‚Landslide‘: Surprising Results of the Elections in IndiaDietmar Rothermund

ASIEN – Nr. 92 (2004) pp. 87–89

Indians like to talk about a ‚landslide‘ when elections lead to an unexpected change of government as they did in May 2004. Hearing about such a dramatic event one would expect that a massive shift of the national vote produced such results. But the majority election system which India has inherited from the British often translates a shift of only a few percentages in the national vote into a major change in the number of seats won by different parties. Actually this pattern is supposed to encourage interest aggregation by means of a two-party system, but it has never done this in India. For a long time the Congress Party faced a fragmented opposition and could benefit from multi-cornered contests. Therefore it shied away from coalition politics even at times when it could have remained in power with the help of allies. Once the Congress committed itself to alliances the multi-cornered play would stop. Moreover, allies can cause problems as the tail may try to wag the dog. But the new Indian government led by the Congress Party is a coalition government which goes by the name of „United Progressive Alliance“ and includes a colourful bunch of regional parties about whom more will be said in due course…