Theories Of Coalition Formation Research Articles

Distribution of Seats in the New 2021 Czech Government Coalition in Terms of Coalition Theories and Power Indices of Political Parties

This study is theoretically anchored in the office-seeking approach and coalition theory of political science. It is based on the most widespread theories of portfolio distribution in executive and legislative bodies (proportionality, power index, voting weights), and it tests these theories using data related to coalition negotiations in the Czech Republic for the new 2021 government coalition, a case of a surplus majority government. The study investigates the distribution of ministerial positions in the government, the office of President (Speaker) of the Chamber of Deputies, and the chairs of permanent parliamentary committees. The analysis also explores the types of electoral coalitions formed; the SPOLU coalition was a superadditive coalition, while the PirSTAN coalition was only an additive coalition. Grounded in the theory of electoral games, the Shapley-Shubik and Banzhaf power indices and the theory of coalition formation are applied in order to analyse the possible minimal winning coalitions that could be formed following the 2021 elections to the Chamber of Deputies.

The closer, the better – How perceived ideological proximity between parties affects the emergence of coalition preferences

ABSTRACT While coalition governments have been studied extensively, there remains a lack of understanding of how coalition preferences emerge and what factors are the most influential. Utilising coalition formation theories, this study posits that voters tend to prefer coalitions with a narrower range of ideological differences between 1.) the parties involved and 2.) between the voter and the party perceived to have the greatest ideological distance from the individual. Previous studies have mainly concentrated on a general left-right ideological dimension or specific issue dimensions, despite the fact that some of the countries analysed are characterized by a two-dimensional political space. Using Germany as a case study that exemplifies this inherent two-dimensionality, this analysis adopts a nuanced approach by employing the calculation of Euclidean distance based on socio-economic and socio-cultural measures. This approach aims to explain the formation of coalition preferences leading up to the federal election in 2021. Our results show how strongly the perceived ideological distance of parties contributes to developing preferences for a specific coalition option, even when controlling for party evaluation and socio-demographics. For this reason, they have important implications for the understanding of the emergence of coalition preferences and party competition.

Denmark: portfolio allocation in the government and parliament in the sphere of foreign policy

The growing number of coalition governments in European states, many of which are minority governments, raises questions about how they form and function. The case of Denmark, where such governments have long become a part of political everyday life, helps to identify the main specific features of foreign policy portfolio allocation in the cabinet and the Danish parliament, since the Kingdom is one of the most successful examples of cooperation between the government and parliament in the field of foreign policy and defence. The article analyses the mechanisms and factors for the foreign policy portfolio allocation in 2001-2023, taking into account successive "blue" and "red" party blocs. Various theories of coalition formation and portfolio allocation in coalition governments are used to explain the distinguishing features of such allocation at a particular historical stage. In addition, general features of the development of the Danish political system at the present stage, the main trends and prospects for this development are considered. The authors conclude that when allocating portfolios in the government, preference is given to "junior" coalition partners, while in parliament - to "senior" ones; the opinion of the Danish People's Party is taken into account by coalition partners without the Party’s inclusion in the government; the choice is given in favour of popular and authoritative politicians constituting the foreign policy elite of Denmark over the past three decades; the functioning of the Foreign Policy Committee provides some kind of balance of power in the Danish Parliament on foreign and defence policy. It is also found out that the strategies for coalition formation and foreign policy portfolio allocation do not significantly differ between the "blue" and "red" party blocs, but follow the same logic aimed at maintaining the stability of the minority government’s position.

Null players, outside options, and stability: The conditional Shapley value

We suggest a new component efficient solution for monotonic TU games with a coalition structure, the conditional Shapley value. In contrast to other such solutions, it satisfies the null player property. Nevertheless, it accounts for the players’ outside options in productive components of coalition structures. For all monotonic games, there exist coalition structures that are stable under the conditional Shapley value. For voting games, such stable coalition structures support Gamson’s theory of coalition formation (Gamson, 1961).

