Party Cartels under stress: Downsizing Parliament as an adaptation strategy to the effects of the economic crisis

Among the important consequences derived from the economic crisis, there have been deep changes in the political arena as shown by the electoral results of the last elections in the most affected countries – Spain, Portugal, Greece and Ireland. While at the national level none of the European countries have passed major electoral reforms since the beginning of the crisis, there have been debates in several of those countries at the national and/or the subnational level on the pertinence of a change in the electoral rules. In Portugal and Ireland there have been debates on the reduction of the number of seats in their Parliaments as well as in several Autonomous Communities in Spain. Drawing on rational choice approaches to electoral reform (Benoit 2004, Boix 1999, Colomer 2005) and on the basis of a comparative analysis of the Spanish electoral reform debates at the subnational level (Autonomous Communities), we propose a framework that aims to explain the emergence of this type of institutional reform in the context of economic crisis. We find that established parties are using minor electoral reforms as part of a broader strategy in which the objective is to maintain their status quo vis-à-vis the threats the crisis has entailed for their survival and their electoral success (emergence of new parties, increasing volatility, dealigment). In order to avoid major losses due to these threats, established parties would put forth minor institutional changes that are easier to be enacted than major reforms.