Summary

There are three rules which must be followed for a third party to have a chance in general.

• Rule 1: A successful third party must be moderate enough to win somewhere.
• Rule 2: A third party needs some principles.
• Rule 3: A third party must have a base of voters/activists that is indifferent to the difference between the Democrats and Republicans.

It is difficult to follow all three rules at the same time. For a left or right wing party, following Rule 1 results in violating Rule 3. Attempts at building a centrist party usually result in violating Rule 2.

To follow all three rules, a party needs to do politics in more than one dimension and triangulate. The Libertarian Party does this to an extent by using the Nolan Chart as its political map. However, this triangulation is imperfect as one of the axes is more heavily weighted than the other. I propose a different political map with equality being one dimension and freedom being the other. Using such a map we can see a large unoccupied market niche that extends nearly to the center. (I centered the graph based on where government is; the demographic center of where people want government to be is likely offset.)

A party which occupies this market niche has the potential to become a new major party. Doing so could end a systemic bias in our political system that leads to government growing bigger while the wealth gap grows.

Both the Libertarian and Green parties have the potential to occupy this niche. If neither goes for it, I intend to launch a new party specifically tailored to fit there. If you want to act, act soon!

Smaller niches can be found for one or more third parties by focusing geographically on those areas where Rule 3 does not apply: gerrymandered districts where one of the major parties is so weak as to not bother running candidates. Such a strategy could lead to a third party holding the balance of power in one or more state legislatures. Applied over time, it could even lead to a few U.S. Congressional seats being held by third parties that apply this strategy.

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Copyright 2007, Carl S. Milsted, Jr. All rights reserved.