Assembly dissolution powers and incumbency advantages in coalition formation

Are dominant governing parties with discretion to call early elections better able to negotiate their return to office? Dominant incumbents in parliamentary democracies sometimes have extensive powers to dissolve parliament, which enables them to affect coalition bargaining. Yet, whether these powers advantage them in forming the next coalition remains poorly understood. To address this gap, this article develops a theory of coalition formation in the shadow of parliamentary dissolution. Incumbents who can dissolve the assembly, it argues, are more likely to return to government than their peers who lack this power because they enjoy greater bargaining leverage and reputational advantages in coalition formation. The article tests this expectation using mixed and conditional logistic regression analysis of data on 631 government formation opportunities and 433,401 potential coalitions and finds that coalition leaders with discretion to dissolve parliament secure significant advantages in negotiating their return to power.

The Online Coalition Game: A tool for online interactive coalition formation research

In this paper, we present the Online Coalition Game (OCG): an open-source tool written for the open-access research platform oTree that enables high-powered interactive coalition formation experiments. Besides containing a tutorial on conducting and configuring studies using the OCG, we discuss two previous implementations. With these examples, we demonstrate that online use of the OCG provides the benefits of large sample sizes and fast data collection, while leading to convergent and robust findings. Moreover, we show that small changes in the experimental setup offer interesting opportunities to expand coalition formation theory by including insights from, amongst others, literature on bargaining, ostracism, and communication, and vice versa.

MOTIVATIONS TO FORM A MAJORITY COALITION OF CANDIDATES MACHFUD ARIFIN AND MUJIMAN IN THE SURABAYA CITY ELECTION IN 2020

The formation of a coalition of political parties in the regional head election is an interesting phenomenon to be studied, as was the case in the 2020 Surabaya City Election. The process of forming a coalition of political parties with the majority supporters of Machfud Arifin – Mujiaaman. Thus, this study analyzes the process of forming political party coalitions in the 2020 Surabaya City Election. This study uses Geoffrey Pridham's motivational theory of coalition formation regarding the factors that can influence the formation of political party coalitions, political coalition theory by William Riker which emphasizes (minimum winning) coalition) and rational choice theory to see the basic interests of the actors in determining the coalition. This study uses a qualitative approach, with interview data collection techniques and documentation studies. The findings of this study indicate that the process of forming a coalition supporting Machfud Arifin – Mujiaman begins with a strategic discourse between Gerindra, PKB, PAN, NasDem, PPP, Golkar, Democrats, and PKS which is oriented towards a tactical orientation to subvert the dominance of PDIP power in Surabaya. These parties basically have the same spirit because post-reform Surabaya has always been dominated by leaders from the PDIP. Machfud Arifin is considered a potential candidate because he has the financial strength, political networks, and inter-party lobbying in building coalition partners. Machfud Arifin became a trigger in the process of forming the coalition. In the process, horizontal-vertical dynamics occurred, because each party encouraged its cadres to become Machfud Arifin's companion. Thus, theoretically, the process of forming a coalition supporting Machfud Arifin - Mujiaman is influenced by three basic things, namely ideological factors which are the initial thoughts of the majority party which emphasizes leadership renewal, then the historical party that has existed since before 2020 elections were held and finally pragmatic factors ambition to gain power by merging eight political parties. In addition, political actors carry Machfud Arifin with rational choices, that first is the electability survey number, financial capital, and political network owned by the candidate. The coalition is dynamic, so it requires the same commitment and vision, as well as conflict management mechanisms to maintain the integrity of the coalition of political parties.

Coalitions and conflict: A longitudinal analysis of men's politics.

To negotiate conflict and navigate status hierarchy, individuals in many species form coalitions. We describe inter-personal conflicts and assess theories of coalition formation in a small-scale human society. Based on longitudinal and cross-sectional social network analysis of men in two communities of Tsimane forager-horticulturalists, we find evidence of reciprocity in coalitional support, as well as evidence of transitivity: an ally of my ally is likely to become my ally. We find mixed support for coalition formation between individuals who share a common adversary. Coalition formation was also predicted by food- and labour-sharing and especially by kinship. Physically formidable men and men higher in informal status were more likely to provide coalitional support over time; evidence was mixed that they receive more coalitional support. The highest status men are hubs of a dense coalitional support network that indirectly link all men in the community. These findings suggest that male coalition formation is multiply motivated, and in general reveals the political dynamics that structure men's lives in small, relatively egalitarian communities.

