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A two party system refers to a party system where the vast majority of voters support one of two major parties. Two party systems generally arise due to a voting system that prevents third parties from gaining popular support.

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A multiparty system refers to a party system where multiple parties are feasibly able to gain representation. Multiparty systems generally arise in voting systems that do not penalize voters for deviating from the status quo.

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A prominent example of a two party system is in the US. In the US, the two major parties that compete for control are the Republican Party and the Democratic Party.

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An example of a multiparty system exists in Canada. The main Canadian political parties include the Conservative Party, the Green Party, the Liberal Party, and New Democratic Party.

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Strengths:

A strength of two party systems is that the parties are able to consolidate control and unify many minority groups towards a common policy. For instance, the Democratic coalition include progressives, democratic socialists, and minority groups, while the Republican coalition includes fiscal conservatives, the Christian right, and the populist right. Another strength of two party systems is that they tend to pursue the most generally favored policies, which limits extremist ideas from entering law.

Weaknesses:

A weakness of two party systems is that they may not reflect the will of the people and often force voters to pick the lesser of two evils. For example, many US voters are drawn to the ideas of the Green Party, but cannot practically vote for them in elections since that would only reduce the votes of their next favored party.

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Strengths:

A strength of multiparty systems is that they give voters more choices to be represented from. In Canada, many voters are willing to support the New Democratic Party and Green Party since the electoral system allows them to potentially gain representation for their desired policies. Another strength of multiparty systems is that minority interests are considered, which may be completely overlooked in two party systems.

Weaknesses:

A weakness of multiparty systems is that political power is often divided among multiple parties, which often forces multiple parties to come together to create a coalition government. This, in turn, may result in a weak government.

Another weakness of multiparty systems is that there might be conflicts between different parties, which ultimately slow down government procedures.

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The Republicans prioritize the preservation of free markets, lowered taxes, restrictive immigration policies, gun rights, and traditional values.

The Democrats prioritize universal healthcare, voting rights, criminal justice reform, anti-discrimination policies, climate action, and public education.

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The Liberal Party favors abortion rights, LGBT rights, a tolerant immigration policy, climate policy, and free markets.

The Conservative Party favors low taxes and regulation, a stronger military, a smaller government, and traditional values.

The New Democratic party (NDP) generally shares many policies with the Liberal Party, but is more progressive, including stronger environmental regulation and greater taxes on the wealthy.

The Green Party is largely a one-issue party, deeply focusing on environmental protection and climate action.

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The US electoral system operates based on plurality-majority elections, with single-member districts. This allows parties to establish a firm control over large numbers of districts with a relatively slim plurality. When combined with gerrymandering, parties under the two party system are able to efficiently consolidate their power and ensure their power is maintained.

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The Canadian electoral system also operates based on plurality-majority elections with single-member districts. However, Canada continues to maintain a multiparty system and ensure proportional representation, in large part due to its parliamentary system of government. Furthermore, Canada prevents parties from gaining too much power by limiting gerrymandering, through hiring independent electoral boundary redistribution commissions to regularly redraw electoral districts. Thus, the strength of each party is weakened in a multiparty system.

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While the US has two major central parties in the Republicans and Democrats, the structure within each party is largely decentralized. For each party, different local party chapters and state party leaders exist. Furthermore, many candidates for political office choose to run based on their own merits and values rather than those of the overarching party, which contributes to decentralization.

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In Canada's multiparty system, however, parties are more centralized. Canadian parties establish a national party organization that organizes most policy and election strategy. The national party organization then delegates candidate selection and advertising to many local constituencies.