembly of Triangular Molecules: Effect of Substrate–Molecule Interaction

A three-dimensional (3D) model is proposed to study the self-assembly of triangular molecules at the solid–liquid interface and the effects of the surface–molecule interaction on molecular ordering. In our model the molecules are subject to the H-bond (<i>e</i>_H) and surface-molecule (<i>e</i>_s) interaction at the lowest plane (interface), while higher planes serve as an additional reservoir of molecules. To determine the ordering and adsorption properties, we study the temperature dependences of the specific heat <i>C</i>_V(<i>T</i>) at various values of <i>e</i>_s/<i>e</i>_H ratio. For low and intermediate values of <i>e</i>_s/<i>e</i>_H, in addition to the peak related to the ordering into the honeycomb phase at <i>T</i>_c, the low temperature <i>C</i>_V(<i>T</i>) peak (Schottky anomaly), caused by adsorption of molecules in the pores of the honeycomb structure, is found. For larger values of <i>e</i>_s/<i>e</i>_H the molecules are adsorbed on the entire first plane, and the adsorption-related peak of <i>C</i>_V(<i>T</i>) is found at higher temperature than the peak at <i>T</i>_c. For both <i>e</i>_s/<i>e</i>_H regimes the frustrated phase is obtained instead of the honeycomb phase at high molecular densities. At <i>e</i>_s/<i>e</i>_H < 2.3 the ordering temperature <i>T</i>_c strongly depends on the number of planes <i>L</i>_Z decreasing for <i>e</i>_s = 0 and <i>L</i>_Z → ∞ by 40% as compared to the 2D (<i>L</i>_Z = 1) model. For <i>e</i>_s/<i>e</i>_H ≳ 2.3 the ordering properties of the 3D model are equivalent to those of the 2D model