12 Facts About Party discipline

Party discipline is a system of political norms, rules, and subsequent respective consequences for deviance; that are designed to ensure the relative cohesion of members of the respective party group.

In political parties specifically the essential purpose of party discipline is to get all its parliamentary members, to maintain the party line and vote in support of policies agreed to by a majority of the parliamentary members or of the party leadership.

In liberal democracies, Party discipline commonly refers to the control that party leaders have over their caucus members in the legislature.

Party discipline is important for all systems of government that allow parties to hold political power as it can often be a determining factor in both the practical functionality of the government as well as the efficient function of legitimate political process.

Party discipline tends to vary largely depending on the type of governmental system of a given country.

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Party discipline tends to be increasingly strong in countries that employ the Westminster parliamentary system, such as the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand.

Weak party discipline is usually more frequent in parties of notables and elite parties than in populist parties.

Party discipline weakened to a degree in the United Kingdom during Brexit under Theresa May with only a slim majority and intra-party divisions between hard Brexiteers and soft or anti Brexiters; and post 2019 under Boris Johnson An independent evaluation found that MPs in the Canadian House of Commons voted the party line 99.

An example of this is Jacqui Lambie, who won election to the federal senate in 2013 with the Palmer United Party discipline, then quit to start a microparty under her own name only four months later, winning another term after a double dissolution.

Party discipline was expelled from the Lambie party, sitting as an independent before joining the Tasmanian Nationals.

Party discipline has become increasingly important in the Twenty-First Century due in part to the rise of instant communication.

Strict party discipline allows political parties to maintain control over the entire respective party caucus and ensure that the party's agenda is placed above all else.