利益代表と議会制民主主義－世界恐慌下のチェコスロヴァキア連合政治－
Between Interest Representation and Governing through Parliamentary Democracy: Coalition Politics in Czechoslovakia during the World Depression

Summary/Abstract: This article examines the Czechoslovak way of parliamentary democracy as it confronts the World Depression, specifically during its first phase from the outbreak of economic crisis until 1932. Three features were characteristic of political structure in Czechoslovakia. First of all, there were more than 15 parties reflecting the ethnic and socio-economic diversity of the Republic. Political parties were widely spread on the two dimensional space. The first dimension was ethnical, setting the Czechs in the centre and the Slovaks, the Germans and other smaller ethnic groups on the sides. The second dimension was socio-economic, namely, labour, agricultural, catholic and industrial. From more than these 15 parties, at least five were necessary to form a majority coalition for government. The second feature was the predominance of the Agrarian Party, which became the mass political party of the Czech organized agricultural interest. Largely due to the support from the agricultural Slovakia, the Agrarian Party became the biggest party in Czechoslovakia and used its power to enforce policies for the benefit of agriculture. Its interest-oriented political style influenced the entire Czechoslovak political scene between the wars. The last feature was the multiplicity of parties representing the working class. In addition to the multiethnic Communists, there were socialist workers, who were first ethnically divided, and then further split along dogmatic lines, such that the Czechoslovaks and the Germans had two socialist parties each - the Social Democrats and the National Socialists.

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