A multi-party system would be good to have in the USA and it would bring more types of topics to the government and make cross-cutting political views and help would break down polarization. However, it can't work with the current voting system. More than two parties is mathematically unstable with first past the post voting. If you look at the UK even in areas where more people voted liberal the conservatives have control because the liberal vote is split among too many parties and only the largest share matters. In order to make a multi-party system work we need a combination of ranked choice voting and proportional representation.

The US needs to have a multi party system, but our system is designed for only two parties so no change will ever happen.

Using the term "economically liberal", to describe left wing economics is really confusing. Because the term Economic Liberalism is free-market, right wing economics.

I would’ve thought Labour would be headed by Bernie Sanders

First-past-the-post voting and winner-take-all elections are the reason this can't happen. Let's get ranked-choice voting and/or proportional representation up in here and see how that changes things

As an old joke from Soviet Era tolds: Why does America have 2 parties when even one Central Communist Party of USSR is enough? And the same pattern joke from 90s in Russia: How did they managed to have only two parties when we have ten in parlament alone ?

When comparing the fictional 5 USA parties with real European examples, I was shocked that you didn't choose Spanish ones. They have basically that same 5 main parties since 2016, and they suit them much better than UK's 4 or Netherland's 20...

"ACELA, Reform capitalism with sensible regulation" -- and you put Bloomberg as the proponent? Because that's like getting a fox to guard the henhouse.

Wait, wait, Bloomberg as the "reign capitalism in" leader? That...makes this hard to treat seriosuly...

There's a huge flaw in the logic of the report. All of the proposed leaders of these supposed non-existent parties.... are current US politicians. Which suggests that a diversity of views is already being provided within the US two-party system. This is the flaw of many critics of the American system: two parties does not mean only two options. America is so big and diverse "Democrat" and "Republican" does not mean the same thing in every state, or even district.

“Trump is a very stable genius” - Tucker Carlson That cracked me up 😂

Labor party: *suggest Biden as leader* "what, no"

I would hope that in this universe they would also correct the red=right, blue=left mix-up. Most the world uses red=left, blue=right.

What if instead of states giving all their delegates to a single candidate, they give X amount of delegates based upon the amount of votes a candidate received. So if a state has 20 delegates and a person gets 50 percent of those, they get 10 instead of the full 20.

I think Pence as the theoretical leader of the theoretical Conservative party is not the right choice. Personally I think Mitt Romney would be a better choice.

A bit disappointed how you didn’t mention how the system of voting decides the structure of parties. First past the post pushes 2 parties pretty strongly because of the mentioned tactical voting. Other systems like proportional voting or stv do not. Multi party is good, not sure its doable without changing the systems

Although the democratic voter base is more aligned with the hypothetical parties green and labor, the democratic establishment like Pelosi, Biden etc. fits more with the acela party

More like, “If only America had more political parties”...

Without PR, ALL systems mathematically end up with two major partys.

As an American, I love this. This, Instant runoff, and no electoral college would be great.

I think that more indicative of the two party system is how the media reacts. Their is almost no media coverage of the Greens or Libertarians and the coverage there is almost always focused on the idea the voters should support a 'proper' party rather than the idea the Democrats/Republicans should try to win their support.

the big two have zero incentive to break them selves up. it keeps the duopoly in power

spotted a wrong expression at 3:53, "Economically Liberal" is a right wing position, it means you favor economical liberty as opposed to government intervention and redistribution

This would be amazing. And would make American politics way more interesting

Problem: The electoral college makes this entire discusion moot because the electoral college is designed that you MUST use stratigist voting which gravitates to a 2 party system The USA used to have more then 2 parties but they were all swallowed by the 2 largest parties

The US' polarization is an effect of its two-party system, not the cause of it.

