This article analyses the political transition and the current vitality of the Uruguayan party system. After a period of crisis that lead to the rupture of democracy in the seventies, in the nineties the party system retrieved its centrality in the process of the democratization. During this process, the party realignment resulted in a moderate multipartysm, with a strengthened left, mainly represented by the Frente Amplio. The rise of the Frente Amplio resulted of its capacity to confrontate the traditional parties, its evolution as a catch-all organization, its ideological transformation and electoral performance. To the traditional parties this process promoted the learning of political compromises and participation in government coalitions; to the process of liberal transition, it resulted in a political scenery with moderate ideological distances, without polarization. However, the left-right parameters still defines the axis of electoral competition.
political parties; democratization; Frente Amplio; party system
