| Part of thepolitics series |
| Party politics |
|---|
 Politics portal |
Abig tent party, orcatch-all party, is apolitical party having members covering a broad spectrum of beliefs.[1] This is in contrast to other kinds of parties, which defend a determined ideology, seek voters who adhere to that ideology, and attempt to convince people towards it.
Following the2018 Armenian parliamentary election, theMy Step Alliance rose to power on an anti-corruption and pro-democracy platform. The alliance has been described as maintaining a big tent ideology, as the alliance did not support any one particular political position. Instead, it focused on strengtheningArmenia's civil society and economic development.[2]
TheLiberal Party of Australia and its predecessors originated as an alliance of liberals and conservatives in opposition to theAustralian Labor Party, beginning with theCommonwealth Liberal Party in 1909. This ideological distinction has endured to the present day, with the modern Liberal Party frequently described as a "broad church", a term popularised by former leader and Prime MinisterJohn Howard. In this context, "broad church" is largely synonymous with "big tent". In the 21st century, the party is often characterised as having a "small-l liberal" wing and a conservative wing, which frequently come into conflict with each other. The party has historically found strong support primarily from the middle-class, though it has in recent decades appealed to socially conservative working-class voters.[3][4]
From its foundation theJusticialist Party has been aPeronist catch-all party, which focuses on the figure ofJuan Perón and his wifeEva. SinceNestor Kirchner took the presidency in 2003, the party is considered as part of center-left coalition. It has divided into left-wing and right-wing factions, withleft-wing populistKirchnerists now dominating the party. Despite this, theright-wing faction still exists.
Juntos por el Cambio is an Argentine big tent political coalition. It was created in 2015 as Cambiemos. It is composed ofRepublican Proposal (centre-right),Civic Coalition ARI (centre) andRadical Civic Union (centre), with common goals to oppose Peronist parties. It is considered as part of center-right coalition.
In BangladeshAwami League'sGrand Alliance (Bangladesh) andBNP's20 Party Alliance forms coalition with a wide range of parties, thus being catch all parties.[5]
In Brazil, theCentrão (lit. 'big centre') is a term for a large bloc of political parties that do not have a specific or consistent ideological orientation, and focus on negotiating support for the government in exchange for positions, resources, and political influence. These parties tend to form the parliamentary base of different administrations, shifting positions as needed, and play a decisive role in forming majorities in theNational Congress.[6] TheBrazilian Democratic Movement (MDB) is one of the oldest and most notable "Centrão" and Big Tent parties in Brazil; despite being Brazil's largest party, both in number of members and number of officials elected, it has never elected aPresident, but has used its position as the largest party as a "bargaining chip" for privileges and advantages.[7] MDB was founded in 1965 at the start of theBrazilian military dictatorship as part of an enforcedtwo-party system by the dictatorship, in which the only allowed parties wereNational Renewal Alliance Party (ARENA), a catch-all party representing the interests of the dictatorship, and MDB, formed to represent a wide-range moderate and less radical opposition to the dictatorship, without a clear program except the democratization of the country.[8]
Brazil also has a number of minor parties known as "Rental Parties [pt]" (Portuguese:Partido de Aluguel), or "dwarf parties" (Portuguese:Partidos Nanicos), that generally have a "catch-all" alignment, with no electoral base of their own, existing primarily to negotiate political support, access to resources, or advertising time.[9]
Other Big Tentcentrão parties include theProgressists (PP),Brazilian Labour Party (PTB),We Can (PODE),Brazil Union (UB),Social Democratic Party (PSD),Social Christian Party (PSC),Act (AGIR),Patriot (PATRI),Forward (AVANTE),Solidarity (SD).[10]
TheKuomintang (KMT), the ruling party of theRepublic of China (1912–1949), operated as a catch-all party encompassing a wide ideological spectrum, from the "diehard Right" to the "pink Left." However, following its defeat in theChinese Civil War and theGreat Retreat in 1949, the KMT in Taiwan gradually transitioned into a more consolidated conservative right-wing party.[11]
At the federal level, Canada has been dominated by two big tent parties practicing "brokerage politics."[a][14][15][16] Both theLiberal Party of Canada and theConservative Party of Canada (and itspredecessors) have attracted support from a broad spectrum of voters.[17][18][19] Although parties such as the Quebec nationalistBloc Québécois have elected members to theHouse of Commons,far-right andfar-left parties have never gained a prominent force in Canadian society and have never formed a government in theCanadian Parliament.[20][21][12]
