The problem of party system change revisited: the 2022 Peter Mair Lecture

Abstract

ABSTRACT Like with Haute Couture, in political science there are also fashions. In the 1990s party system change was the flavour of the day, and Peter Mair its uttermost pontiff. The popularity of the topic fadde away with the new century, especially after the 2008 Great Recession made buzzwords like populism and democratic backsliding, among others, more fashionable. Departing from Mair’s, 2001 book chapter on the topic, and using Mair’s conceptual and methodological tools, this paper revisits the sister concepts of party system freezing and party system change, showing to what extent fears about never-ending change and party system collapse are really true. While cleavage structures have changed, electorates are in disarray, and parties are in constant turmoil, party system change in Western Europe is still the exception (e.g. Ireland), rather than the rule.