88% is the new 100% Nationalist 24 Conservative 19 Acela 10 Labor 26 Green 9 ✨Maths is hard✨

If we went with a multi-party system, we'd also need to get rid of First Past the Post and go with Ranked Choice or Approval Voting. Otherwise, people would vote for one of the bigger new parties just to prevent the bigger new party that they disagree with from winning. For example, the conservatives and nationalists would vote for the same candidate to keep Labor/Green from getting their candidates elected. Eventually, parties would merge and we'd be back to two parties. With Ranked Choice or Approval Voting, though, people could vote for every candidate they liked without worrying that this vote would cause a candidate that they didn't like from winning because they didn't vote for a major party candidate. In fact, if we went with Ranked Choice/Approval Voting first, it might strengthen existing third parties and allow them to grow into major parties.

It would improve it massively. Assuming the voting system was improved too The coalitions that would need to be made already exist today, its just they are hidden and the smaller voices more sidelined. There would be some new faf when a new government starts but being able to vote easily for a party you actually like is a very good trade off imo

As a Dutchman, I love to see my small nation being used as an example in your vids 😁

"What if America fundamentally changed its electoral system?" is a better title

things would have been really interesting if Perrot had got to become president or even if John B. Anderson in the 1981 presidential election got more mileage

I have never been a fan of political parties. I would prefer candidates run on individual merits.

"They have to vote for someone" Actually they don't and it's quite a big problem how many people don't

I would split each of our parties into three factions. Republicans: -Patriot Party: People that'd vote for Trump -Conservatives: People that'd vote for Haley or Scott -Christians: People that'd vote for Pence or Pompeo Democrats: -Labor (the right way to spell it): Biden folks -Progressives: Sanders people -Social Justice: AOC type of people And then there'd be other random niche parties that would spring up that are very minor factions in the current Republicans and Democrats. Libertarians, socialists, a green party, a centrist party, a liberal party.

We have a bicameral legislature. one of the two chambers could use a party-based system and move to multiparty coalition based politics. The other could retain the first past the post system, and represent districts directly.

Would you mind linking the study this video is drawing from? It’s always interesting to see that kind of data

Stupid question, does the name "Acela" refer to the trains (like going forward, progress etc.)?

Here's my theory how such a political system would look: Firstly, it would be proportionately representitive. If it wasn't, it would just collapse back into a two party system within a couple of elections due to the Spoiler Effect. Most likely this system will be modelled on the Irish or the EU electoral system where each state would have a number of electors, determined by proportional representation. Each state will have as many representitives as electoral votes minus 2. So for instance, if the state of Missouri, which has 10 EV - 2 = 8 elected representitives. If Party 1 got 50% of the vote, party 2 30%, Party 3 14% and Party 4 6%, we divide 100 by the number of representitives, meaning to get a representitive, a party needs at least 12.5%, until it's not possible to subtract 12.5 from any party, and once that happens, the largest number gets the representitive. The final result is 50/12.5 = 4 (0% remaining) 30/12.5 = 2 (5% remaining) 14/12.5 = 1 (1.5% remaining) 6/12.5 = 0 (6% remaining) 4+2+1= 7, and the largest remainder goes to Party 4, thus giving them the final representitive. Parties: Such a political system would offer a lot of parties the opportunity to get representation, so I think many would. I'll offer a name, description, and finally a political idol that will epitomise this party's philosophy the best. Party 1. Labour (or Labor) - Party built from union representation, strong proponent of labour rights, better working conditions, would be left-populist in terms of economic positions. Supporters will mostly be working class, young-ish to middle-aged people. Tries to avoid the culture war issues, leaving that to the Progressives whilst this party chaces a purely economic vision. - Political Idol: Bernie Sanders Party 2. Progressives - Party built on social equality. Focuses its attention on social issues, racial issues, gender issues, etc. Supported by mostly young people, college educated people, especially of minority backgrounds. - Political Idol: Stacey Abrams Party 3. Greens - Party based on environmental issues like climate change, pollution, etc. Mostly supported by young college educated people, overlaps with the Progressives, probably more economically left, primarily focuses on green issues, like Green New Deal and preventing harmful climate catastrophe. - Political Idol: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Party 4. Democrats - The remainder of the original Democratic party. A big tent, inclusive party that focuses on compromise with surrounding parties. Wants to get along with most of the other parties. Runs a more safe approach focused on electability and working across the aisle - Political Idol: Joe Biden Party 5. Freedom - An economically right party valuing social freedoms. Runs on individual liberty, property rights, and other related issues - Political Idol: Rand Paul Party 6. Moderates - A party funded by a popular technocrat as a centrist, socially liberal institution. May have some gimmick that tries to set it apart from other parties. Deep down is a centrist party that tries to satisfy all sides - Political Idol: Andrew Yang Party 7. Patriots - A right wing populist party. Runs on national sovereigety, protectionism, anti-immigration, national pride, etc. Largest supporter base is from non-college educated whites. Channels the populist anger against the establishment. Focuses most on culture war issues to whip up a frenzy - Political Idol: Donald Trump Party 8. Christ Party - A right wing party centred on a Christian identity. Supports biblical law under the name "religious freedom", supports teaching creationism in school science class. Most socially conservative of all the main parties with representation in the government. Mostly supported by older people, especially Southerners. - Political Idol: Mike Huckabee Party 9. Republican - The remainder of the original Republican party. Would try to connect with the other right wing parties as a sort of big-tent right wing party. This contrasts with the Democratic party that would be more big tent in compromising with right wing parties. Many of your economic conservatives and neoconservatives would be in this party - Political Idol: Lindsey Graham

