One-party system

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    Last updated 2012

    A one-party system or actually a one-party system is a political system in which sole rule of one party is enshrined in law. The Unity Party has sole power of governance in the long term , with no opposition parties permitted. The Unity Party is thus the only legal party and usually a specific ideologyCommitted. One-party systems are fundamentally in contradiction to democratic party diversity. One-party systems usually have to be maintained with state pressure and / or violence against the population and with restrictions on civil rights.

    While in some one-party systems there is actually only one approved party, other states allow the existence of further, so-called block parties , which, however, have to accept the absolute leadership role of the unity party and are not allowed to compete with it. Elections have the character of sham elections in which there is always only one list that includes any block parties that may be present. The existence of block parties does not change the character of the one-party system.

    In a figurative sense, states with multi-party systems that are dominated by one party in the long term are sometimes referred to as "(factual) one-party states" in an inaccurate manner. Although other parties remain officially authorized, they have no real chance of a significant share in the exercise of power due to disadvantageous laws, open repression, lack of financial resources or insufficient infrastructure. There is competition between parties, however, and such political systems need not necessarily be undemocratic.

    history

    The first one-party system in history is considered to be Liberia , which was ruled by the True Whig Party between 1878 and 1980 .

    After the October Revolution in Russia, a one-party system was established there, initially Leninist and later Marxist-Leninist , which became the model for the people 's democracies of the post-war period. The main party was the Social Democratic Workers' Party of Russia ( consisting exclusively of the radical Bolsheviks since 1912 ) , which was renamed the Communist Party of Russia in 1918 and, after the establishment of the USSR, the Communist Party of the Soviet Union .

    The Kemalist-Social Democratic Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi was the unity party of the Republic of Turkey from its foundation in 1923 until the transition to the multi-party system in 1946.

    Following the example of Italian fascism (seizure of power in October 1922), fascist one-party systems came to power especially in Europe in the 1920s and 1930s, for example the NSDAP in Germany (January 1933), the Falange in Spain , the Fatherland Front in Austria or the Ustasha in the Independent State of Croatia . After 1945, fascist one-party systems still existed in Spain until Franco's death , in Portugal until the Carnation Revolution and in the form of military dictatorships in Latin America and Asia .

    After the Second World War, communist parties prevailed in many countries, such as in the People's Republic of China or in Yugoslavia . Above all, the Soviet Union (where Joseph Stalin ruled de facto as sole ruler until his death in 1953 ) had brought about through political pressure, reprisals or sham elections that communist one-party systems also came to power in almost all of the countries it occupied during the World War, wherever they did were then mostly able to hold out until the end of the Cold War in 1989 (even in the Soviet Union itself, until its collapse in 1990, the CPSU remained in power as the only admitted state party). As satellite states of the Soviet Union, these countries formed the so-called Eastern Bloc until 1989 (see also post-communist system transformation ). Such authoritarian or totalitarian systems based on the Soviet dictatorial pattern still exist in isolated cases (such as in North Korea , see above).

    Many African and Arab states also became one-party states after their independence. Mostly, the former liberation movements made up the governments after gaining independence. B. in Eritrea , Angola , Syria ( Ba'ath Party ) or Algeria .

    In Egypt, General Muhammad Nagib and Gamal Abdel Nasser overthrew the king in 1952 and proclaimed a republic on June 18, 1953. Nasser overthrew General Nagib in 1954 and determined politics as President until his death in 1970.

    Justifications

    A one-party system usually legitimizes itself in accordance with the ruling ideology of the state. There are different theories of legitimation in the different one-party systems. The most important are the following:

    Marxism-Leninism

    Socialist one-party systems often referred to themselves as the dictatorship of the proletariat to emphasize the difference to bourgeois democracy, the dictatorship of capital . The Communist Party is, according to its own name, built according to the principle of democratic centralism , which has bottom-up eligibility and top-down accountability as a central feature. The politics of the (communist) party is thus an expression of the will of the majority of the people or the working class. In reality, however, politics often deviated greatly from the will of the people. Examples of such systems include the Soviet Union , the PR China and Cuba .

    Kemalism

    By Mustafa Kemal Ataturk founded the state ideology of the Republic of Turkey , of Kemalism , served to further the approval parties mid-40s to legitimize the supremacy of the CHP . According to the six pillars of Kemalism, consisting of republicanism , populism , secularism , revolutionism , nationalism and statism , action is not in the interests of individual classes , ethnic groups or religions , but in the interests of the entire nation. The Kemalist party is therefore an expression of rule in the interests of all. Internal contradictions are constantly being overcome by the established revolutionism. According to this theory, any opposition party was unnecessary.

    Fascism and National Socialism

    Fascist dictatorships are built on the leader principle . This “ leader ” is seen as the savior of one's own nation and is accordingly staged in public. He is at the head of a tight hierarchy, which aims to stamp out any internal opposition in order to be able to conduct the external "struggle for survival of the nation", that is, the war, as effectively as possible.

    present

    Since the fall of communism in Eastern Europe and the simultaneous wave of democratization in Africa, the number of one-party systems has fallen sharply. In 2018, six states can still be considered as one-party states:

    Not generally recognized internationally:

    Most recently, Syria and Turkmenistan each gave up the one-party system in 2012 and formally allowed opposition parties.

    Web links

    Individual evidence

    1. ^ Alf Mintzel: One-party system. In: Dieter Nohlen (Ed.): Political Science 1. Dependency - Multiple Regression (= Piper's Dictionary of Politics. Volume 1). Piper, Munich 1985, ISBN 3-492-02484-X , p. 180.
    2. ^ Alf Mintzel: One-party system. In: Dieter Nohlen (Ed.): Political Science 1. Dependency - Multiple Regression (= Piper's Dictionary of Politics. Volume 1). Piper, Munich 1985, ISBN 3-492-02484-X , p. 180.
    3. ^ William Roberts Clark, Matt Golder, Sona Nadenichek Golder: Principles of Comparative Politics. 2nd Edition. CQ Press, Los Angeles 2013, ISBN 978-1-60871-679-1 , pp. 611f.
    4. ^ William Roberts Clark, Matt Golder, Sona Nadenichek Golder: Principles of Comparative Politics. 2nd Edition. CQ Press, Los Angeles 2013, ISBN 978-1-60871-679-1 , pp. 611f.
    5. ^ William Roberts Clark, Matt Golder, Sona Nadenichek Golder: Principles of Comparative Politics. 2nd Edition. CQ Press, Los Angeles 2013, ISBN 978-1-60871-679-1 , pp. 611f.