Bulletin n. 1/2016 | ||
June 2016 | ||
Helder Ferreira Do Vale |
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Federal Political Fragmentation in Mexico's 2015 Elections | ||
in Regional and Federal Studies , Volume 26, Issue 1 , 2016 , 121-138 | ||
The 2015 congressional, gubernatorial and mayoral elections in Mexico display the continuation of political changes that started 15 years ago. The most notorious change in 2015 is the electoral success of non-mainstream parties, which have increased their vote share vis-à-vis the mainstream parties, the Party of National Action (PAN), the Revolutionary Institutional Party (PRI), and the Party of Democratic Revolution (PRD). These mainstream parties lost important vote shares, although the PRI has shown itself to be more resilient to electoral volatility than the other parties. The increase of volatility in Mexico favours the alternation of the parties in power; however, it also increases political fragmentation. This article argues that in a context of growing electoral volatility and political fragmentation, presidential authority is weakened, giving rise to the dispersion of power to other levels of government. Furthermore, the article suggests that party volatility presents important territorial variation in Mexico. | ||