In Colombia, the presumedLeague of Anti-Corruption Governors, led by the former presidential candidate, sometimes referred to as "the Colombian Trump", has been described as a "catch-all party",[22] although analysts agree that it belongs to a more or lessauthoritarianright-wing. That is to say to a type ofextreme right.[23][24]
The centre-rightNational Coalition Party has been described as catch-all party supporting the interests of the urban middle classes.[25]
TheRenaissance party (formerly La République En Marche!) founded by PresidentEmmanuel Macron has been described as a centrist party with a catch-all nature.[26]
Both theChristian Democratic Union of Germany/Christian Social Union in Bavaria (CDU/CSU) and theSocial Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) are considered big tent or catch-all parties, known in German asVolksparteien ("people's parties").[27]
TheIndian National Congress attracted support from Indians of all classes, castes and religions supportive of theIndian independence movement.[28] TheJanata Party which came into power in India in 1977, was a catch-all party that consisted of people with different ideologies opposed toThe Emergency.[29]
Fine Gael andFianna Fáil are considered catch-all parties and are supported by people from different social classes and political ideologies.[30] The two parties are usually described as being very similar in their current and recent policies, both being positioned on thecentre-right with aliberal-conservative ideology. The reasons for their remaining separate are mainly historical, with those who supported theAnglo-Irish Treaty in the 1920s eventually becoming Fine Gael and those who opposed the treaty having joined Fianna Fáil to seek an independent Ireland.
In Italy, theFive Star Movement, founded and formerly led by the comedian and actorBeppe Grillo, has been described as a catch-allprotest party and "post-ideological big tent" because its supporters do not share similar policy preferences, are split on major economic and social issues and are united largely based on "anti-establishment" sentiments.[31] The Five Star Movement's "successful campaign formula combined anti-establishment sentiments with an economic and political protest which extends beyond the boundaries of traditional political orientations", but its "'catch-all' formula" has limited its ability to become "a mature, functional, effective and coherent contender for government".[31]
TheNew Frontier Party, which existed from 1994 to 1997, was considered a big political party because it was created to oppose the LDP by people of various ideologies, including social democrats, liberals, neoliberals, Buddhist democrats, and conservatives.[32]
The former maincentre-left opposition, theDemocratic Party of Japan (DPJ), was Japan's version of third way politics and served since the mid-1990s as a ‘big tent party’ for a plethora of heterogeneous groups ranging from twosocialist parties toliberal andconservative groups.[33]
TheInstitutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) held power in Mexico for 71 uninterrupted years, from 1929 to 2000. It was founded after theMexican Revolution by Mexican presidentPlutarco Elías Calles. Then known as the National Revolutionary Party, it was founded with the intent of providing a political space to allow all surviving leaders and combatants of the Mexican Revolution to participate and to resolve the grave political crisis that had been caused by the assassination of President-electÁlvaro Obregón in 1928. Throughout its nine-decade existence, the PRI has adopted a vast array of ideologies, which have often been determined by thepresident of the republic in office at the time. The party nationalized the petroleum industry in 1938 and the banking industry in 1982. In the 1980s, the party went through reforms that shaped its current incarnation, with policies characterized as centre-right, such as theprivatization of state-run companies, closer relations with theCatholic Church, and embracingfree-market capitalism and neoliberal policies.[34][35][36]
TheNational Regeneration Movement, founded byAndrés Manuel López Obrador, has often been described as a big-tent party because of the various constituents who joined its ranks during the 2018 Mexican general elections.[37][38]Juntos Hacemos Historia is a big-tent alliance led by the National Regeneration Movement that contested the2021 Mexican legislative election.[39] The successor alliance,Sigamos Haciendo Historia, has been described by some political scientists as catch-all.[40]