I love these kind of speculative videos and I'd like to see more of this type of content. I'm not from the US, but I'd like to see them adopt a multi-party system with proportional representation.

Our two party system always worked when we had many different wings of each party. We used to have blue dog democrats and northern liberal Rockefeller republicans. People broke away from their own party on legislation all the time. The problem is the radicalization that has happened over the last 20 years. The purification of the parties by a flawed primary system. If you want to fix American politics, fix the primary system. Go to a jungle primary or something. Anything but this system that forces candidates to the extremes.

Well maybe in the future,we will see these two major parties splited in other smaller parties,Democrat Party and Republican Party seem both very divided.

I'd definitely go between labor and the greens. It'd be interesting to see a mapped out distribution of these parties.

"If the US were to implement such a system..." But the two party system wasn't implemented and nor could 'a multi party system be implemented'. Both are natural results of certain electoral systems.

"economically liberal" and higher taxes contradict each other.

In other words, if America had a democracy.

We need to change the election system from Plurality/FPTP to a Proportional Representation format to have multi-party coalitions. Oregon (from where I come from) has Fusion voting where candidates can represent more than one party. But I think we need to rank type voting with PR to substantially change things. Also we need to stop or vastly limit gerrymandering since this also helps in maintaining the two-party system. What about a video about what Electoral system can best fit this video's premise?

I find it interesting that my reactions as a non-American (pretty centrist by Canadian standards), 4 of the suggested leaders just strike me as different flavours of conservative (fringe right to centre-right) and AOC is at most centre-left (closer to what I would think of as a Western centrist with liberal social views really - she's hardly calling for workers to control the means of production but rather for workers to get treated decently). The American Overton window is a wacky thing.

EXCELLENT video. Great abstracted view of the political system. I very much like the idea of doing away with colors/symbols for the parties so we can focus on policies.

I love this idea, but I don't know how it could be implemented successfully with first past the post. There would be no love lost if we got rid of that too, though. At least speaking for myself.

Just to kindly bring a little fun into the comments section, the legendary 8:55 speech bubble has got to be the most British pun about parliament I have seen on the channel to date~

I’d say that there’s a decent ground of improvement with more larger parties than the big two, at least then it’s likely for the parties to focus on the consequences of any major candidacy as apposed to simply meeting that ends by whatever means at their disposal

In terms of coalition forcing compromise making it similar to the system we have now, I’d disagree: with many parties, you don’t always have to form an exclusively left-wing or right-wing coalition. For example in Germany center-right CDU cooperates with center-left SPD instead of the right-wing/far-right AfD, as it might happen if Germany have only two major parties. Coalitions give more flexibility on who you can ally with.