Enabling security for the Industrial Internet of Things using deep learning, blockchain, and coalitions

AbstractIn a wireless Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) network, enforcing security is a challenge due to the large number of devices forming the network and their limited computation capabilities. Furthermore, different security attacks require specifically tailored security protocols to prevent their occurrence. As an alternative to these conventional centralized security protocols, the application of Blockchain (BC) and Deep learning (DL) for securing IIoT networks hold great potential. BC facilitates security by being an immutable record of the changes happening in a network. Coalition Formation theory aids decentralization and promotes energy efficiency. And to enforce a state‐of‐the‐art attack detection technique, Deep learning provides an adaptive and reliable platform. Thus, in this paper, a security framework that facilitates generalized security for the IIoT network using BC and Coalition Formation theory is proposed. Additionally, we promote a sophisticated deep learning‐based classification algorithm to efficiently classify malicious and benign devices in IIoT scenarios. In the proposed model, connection links can only be established if the details of the connection are mined on the BC by the “sender” device. Therefore, we propose a Proof of Reliance algorithm that dynamically increases the computational difficulty to prevent malicious devices from attacking the network. Through simulations, it is experimentally proven that malicious devices can never attack the network when the proposed framework is employed for IIoT security.

Práticas de barganha política por meio da execução orçamentária federal

Resumo O processo orçamentário brasileiro tem sido historicamente questionado pela suposta presença de barganha política na inclusão e na execução de emendas ao orçamento, fato que interfere nas premissas, nos critérios e nas práticas das escolhas alocativas. Este artigo, sustentado pela Teoria da Formação de Coalizões, investiga a existência de uma possível relação de barganha política entre os poderes Executivo e Legislativo no processo orçamentário na esfera federal. Tal pesquisa ocorre por meio da análise das execuções de emendas parlamentares singulares ao longo de cinco legislaturas (entre 2000 e 2017) e das decisões dos deputados na votação de projetos propostos pelo Executivo. Analisaram-se dados referentes à execução de emendas singulares, bem como aqueles concernentes à posição política do parlamentar com relação ao Executivo no instante da proposição das emendas. A metodologia envolveu técnicas econométricas que lidam com a correção do viés de seleção para avaliar a presença ou não da referida relação de barganha. Os resultados obtidos corroboram a hipótese de existência de barganha política entre os poderes Executivo e Legislativo, pois o parlamentar com maior aporte de execução de suas emendas singulares foi aquele que, além de ter exercido apoio ao Executivo através de votos favoráveis aos projetos enviados ao congresso nacional, era de fora da coligação de governo, alvo do Executivo na formação do quorum mínimo para a aprovação de seus projetos.

You’ll never rule alone: how football clubs and party membership affect coalition formation

ABSTRACT The research on coalition formation has used the abundance of local-level data to test the classical theories of coalition formation. I take the classical theories as a baseline and supplement them with additional factors related to how political agents are embedded in the local community. In particular, I investigate how the social capital of elected councillors attained in local football clubs and the membership bases of local party branches affect coalition formation. The results of conditional logit models show that coalitions are more likely to be formed between parties whose elected councillors are members of a local football club. In addition, a higher share of elected councillors who are not party members is associated with preference for oversized coalitions. This indicates that when local party branches are not sure about their own and their coalition partners’ unity, they prefer to ensure coalition survival by including an additional party.

