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One-party state

A one-party state, single-party state, one-party system or single-party system is a governance structure in which only a single political party controls the ruling system.[1] All other parties are either outlawed or only enjoy limited and controlled participation in elections. Sometimes the term "de facto one-party state" is used to describe a dominant-party system that, unlike the one-party state, allows (at least nominally) democratic multiparty elections, but the existing practices or balance of political power effectively prevent the opposition from winning power.[2]

Not to be confused with Dominant-party system.

Membership in the ruling party tends to be relatively small compared to the population.[3] With such a small winning coalition, leaders in one-party states usually lack the incentive to care about the well-being of citizens.[4] Rather, they give out private goods to fellow elites to ensure continued support. One-party, compared to dominant-party dictatorships, structure themselves unlike democracies. They also turn into democracies at a lower rate than dominant-party dictatorships.[5] While one-party states prohibit opposition parties, some allow for elections at the smallest local level. One-party states lack any legitimate competition. Therefore, they place elites and sympathetic candidates in key administrative races.[6] For example, the Chinese Communist Party exercises political control by infiltrating village administrations.[7] They view these positions as crucial for gathering information on the population and maintaining a presence in the far reaches of their borders.[8] One-party states recognize the trade-off between election victory and gathering valuable data.[9] To account for this, the regimes have been observed placing local nobility in easy-to-win races.[10] One-party states have also been observed using elections to ensure that only the most popular elites get chosen to office.[11] They also gather data from elections to indicate if a local official is performing poorly in the eyes of the residents.[11] This gives locals the opportunity to monitor local officials and communicate satisfaction with the local government.[11] Throughout the country, members of the one party hold key political positions.[5] In doing so, the party avoids committing outright fraud and rather sustains their power at the local level with strategic appointment of elites.[8] Data on one-party regimes can be difficult to gather given their lack of transparency.[6] 

Ban on factions in the Communist Party of the Soviet Union

Multi-party system

Outline of democracy

Political factionalism

Political organisation

Two-party system