Believe it or not, the Republican Party significantly reformed its primary election system this year to avoid pitfalls that arose in 2012. It authorized fewer debates, altered some delegate rules and moved up the convention date. Now, with Donald Trump adding a few more cars Tuesday to the rolling train wreck of the 2016 campaign, party leaders probably are wishing for the good old days of 2012.

One certain result of the campaign, unless Trump further defies expectations and actually wins the presidency, is that the Republican Party’s 2020 selection process will be altered substantially to forestall the rise of another Trump-like candidate.

But Republicans are not alone. The entire primary process raises the question of whether this is the best way available to select nominees for the world’s most powerful office. And the fundamental problem is that a nomination does not arise from a process, but a series of processes that often are ill-suited to the purpose. The parties need to work on a cohesive, national nominating process with rules that come within hailing distance of democracy.

Consider Pennsylvania. Trump crushed Sen. Ted Cruz and Ohio Gov. John Kasich, but is guaranteed only 17 of 71 candidates. While forming an alliance with Kasich to try to keep Trump from getting enough delegates for a first-ballot nomination at the convention, Cruz is conducting a highly sophisticated second campaign aimed only at delegates. If he eventually gets the nomination, the primaries will have had little to do with it.

For the sake of tradition, both parties continue to give undue influence to small states. In practice, that often enables marginal candidates to gain momentum by playing to the fringes. The first four primary/caucus states — Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina — have a combined population of about 12 million. That’s slightly less than Pennsylvania’s population and about a third that of California, where the primary is scheduled June 7.

The parties could resolve many of the problems of the current mish-mash — massive costs, undue influence of small states, Byzantine rules for delegate commitments, incessant “reality” shows posing as debates, and candidates catering to the fringe — by agreeing to a series of five or six big regional primaries on a relatively tight schedule.

Today’s primaries and caucuses partially of the result of trying to democratize the nominating process by wresting it from the hands of party bosses and power brokers. That’s to the good but the effort is far from complete. Party leaders should work on a far more coherent, logical, democratic system for 2020.