‘Cooperate to win’: the influence of the Chilean student movement on the 2012 Budget Law

ABSTRACT In 2011, one of the most important social movements since the end of the dictatorship proposed a change in higher education in Chile. More than two hundred thousand people participated in public demonstrations. Facing the failure of the negotiations with the government, the student movement focused on proposing changes to the 2012 Budget Law. What coalitions did the leaders of this student movement form to influence the Budget Law? The aim of this paper was to analyse the factors that explain coalition formation to impact the 2012 Budget Law. In doing so, an analysis has been carried out, focusing on the leaders of the student movement (CONFECH). This paper emphasizes their coalition with the rectors of public universities and their relationship with other educational actors and the opposition parties. The analysis includes the review of documents and national newspapers and interviews with the leaders of the CONFECH. The results of the analysis show that the traditional factors explaining coalition formation are useful but not sufficient to explain the student movement alliances. This paper argues that the factor that explains the student movement coalitions is the ‘strategic sense’ that the movement is focused on an outcome-based strategy. The leaders consider a coalition with the rectors of public universities as outcome-tactics. However, the relationship with opposition parties was much more difficult because of their distrust resulting from what happened in 2006. This study thus has significant implications for the coalition formation theories and its relationship with social movements’ impact.

Unnatural partners: coalescence in Israeli local government

ABSTRACT A prominent finding in coalition formation literature is that the underlying political rationale at the subnational level largely follows that of the one revealed by the classic literature on national coalitions. The Israeli political system is extremely centralized, with a local government that is highly dependent on its national counterpart. One could expect such a setting to result in local party behaviour that closely resembles the national one. However, as we show, this is far from being the case. We analyze 34 municipal coalitions in the 17 largest Israeli cities. After establishing that Israeli municipal politics fly in the face of classical coalition formation theories, we turn to explain this discrepancy with a qualitative analysis of interviews with 5 formatuers and 8 councillors. We conclude that mayors face low costs of adding surplus coalition partners, while standing to gain from wider legitimacy, weaker opposition, and constrained future competition. At the same time, municipal lists have strong resource- and policy-related incentives to join the coalition while compromise is met with low political costs. The result is an overwhelming predominance of oversized coalitions and partnerships which would be highly improbable at the national arena.

Political Responses to the Extreme Right in Poland. Motivations and Constraints for Collaboration in the Executive Arena

The aim of the article is to indicate potential causes for formation of a government coalition with the extreme right-wing League of Polish Families (LPR) in Poland in 2006. The aim is to determine the motivation of the right-wing mainstream Law and Justice party to cooperate with LPR, but also to indicate potential reasons why the coalition was not concluded until nine months after the elections. The goal is therefore to highlight potential constraints in the formation of the coalition. The analysis uses theories of coalition formation based on the rational choice paradigm (office, policy and vote) combined with an empirical approach to coalition research, with particular emphasis on factors such as the structure of competition in the party system and the internal dynamics of parties. The starting point for this analysis is the result of research on the causes of cabinet collaboration with the extreme right in Western Europe. The aim is to indicate whether the motivations for forming a coalition with the extreme right in Poland are based on similar premises and mechanisms. The analysis combines the deductive approach resulting from the theory of coalition formation with the inductive analysis of facts and factors that accompanied the formation of the coalition. In order to achieve the assumed goals, the article uses quantitative and qualitative methods and systemic analysis.

Party Animals: Asymmetric Ideological Constraint among Democratic and Republican Party Activists

Existing literature shows that Republicans in the mass public demonstrate greater ideological inconsistency and value conflict than Democrats. That is, despite a commitment to the conservative label and abstract belief in limited government, Republican identifiers’ substantive policy attitudes are nonetheless divided. Conversely, Democrats, despite registering lower levels of ideological thinking, maintain relatively consistent liberal issue attitudes. Based on theories of coalition formation and elite opinion leadership, we argue that these differences should extend to Democratic and Republican Party activists. Examining surveys of convention delegates from the years 2000 and 2004, we show that Democratic activists’ attitudes are more ideologically constrained than are those of Republican activists. The results support our hypothesis and highlight that some of the inconsistent attitudes evident among mass public party identifiers can be traced to the internal divisions of the major party coalitions themselves.

