Some are calling for a national unity government in #Lebanon following PM Diab’s resignation. In my dissertation, I frame the post-2005 Lebanese regime as a “party cartel.” A thread about how party cartels form, what they look like, and why they often lead to poor governance: /1

Electoral competition is usually thought of as a good thing, letting voters weed out bad candidates and reward good ones. But after disruptive/violent episodes of conflict (i.e. civil war), too much competition is often seen (by citizens + elites) as dangerous /2

So after civil war or regime change, it's fairly common to see governments form that include all major parties/factions that won significant vote shares - even if they don't agree on anything, policy-wise /3

In the last century, this has happened in (among others) Bolivia, Venezuela, Colombia, Indonesia, Italy, Nepal - and Lebanon. In all cases, elites formed an informal pact in the hopes of facilitating national stability /4

@SlaterPolitics + Simmons (2012) develop a strict definition of a party cartel in which all significant parties in Parliament gain power via representation in the government. If the definition is nearly met, it's referred to as an "oversize coalition" /5 https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0010414012453447

Party cartels are also different from the "cartel of elites" coined by Lijphart (1969) and others in the ethnic power-sharing literature. Consociationalism encourages, but does not require all party factions being represented in the government /6 https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/world-politics/article/consociational-democracy/BB47BF2A5A4EBAE341FD3FA4E262410F

Party cartels are conceptually similar to "national unity governments." That being said, scholars of party cartels argue that these types of regimes are not good policy solutions in the long run - why not? /7

Because party cartels preclude the formation of an opposition, they nullify the tools voters have to hold their elected officials accountable. As a result, the policies that party cartels agree on and pass rarely reflect voter preferences /8

Instead, Slater and Simmons (2012) and others show that party cartels systematically encourage regressive economic policies, welfare state retrenchment, and elite rent-seeking. This is true even in cases where the cartel includes an explicitly Leftist party! /9

Party cartels in Latin America and elsewhere have been thrown out of power through elections and/or protest movements. They don't act as a viable solution to long-term challenges associated with state-building and developing inclusive citizenship /10

#Lebanon 's protest movement since October (and even years prior) has been organized around the idea that elite collusion lies at the heart of governance failures. A comparative perspective from other Global South contexts sheds light on how apt this characterization is. /11