Personally I would lean towards either Labor or the Greens. Both of those parties have policies that I would really align with. As far as a coalition making things worse, I think part of the problem is first past the post voting. If there was a switch to either the approval system or RCV, that would help with the tactical voting and longer-term strategy. If we get rid of that, then potentially the smaller parties can grow, or these other parties can emerge and become reality.

Really interesting. Great vid!

As an Englishman seeing conservative being red and labour blue is messing my head up

Such an interesting thing to discuss and I hope this happens for them some day. 2 parties are just ridiculously unfit for today, but will it ever change? I don't think so.

It would be interesting to see how a multi-party system could work in the US.

As some people have already noted, one of the best documented principles in Political Science (see, for instance, Maurice Duverger's work) is that the voting and political systems largely determine the number of parties. A presidentialist/FPTP system will always result in a two-party system. Conversely, a parliamentary/proportional system will produce a multiparty political system. It hasn't anything to do with political ideology. Even a country as big and culturally diverse as the US has become a two-party democracy under a presidentialist/FPTP system!

I can't believe you made a video this long on this topic without even mentioning the effects of a first-past-the-post voting system and how it tends to shape a theoretically open electoral landscape into a two-party system (that might flip at some point with a new party replacing one of the old ones). I mean, if you don't agree with that analysis I'd really like to hear why as that is the conventional wisdom on why there are only two major parties in the UK an US.

"Labor. Although our one has a 'U' as let's be honest it should." Australians: "That's fighting right words there"

A good video idea would be on the number of House seats being fixed at 435 meaning reapportionment hapoes and states that grow will lose seats if they don't grow fast enough. If a seat was awarded for a set amount of population (originally it was 30k in 1789) imagine how much cheaper running for office gets and much better chances at being represented and feeling one's vote matters. A combination of this with awarding electoral votes based on how the district voted and ranked voting might fix a lot of what ails American democracy.

As someone who is economically left and socially right, the conservative or labour parties here seem much better than the two options currently for me.

You absolutely should have mentioned the spoiler effect in this video. Big oversight.

A multi-party system would help the US, people feel underrepresented here. It will do the American public good to actually feel truly represented because the Republicans and Democrats aren't filling that role.

Thank you TLDR!! You guys are the best in the business. Right down the middle of the road. Keep it up, and I'll keep supporting you guys on patreon and by telling my friends!

9:11 As a Dutch, I have to remind the world that in the election of the Tweede Kamer, PvdA (the red rose) and GroenLinks were on the same list. In fact, they are joining together now as GroenLinksPvdA. As such both are far more alike than showed here. Practically on the left/right and progressive/conservative they were already almost the same. You could call it the Dutch model: we talk so much with eachother that we're post labour or green: that's now the green labour party here. They are also reaching out tto Partij vd Dieren (the butterfly) and ChristenUnie(Christian left) to join the union. One could argue we're post the green / labour devide here. Interestingly enough SP, the most conservative left party is not on your list.

Multi party coalition would help in moving policy more towards the center and reduce polarization and increase co-operation among parties.

I would vote for ACELA since it's the closest to my views. I think the reason why a multi-party system will help and change something is the ACELA party which falls on the center between the democrats and the republicans and will improve democracy and the representation of these people who fall on the center like me.

Americans know we need a multi-party system but that’d mean the constitution would have to be amended and there’s no way anyone is touching the constitution in this political climate

Great video! Could you do this for Canada if we had PR ?

Funnily enough, J.J. McCullough did a video on if the USA had a 10 party system. How much of a difference a Multi-Party system v a Two-Party system makes I'm not sure of. I have an interesting idea for a video on the TLDR News EU channel, 'What if Germany had a Two-Party system?'.

