Aurel Croissant and Philip Völkel, "Party system types and party system institutionalization: Comparing new democracies in East and Southeast Asia," Party Politics, 18 (March, 2012): 235-265. [Available at http://ppq.sagepub.com/content/vol18/issue2/ ]

First paragraph:
During the past two decades East and Southeast Asia have seen numerous transitions from authoritarian rule to democracy. Democratic transitions have taken place in the Philippines (1986), South Korea (1987), Mongolia (1990), Thailand and Taiwan (1992), Cambodia (1993), Indonesia (1999) and East Timor (2002). However, most scholars agree that many of these transitions did not result in consolidated liberal democracies (Case, 2009; Croissant, 2004; Reilly, 2006; Rodan and Jayasuriya, 2009; Shin and Tusalem, 2009). While South Korea and Taiwan have succeeded in consolidating their new political regime at a relatively high level of democratic quality, deep political crises and chronic instability remain virulent in other countries such as Thailand, the Philippines and East Timor. Even though these crises cannot be attributed to a single factor alone, many students of Asian politics point to the incapacity of party systems in the region to accommodate social and political tension. Their feeble institutionalization and the lack of adequate opportunities for political representation and participation within political parties are seen as major obstacles to democratic governance in most East and Southeast Asian countries (Dalton et al., 2007; Hicken, 2006, 2009; Reilly, 2006; Tan, P. J., 2006).

Figures and Tables:

Table 1. Case sample and period of analysis

Table 2. Siaroff's typology of party systems

Table 3. Four-dimensional index of party system institutionalization

Table 4. Party system indicators in East and Southeast Asia

Table 5. Changes in party system types across Pacific Asia

Table 6. Degree of party system institutionalization

Figure 1. Cross-regional comparison of party system institutionalization (aggregate index).

Figure 2. Cross-regional comparison of party system institutionalization

Table 7. Indices of disproportionality

Last Paragraph:
(First paragraph of conclusions) This article has provided an overview of party system types and party system institutionalization in East Asia. The data presented allow for five conclusions. First, our analysis demonstrates that party systems in the region are not converging on a single type of party system. Looking at the most recent elections, Mongolia can be classified as a two-party system, Indonesia and East Timor as extreme multiparty systems and the remaining four cases as moderate multiparty systems. Within the latter category, we identify singleparty dominance in Korea and Taiwan, and systems with two dominant parties (Thailand) or party balance (Philippines).