New Democratic Party

The New Democratic Party (NDP or New Democrats, colloquially known as the New Dems) was a liberal political party in Enderron that existed from 1920 to 1985. It was represented in the Enderronian legislature from 1923 to 1966 and 1974 to 1978. The party was the main third force in Enderronian politics for most of the mid-20th century.

The party was originally founded as a centrist liberal party positioned between the centre-left Social Democrats and conservative Enderron People's Party and later the United Party. It was established by former Democratic Party members who opposed the merger with the Labour Party.

The NDP was a heavy supporter of free trade (especially with neighbouring Dutch Mariana), welfare and personal liberty. After World War II the party expanded its platform and became known as an ardent advocate for Enderronian republicanism, official multiculturalism, anti-discrimination legislation and the abolition of race-based immigration, and became the favoured party among the Asian Enderronian community. It was the first party to elect an Asian Enderronian leader and to regularly run Asian Enderronian candidates for federal parliament.

The NDP significantly declined in the 1950s and 1960s through a combination of factors. After World War II, the Enderronian political landscape began to coalesce around the Social Democrats and United Party, and the two parties began running candidates in all electorates, as opposed to the prior policy of not contesting "unobtainable" seats. Previously, the NDP often benefited from one of the major parties not running a candidate in particular seats. Another major blow occurred in the late 1950s when the Social Democrats, then the official opposition, began shifting its positions on immigration and multiculturalism. The New Democratic Party lost all but one seat in the 1962 election, and was completely shut out in 1966. However, its preference flows continued to assist the Social Democrats in maintaining a majority from 1970 onwards and its influence contributed to the Rhinehart Government instituting official multiculturalism. The party enjoyed a brief resurgence in the mid-1970s under leader Susan Liew, holding a single seat (Chung'an) from 1974 to 1978, but the party became marginalised in the political landscape as Asian Enderronians, once its core constituency, increasingly abandoned it for the Social Democrats. The party became embroiled in unstable leadership and factionalism between the centrist classical liberal and centre-left social liberal wings.

By the late 1970s, the party had moved back towards a classical liberal position, but continued to face intra-party factional disputes until it was dissolved in 1985. The two main factions became the classical liberal Liberal Democrats, which later merged with the Conservative Party to form the modern Liberal Party, and the social liberal Progressive Party, which later further split, with one faction merging with the Greens and the other becoming the Unity Party.