The Times has an interesting leader this morning. This contends that there are two important distinct functions of democracy: "the public being able to kick out governments it dislikes" and "that the government appointed to lead the nation should reflect the nation's preferences." It suggests that delivering clarity in respect of the first of these is the key virtue of first-past-the-post in a two-party system, but that if we enter three-party politics, so that first-past-the-post ceases to deliver a clear result, then its key virtue is lost and a change in the system might be required.
I would not quite characterise the virtues of democracy in this way, but that is not the issue I wish to focus on here. Instead, I want to say that the Times' argument misses the dynamic virtues of first-past-the-post. Just because one obtains an unclear result on one occasion it does not follow that there will always thereafter be unclear results. Instead, what happens under first-past-the-post is that either public preferences evolve or there is realignment in the positionings of parties, until a new two-party structure is re-asserted. (This can sometimes take a little time, as in the 1920s in the UK.)
In this way the first-past-the-post system drives the formation of new sustainable, broad, and vaguely coherent alternative political coalitions (parties). This is one of its great virtues. To respond to a three-way split result by overthrowing the system is to refuse to allow first-past-the-post's virtues to operate.