The thing people misunderstand about the two party system is that they assume it’s the first past the post system that causes it but many countries with fptp have multiple parties the cause is that dems and reps have very little control over individual members meaning most people would rather make a faction in one of them then form their own parties

I want a multi-party system AND Approval voting. Make a video about voting systems throughout the world!

Is there a link to the study by Echelon Insight that was mentionned in this video?

I live in Australia and like the voting system (Instant-runoff voting) as the government generally doesn’t need other in the lower house but there’s no spoked effect

The modern US Democrats would largely stand around the Acela Party area, not the Labour Party area

I would definitely put Bernie Sandars as the hypothetical president of the labor party.

The biggest issue is the first past the post system that favours the two party system. If there was proportional representation then “third” parties would actually have a chance

its really interesting that despite economic liberalism and social conservatism came out on top, the US continues to go towards a socially liberal, economically conservative “ideal”. Really makes you think.

I wish we could get a tiered voting system and more parties. I would vote for green but heavily support labor as well.

Bloomberg.... lmao whoever picked this... give me whatever drugs you were taking. XD

In this system, and those numbers I could easily see a National/Conservative/Acela coalition, with that last being the kingmakers. Honestly the need to break down the Big Two's dominance is part of why I support ranked choice voting. We need a system which is intended to let people be more open in how they express themselves at the ballot box.

The two party system arises from the game theory equilibrium with single vote. If you have only a single vote, and it's winner take all in state electoral votes or districts, then you need to support one of the two top options, leading to duopoly. With Approval Voting, for example, you aren't restricted to a single choice.

2 words: JJ Mccullough 😁

If they had more parties some kids would probably start a party like the amogus party

Would love to see one of these for the UK, even though we do have more smaller parties itd still be interesting to see what would happen with a proportional system over here!

Out of curiosity what keeps the equilibrium? What stops people from changing their vote for an ideal loser to an acceptable possible winner? What stops parties from merging in order to win?

Unfortunately, two parties is the natural endgame of single-vote FPTP, we have to change _that_ flawed methodology first.

You’d need to change the US electoral system to implement this. Or at least you would take the opportunity to reform. 1 national election for president, 1 national election for the houses numbers, 1 local election for the senate. Also this way you won’t technically need coalitions, just parties voting on issues based on their interests.

This would be beneficial for depolarizing US politics and restoring trust in public representatives, but vast changes to the current electoral system would have to happen to promote party divergence, like removing first past the post systems or creating ranked-voting allowing people to support candidates that they think may fail without entirely tossing away their vote if they do -changes that those in power who benefit from the current system aren’t likely to allow willingly.

Great video!

Where exactly does the name "Acela" come from??

I really hope we see the end of the two party system in my lifetime...sooner the better. I'd be with the greens as described here. I'm quite surprised that only 9% came out for those policies when placed on an even playing field though. :/

Echelon Insights really did a great job with this study!

The reason for this is because the smaller parties are often barrad from running due to a few reasons: they aren't in other states/territories, they may not have enough registered voters, and they don't have enough funds to run campaigns. The Green and libetrian parties are probably the next to gain wider expansion they're already in 32 states and increasing, the question is when?

The way that each race in each district of both state and federal requires 50+%. Therefore multi party races would favor only two parties. The idea is that the political coalitions are done at the party primary level ie one of the two parties. Each candidate tries to build his individual coalition to capture 51%. The “swing” voters control the outcome by choosing which of candidate coalition they most favor. Historically this favors drawing parties to a centerist position. In past voters often complained they could see no differences between the two resulting in low voter turnout. That.has not been a problem recently. George Washington warned against the formation of political parties at all saying they would promote discord between the people charged with managing the central government.

The Acela Party sounds amazing

You can't really compare UK and US political parties since British right (Conservatives) and centrist (Liberal Democrats) party still the left of American Democratic Party.

As a classical liberal, I'd be split between Acela and the conservatives. Americans just don't usually hold my political opinions... A classical liberal party wouldn't succeed (like the FDP does in Germany, for example)