Promises, Pains and Realities of Coalition Politics in Tanzania
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Date
2005-07
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Abstract
Coalition politics tends to be one of the necessary practices in political systems that allow multiparty and competitive politics. Depending on the rules on the ground, coalition politics has, from time to time and in some political systems, become the only way for political parties to have the standard requirement of democratic politics for government formation – the majority. In a multiparty system where there are several viable political parties, and the playing field is somewhat level, the chances are, any one political party might need to coalesce with others in order to have the required majority in order to form government, or share power. Those who are seeking to coalesce have always done that in trying to get representation and/or share power in a political system. If they could get these on their own, they would not seek the coalitions. In many of the emerging new democracies in Africa, coalitions have been sought to strengthen the party in power or to create a viable opposition in the respective legislative bodies. There are cases where the formation of coalitions has led to the consolidation of democracy in the sense that either the respective political systems have been more stable, or decades-long domination by some political parties has had to come to an end. There are also case where coalitions have ended in failure.