Development of the Party System and the Character of Coalition Governments in Slovakia in the Years 2006-2016

The study analyzes the development of the party system in the Slovak Republic in 2006-2016 through the use of sociological methods. Based on the terminology proposed by Giovanni Sartori and Klaus von Beyme, the article describes the retrieved attributes of the party system employing the RILE index. The application of the index confirms the correlation between the programmatic and ideological nature of the parties and their public self-presentation within the confinements of “right-wing” and “left-wing” parties. The study traces the dynamics of the development of variable party tension in the party system, as well as the level of programmatic and ideological polarization in the Parliament of the Slovak Republic. Besides, the study describes trends in the development of programmes of the respective parliamentary parties, changes in their programmes, and a certain heterogeneity of government coalitions during the period under study. Simultaneously, it focuses on the key parameters and divisions in the Slovak party system that had the greatest impact on the creation of a two-bloc party competition. During the 1990s transformation, this competition turned into a polarized multiparty system, preserving up till the present. The analysis of the government groups' development based on the RILE index demonstrates that not all political estimates concerning the programme homogeneity (Iveta Radičová's government (2010-2012) and the heterogeneity of the first government of Robert Fico's coalition (2006-2010)) coincide with the analysis of the party programmes and the nature of the coalitions estimated with the application of the RILE index. Although the variable intensity of the party programmes in the National Council of the Slovak Republic indicates a declining trend, the ideological polarization of the party system has not shown any signs of decreasing. The inter-party politics has been of a confrontational style throughout the entire study period, with a zero-score strategy preserved at the level of political presentation between the government and the opposition. This later affected the fragmentation of the right-wing parties, leading to the emergence of new extremist parties and anti-political establishment movements in the Slovak party system.

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