Party rules, party resources and the politics of parliamentary democracies: How parties organize in the 21st century (original) (raw)
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Party rules, party resources and the politics of parliamentary democracies
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Country or party? Variations in party membership around the globe
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Parties in Democratic National Assemblies
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Contemporary democracy is “unthinkable save in terms of parties”, the US political scientist, E.E. Schnattschneider has noted. For over 200 years, political parties have been and remain the most important organizations in national assemblies across the democratic world. The vast majority of national assembly members are elected as members of political parties and once elected accept the benefits of joining and organizing political party caucuses or groups or blocs within the assembly; in a sample of 18 legislatures, less than one per cent of members were independents. “Party” not only impacts who is elected to the national assemblies but also how assembly members vote on legislation, structures those assemblies’ internal organization and procedures, has a significant influence on their relations with political executives, and impacts the kind of legislation they produce. Yet, parties are among the most complex political institutions within national assemblies primarily because they are so intrinsically and inextricably connected to electoral and legislative politics.
Political Parties and Party Organisations
The Routledge Handbook of East European Politics, 2017
Stable parties that successfully perform their representative function and connect to citizens are essential for democratic consolidation (Innes, 2002; Kreuzer & Pettai, 2004; Markowski, 2011; Tavits, 2013). Whether such parties will form in new European democracies has been questioned from early on (see Mair, 1997), but some degree of democratic stability has been achieved in the new East European EU member statesparticularly if we contrast them to most of the Former Soviet Union or Western Balkans. This chapter focuses on the development of political parties in countries that joined the EU in the first two waves; trends elsewhere in other post-communist countries differ considerably because of much lower levels of political stability or political freedoms. This chapter first looks at types of parties found in the region using a combination of two common approaches: party families and party development. The second section focusses in on the remarkably successful genuinely political parties without clear roots in the transition period and the related phenomenon of major parties suddenly becoming defunct. We then look at the internal life of parties through the analytical lens of party resources: symbiosis with the state, party organisations and membership. The conclusion summarises important trends since early 1990s and critically discusses the relationship between party development and democratic quality. PARTY TYPES Eastern Europe has been rich in the number and variety of political parties; to understand and analyse them, several approaches to party classification have been used. Party families is a classic and generally insightful approach that identifies similar parties across countries (Beyme, 1985; Hloušek & Kopeček, 2010). However, some parties defy easy classification, some families are internally diverse and parties can even change families. Also, it is not obvious why West European party families should provide a good guide to understanding parties elsewhere. Firstly, even if patterns of party competition in Eastern Europe have come to resemble Western Europe, a unique divisioncommunist legacyremains important in the former (Rohrschneider & Whitefield, 2013, p.84). Secondly, many East European parties have traits that are at odds with their reference "families" in the West (for a discussion on centre-right see Hanley, 2004); others are programmatically vague or flexiblenote the transformation of Fidesz from a liberal to a conservative party (Kiss, 2002). A related approach to classification is based on parties' membership in European party organisations. Yet, sometimes foes in national politics sit together and close allies in different party groups in the European Parliament. For example, as of 2016, the Czech, Estonian, Lithuanian and Slovak delegations to European People's Party or the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats included parties both from national government and opposition benches. Three broad groups of parties can be distinguished using a developmental approach: (a) former communists, (b) parties rooted in anti-communist movements, and (c) new parties, usually set up by charismatic leaders. The simple threefold classification covers most but not all important parties. For example, a small number of parties trace their history back to the pre-communist periodcurrently significant examples include the Czech Social Democratic Party (ČSSD), the Latvian Farmers' Union (LZS) and the Lithuanian Social Democratic Party (LSDP, now merged with the ex-communist Democratic Labour Party, LDDP).