It is fact, actually. This is a result of basic game theory. First-past-the-post electoral systems inexorably develop into two-party systems because of the mechanism that he describes, in the same way that gas inexorably diffuses or water flows downhill.
Insisting that it won’t happen because you feel like it shouldn’t happen just causes you to fall into the traps CPG Grey described.
game theory assumes that we have rational actors acting in their own best interests. That’s not what people do. game theory doesn’t predict what people will do.
his charcterization isn’t scientific fact. it is opinion.
It is fact, actually. This is a result of basic game theory. First-past-the-post electoral systems inexorably develop into two-party systems because of the mechanism that he describes, in the same way that gas inexorably diffuses or water flows downhill.
Insisting that it won’t happen because you feel like it shouldn’t happen just causes you to fall into the traps CPG Grey described.
no, those can be calculated and predicted. the same isn’t true for the rate at which political parties are created or dissolved.
this is the crux of duverger’s “law” which is not a law at all but actually a tautology.
that didn’t happen here.
game theory assumes that we have rational actors acting in their own best interests. That’s not what people do. game theory doesn’t predict what people will do.