TheEcologist Green Party of Mexico has often been described in terms of catch all politics. AP News describes it as a "strange political group" that almost always joins the governing party's coalition to maintain influence.[41] According to Muñoz Patraca, a professor of political science atUNAM, the PVEM is not a political party like other movements in favor of democratization, or economic or social struggles. Rather, the party serves, in name only, to concerns about the environment - escaping the traditional left-right ideological axis.[42] Miguel Angel Toro, the Director of the Bachelor's Degree in Government and Public Transformation at Tecnológico de Monterrey, describes the party as a "party that has no ideology... It’s been with parties who are on the right, center, and the left.” Critically, Toro says, “the big parties overestimate the votes the Partido Verde can bring in, so the party always ends up with more seats than they would have gotten. That gives the Green Party more life than it should have.”[43]
The centre-leftSocialist Party (PS) and centre-rightSocial Democratic Party (PSD) have been described as catch-all parties.[44]
Romania'sSocial Democratic Party has been referred to as a catch-all party. Political analyst Radu Magdin described it in December 2016 as having conservative values, while beingeconomically liberal, and espousing left-leaning rhetoric on public policies.[45]
Citizens (Spanish:Ciudadanos) has been considered as an example ofastroturfing in theSpanish media since 2015. Originally founded as asocial-democratic regional party opposed toCatalan nationalism, the party switched to a catch-all message to attract votes from the right to the moderate left in the party's appearance in the national political landscape. Its stance includes a mix ofliberalism andpro-Europeanism, but the party has also embracedpopulist views on the legitimacy of its political opponents;conservative views on topics such as the criminal system and personal property andSpanish nationalist positions. It has become one of the most recognisable catch-all parties in the history of the country. In the mid-2010s, however, the party's main ideology is perceived to have drifted towards the right, withAlbert Rivera admitting that it would not agree to form a coalition with the two main centre-left and left parties after theApril 2019 Spanish general election, regardless of the results.[46][47][48] Furthermore, some commentators argue that Ciudadanos was attempting to supplant thePeople's Party, which suffered massive losses as the hegemonic party of the right and thus contributed to the shift in Ciudadanos to the right. Similarly, Ciudadanos has allied with both the conservative People's Party and the far-rightVox to achieve coalitions in regional parliaments. That has given rise to the expression "the three rights" or colloquially "El Trifachito" to describe the grouping, which defines its opposition as "the left".
TheAfrican National Congress (ANC) has been the governing party ofSouth Africa since the country'sfirst democratic election, in 1994, and it has been described by the media as a "big tent" party.[49][50][51][52] An important aspect of its electoral success has been its ability to include a diverse range of political groups most notably in the form of theTripartite Alliance between the ANC; theSouth African Communist Party; and the country's largest trade union,COSATU.[50] Additional interest groups in the party are members of the business community and traditional leaders.
WhenGordon Brown became theprime minister of the United Kingdom in 2007, he invited several members from outside theLabour Party intohis government. They included former CBI Director-GeneralDigby Jones who became a Minister of State and formerLiberal Democrats leaderPaddy Ashdown who was offered the position ofNorthern Ireland Secretary (Ashdown turned down the offer).[53][54] The media often referred to Brown's ministry as "agovernment of all the talents" or simply "Brown's big tent".[55]
All for Unity was a big tent anti-SNP electoral alliance that contested the2021 Scottish Parliament election but failed to win any seats.[56]
TheDemocratic Party was a "big-tent" party during theNew Deal coalition, which was formed to support PresidentFranklin D. Roosevelt'sNew Deal policies from the 1930s to the 1960s.[57] The coalition brought togetherlabor unions, working-class voters, lower-middle class voters, farm organizations, secular liberals,Southern Democrats,African Americans, urban voters, and immigrants.[58][59]
After the 1974Dallas Accord, theLibertarian Party embraced the big-tent idea to the extent it ensured that theanarcho-capitalist views would not be excluded from the majorityminarchist party.[60]
The Libertarian Socialist Caucus of theDemocratic Socialists of America identifies DSA as a "big tent" organization amongst theAmerican left, as individual members are aligned with a wide range of socialist ideologies, includingsocial democracy,democratic socialism, thedemocratic road to socialism,Trotskyism,Marxism–Leninism, andanarchism.[61]
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)Although China has a one-party Government, the Kuomintang is actually acatch-all of coalition groups ranging from the diehard Right to the pink Left. On the Right are such men as Gen. Ho Ying-chin and Minister of Organization Chen Li-fu; on the Left are such men as Dr. Sun Fo and Shao Li-tze, Secretary General of the People's Political Council.
