Theatrics are par for the course in coalition politics
To maintain individual identities, coalition partners often stage public tiffs, even when compromises are being worked out behind the scenes
First published in BDLive
25 April 2025
To prevent future outbreaks of mass hysteria about the supposed demise of the government of national unity (GNU), citizens must embrace the inevitable theatricality of coalition politics.
Coalitions bring together parties with differing ideologies, constituencies and ambitions. To maintain their individual identities they often stage public disagreements, even when compromises are being worked out behind the scenes. It is a way of telling their base they haven’t sold out.
In coalitions, political actors often rely on symbolism and spectacle to assert leverage. Dramatic resignations, open letters or last-minute ultimatums are tactics meant to sway public opinion or pressure coalition partners. The news media spotlight moments of conflict, impassioned speechifying or bizarre alliances, while leadership rivalries, personal ambitions and factional dynamics get aired in public.
Ask the citizens of countries around the world who have lived for decades with coalition politics. In 1997, India’s United Front coalition government collapsed when the Congress Party withdrew support after an assassination scandal. Public attention focused on claims that a former coalition prime minister was obsessed with cows, spending more time at dairy events than in parliament. One Congress leader complained of government “run by cows, for cows, and only for cows”, while others described the coalition as the “bovine bloc”.
When Evo Morales became Bolivia’s president in 2006 he headed a broad coalition embracing leftist intellectuals, indigenous leaders, trade unionists and coca growers. Vice-president Álvaro García Linera, a former guerrilla and mathematician, described coalition meetings as “a zoo with llamas, jaguars and parrots all trying to direct traffic”. Internal disputes played out publicly on state television, sometimes ending in tears.
Meanwhile, after a disputed 2007 election violence had erupted across Kenya. A power-sharing deal was struck between president Mwai Kibaki and opposition leader Raila Odinga to restore stability. Odinga accepted the nonexecutive post of prime minister, joking that “I have taken half a loaf instead of going hungry”. The cabinet ballooned to 94 ministers and assistant ministers, one of whom, according to local wags, ran the “ministry of watching the other ministers”. Constant public bickering between Kibaki and Odinga made every cabinet meeting feel like a deranged family reunion.
In the world’s second-most advanced banana republic, the UK, the Liberal Democrats entered into coalition with the Conservatives in 2010, after promising repeatedly not to raise university tuition fees. As Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg toured the country making this pledge, his coalition negotiating team — which included the DA’s current coalition guru, Ryan Coetzee — were making contingency plans to abandon it. By the end of the year, fees had tripled. Clegg later released an apology, quickly rehashed in a spoof autotuned remix entitled “I’m sorry”, that charted on iTunes.
In Romania, a famous “coalition of the commode” exploded in 2021. Led by the National Liberal Party, it promised stability and good governance. Amid fallout from an infrastructure scandal, however, the education minister was accused of spending €350,000 renovating his ministry’s bathrooms, importing custom-made Italian tiles and a jacuzzi. This resulted in parties accusing each other of “bathtub populism” and “toilet-seat corruption”.
Coalition partners prepare for the next election from the moment the last one ends. They cannot help using theatrics to distance themselves from unpopular decisions or to take credit for popular ones, even if both were agreed upon collectively.
Theatricality helps parties signal their values, bargain for influence and manage diverse constituencies, all the while navigating the fragile architecture of shared governance.
- Butler teaches public policy at the University of Cape Town.
Practical Reason 