Example (Outline Only)
India is an example of a complex multi-party system. In some elections as many as 30 parties contest a
race. With this mind-boggling diversity one is tempted to conclude that there is no transcendent or long-
lived linkage between party and social station. However, the literature on political parties finds that
there is a class to party bias in nearly all multi-party systems. The question under investigation is
whether this class to party bias is found in India as well.
I.
Theoretical Background on Political Parties
a. What the literature has to say about parties representing class interests.
b. What the literature has to say about multi-party systems and class interests.
c. Discussion of one or two other nations and their party systems and class interests (if you can
find it!)
II. Botterove
a. Basic political structure (parliamentary system, federated, separated head of state and head of
nation)
b. Brief history of the development of the party system from unified to fragmented
i. The Steel Party as dominant force until the 1980s
ii. Fragmentation of political parties and Parliament: Rise of Coalition Governments
iii. Rise of Obstructionist parties (HEJ and others)
iv. Link between the rhetoric of HEJ to the Sons of the Department movement.
IV.
III. Research Design
D Drawing on theoretical question of class interests and the rise of extremist parties, the
question is whether there is a solid class bias to Obstructionist parties. Theory would indicate
there ought to be a stable constituency based on class that supports Obstructionist parties.
E Extremist parties tend to tout similar agendas as did the Sons of the Department movement
in the mid-1980s.
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d. Data: All 100 districts where extremist groups won at least 35% of the vote in the past two
elections were selected (35 districts in first election, 65 districts in second). Regression
analysis was run using party affiliation as the dependent variable with the following as
independent variables: income, primary occupation of district, district classification, and rates
of literacy.
IV. Findings
a. Class, in terms of income levels, was not a good determinant of party affiliation.
b. The concept of class, in the case of Botterove, needed to be linked to occupation rather than
income.
c. When occupation was held as the independent variable (party affiliation as the dependent
variable), there was very strong correlation between occupation and party affiliation.
d. Education labor tended to be the strongest supporter of Obstructionist parties. This may be the
case because….
e. Teachers were only strong supporters when it appeared there was a significant Administrative
population in the district, indicated by the presence of a strong pro-Administration party showing
in the election.
f. Individuals in small towns not having a large or politically active Administration population did not
support Obstructionist parties to any greater extent than found in the general population.
g. The surprise was that urban populations….
Convention