two historically dominant political parties have avoided ideological appeals in favour of a flexible centrist style of politics that is often labelled "brokerage politics"
...most Canadian governments, especially at the federal level, have taken a moderate, centrist approach to decision making, seeking to balance growth, stability, and governmental efficiency and economy...
Canada's party system has long been described as a "brokerage system" in which the leading parties (Liberal and Conservative) follow strategies that appeal across majorsocial cleavages in an effort to defuse potential tensions.
First Past the Post in Canada has favoured broadly-based, accommodative, centrist parties...
The initial period of party system change found its first culmination in 1996 when a new catch-all party, the Shinshinto (New Frontier Party), got founded by Ozawa and others.
The former main centre-left opposition, the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), was Japan's version of third way politics and served since the mid-1990s as a 'big tent party' for a plethora of heterogeneous groups ranging from two socialist parties to liberal and conservative groups.
Morena's star has risen so quickly because it offers refuge to such a wide range of beliefs and ideologies. The party has room for old guard supporters of Hugo Chávez and Fidel Castro, young leftist academics, former PRI leaders, evangelical Christians, actors, athletes, and even the odd business tycoon or two. In this way the party resembles the big tent of the PRI, which more than a guiding philosophy was guided by the administration of political power.
In a few months, he has assembled a coalition stretching from socially conservative Christian evangelicals to admirers of socialist Venezuela and business tycoons, each with contrasting visions for Mexico. Dozens of lawmakers from across the political spectrum have switched sides to join Lopez Obrador's National Regeneration Movement (MORENA), a party that is not yet four years old.
"Yo designaría a Morena como un partido 'cacha todo', en donde la dirigencia ha buscado perfiles de candidatos con bases electorales que ayuden a generar más voto sin necesariamente ser de izquierda o tener una ideología determinada", dijo Enrique Solis, consultor de políticas públicas y asuntos públicos consultado para esta nota.[I would designate Morena as a 'cacha all' party, where the leadership has sought profiles of candidates with electoral bases that help generate more votes without necessarily being left-wing nor having a determined ideology, said Enrique Solis, public policy and public affairs consultant consulted for this excerpt.]
During the 1930s liberals, labor unions, white ethnics, African Americans, farm groups, and Southern whites united to form the New Deal coalition. Though never formally organized, the coalition was sufficiently cohesive to make the Democratic Party the majority party from 1931 into the 1980s. Democrats won seven out of nine presidential contests and maintained majorities in both houses of Congress from 1932 to 1964. The divisiveness of the Civil Rights Movement and the Vietnam War, the increasing segmentation of the labor force, and waning influence of unions, and the relative weakness of Democratic Party leadership are among the factors that led to the coalition's erosion in the late 1960s.
Under this umbrella fall ideologies such as Trotskyism, anarchism, reformism, orthodox Marxism, libertarian Marxism, the democratic road to socialism, Marxism–Leninism, and more. In other words, there is no such thing as being 'more left-wing than DSA'—the organization is meant to be a big tent that includes all socialists from the center-left to the far-left.
...GD as a catch-all movement...
Both major parties in the Armenian parliament [Republican Party and Prosperous Armenia] represent elite groups. With almost no ideology to speak of, they are catch-all parties, a phenomenon becoming typical in the modern world.