Teorie her, formování koalic a koncentrace politické moci v zastupitelstvu hlavního města Prahy

The objective of the paper is to study the political development in the Prague City Assembly after three elections in 2006, 2010, and 2014. The theory of voting games, the Shapley-Shubik and Banzhaf power indexes, and theories of coalition formation are used for an analysis of possible majority coalitions. We developed the mayor's power index that measures the probability that the party will be the strongest party in the majority coalition with the right having a mayor. Measures of concentration of political power are used for evaluating the processes of political fragmentation. The increased number of political parties represented in the Prague City Assembly highly increased the number of possible coalitions and the number of political parties needed to form majority coalitions. The process of political fragmentation is probably not limited only to the Prague City Assembly.

‘Alliance with the Enemy’: Why the CDU and the Greens Formed Their First Coalition in a Large German Federal State

This article seeks to explain the 2013 coalition between the CDU and the Greens in the German federal state of Hesse. It applies traditional office-seeking and policy-seeking coalition formation theories to the case alongside a new explanation underscoring the influence of past behaviour on coalition partnership; namely, the negative impact of a pre-electoral commitment breach on future coalition formation. The results show that pure office-seeking cannot explain the coalition outcome. Instead, as the analysis of textual data extracted from political parties' manifestos shows, there has been a constant process of policy approximation between the CDU and the Greens in Hesse. Additionally, we find evidence suggesting that the SPD's breach on their promise not to rely on support by the Left Party in 2008 shaped the CDU's refusal to coalesce with the SPD in 2013. The findings add to our understanding of the interplay between office-seeking and policy-seeking motivations as well as the personal enmities of key actors in shaping the coalition formation. The study further offers insights into the new German coalition option between the Greens and the CDU, which can serve as a blueprint at the national level.

The Theory of Coalition Formation in Constant Sum Games

Agents compete for a reward by forming coalitions through a sequential process. The probability that a coalition wins the reward depends on the relative size of the coalition in the economy. The winning coalition equally divides the reward among all its members. Agents strategically form coalitions to maximize the expected value of their individual reward share. In the most general framework, I show that the coalition structure at the Stationary Perfect Equilibrium contains at least two coalitions. One coalition consists of at least a majority of the agents. I also characterise the size of the coalition. Further, I derive conditions under which the remaining agents form a single coalition. As examples to this theory, agents estimate their winning probability based on the power of their coalition or relative ranks. I show that the size of the majority coalition formed differs greatly based what parameter agents use to estimate the winning probability.

Coalitions in theory and reality: a review of pertinent variables and processes

Coalitions and alliances are ubiquitous in humans and many other mammals, being part of the fabric of complex social systems. Field biologists and ethologists have accumulated a vast amount of data on coalition and alliance formation, while theoretical biologists have developed modelling approaches. With the accumulation of empirical data and sophisticated theory, we are now potentially able to answer a host of questions about how coalitions emerge and are maintained in a population over time, and how the psychology of this type of cooperation evolved. Progress can only be achieved, however, by effectively bridging the communication gap that currently exists between empiricists and theoreticians. In this paper, we aim to do so by asking three questions: (1) What are the primary questions addressed by theoreticians interested in coalition formation, and what are the main building blocks of their models? (2) Do empirical observations support the assumptions of current models, and if not, how can we improve this situation? (3) Has theoretical work led to a better understanding of coalition formation, and what are the most profitable lines of inquiry for the future? Our overarching goal is to promote the integration of theoretical and field biology by motivating empirical scientists to collect data on aspects of coalition formation that are currently poorly quantified and to encourage theoreticians to develop a comprehensive theory of coalition formation that is testable under real-world conditions.

Participation and Commitment in Voluntary Coalitions to Provide Public Goods

This paper reports experimental evidence on the voluntary formation of coalitions to provide a public good. Participation and commitment in a coalition are either exogenously imposed or endogenously determined by the players themselves. We find larger voluntary participation rates when commitments in the coalition are endogenously determined using a minimum contribution rule rather than exogenously determined. However, due to a trade‐off between participation and commitment, coalitions with voluntary participation are less effective in facilitating cooperation compared to when all players are forced to participate. This paper therefore confirms the rather pessimistic conclusions from coalition formation theories.