CHAPTER 10 Parties and Party Systems
‘In politics, shared hatreds are almost always the basis of
friendships.’
AL E X I S D E TO C Q U E V I L L E , Democracy in America (1835)
P R E V I E W So fundamental are political parties to the operation of modern politics that their
role and significance are often taken for granted. It is forgotten, for instance, that
parties are a relatively recent invention. As political machines organized to win elections
and wield government power, parties came into existence only in the early
nineteenth century. Now, however, they are virtually ubiquitous. The only parts of
the world in which they do not exist are those where they are suppressed by dictatorship
or military rule. Quite simply, the political party has become the major
organizing principle of modern politics. Political parties are the vital link between
the state and civil society, between the institutions of government and the groups
and interests that operate within society. However, parties are by no means all
alike. Not only do they differ in terms of matters such as organizational structure
and ideological orientation, but they also carry out different roles within the larger
political system. Political parties have thus been both lauded as the great tools of
democracy and criticized as a source of tyranny and repression. Their impact, moreover,
is crucially influenced by what is known as the party system, the network of
relationships between and among parties, structured in particular by the number of
parties in existence. One-party systems operate very differently from competitive
party systems, but there are also important contrasts between two-party and
multiparty systems. Nevertheless, parties and party systems have increasingly come
under attack. They have been blamed for failing to articulate the new and more
diverse aspirations that have emerged in modern societies, and for failing to solve,
or perhaps even to address, many of their most troubling problems.
K E Y I S S U E S What is a political party? How can parties be classified?
What are the key functions of political parties?
How are parties organized, and where is power located within them?
What kinds of party system are there?
How does the party system shape the broader political process?
Are parties in decline, and is this decline terminal?
PARTY POLITICS
Political parties are found in the vast majority of countries and in most political
systems. Parties may be authoritarian or democratic; they may seek power through
elections or through revolution; and they may espouse ideologies of the left, right
or centre, or, indeed, disavow political ideas altogether. However, parties of some
kind exist from Brazil to Burundi and from Norway to New Zealand. The development
of political parties and the acquisition of a party system came to be recognized
as a mark of political modernization. By the late 1950s, some 80 per cent of
the world’s states were ruled by political parties. During the 1960s and early 1970s,
however, a decline set in with the spread of military rule in the developing world.
Political parties were accused of being divisive, and of failing to solve overriding
problems of poverty,and ethnic and tribal rivalry.They also proved to be inconvenient
for economic and military elites. The upsurge of democratization (see p. 272)
since the 1980s has, nevertheless, led to a renewed flourishing of parties. In Asia,
Africa and Latin America, the relaxation or collapse of military rule was invariably
accompanied by the re-emergence of parties. In former communist states, oneparty
rule was replaced by the establishment of competitive party systems.
It would be a mistake, however, to assume that parties have always been with
us. Political parties are part of the structures of mass politics, ushered in by the
advent of representative government and the progressive extension of the franchise
during the nineteenth century. Until then, what were called ‘factions’ (see p. 223)
or ‘parties’ were little more than groups of like-minded politicians, usually formed
around a key leader or family. So-called ‘court’ parties, for instance, often developed
within autocratic monarchies as a result of the struggle for influence amongst
notables and advisers. Thus, when Edmund Burke (see p. 36) in the late eighteenth
century described a party as ‘a body of men united . . . upon some particular principle
upon which they all agree’, he was thinking about fluid and informal groupings
such as the Whigs and the Tories, and not about the organized and
increasingly disciplined machines into which they were to develop.
Parties of the modern kind first emerged in the USA. Despite the abhorrence
of parties felt by the ‘founding fathers’ who created the US constitution, the
Federalist Party (later the Whigs and, from 1860, the Republican Party) appeared
as a mass-based party during the US presidential election of 1800. Many conservative
and liberal parties started life as legislative factions. Only later, forced to appeal
to an ever-widening electorate, did they develop an extraparliamentary machinery
of constituency branches, local agents and so on. In contrast, socialist parties and
parties representing religious, ethnic and language groups were invariably born as
social movements, or interest groups, operating outside government.
Subsequently, they developed into fully-fledged parliamentary parties in the hope
of winning formal representation and shaping public policy. By the beginning of
the twentieth century, parties and party systems had, in effect, become the political
manifestation of the social and other cleavages that animated society at large.
However, the resulting party forms varied considerably.
Types of party
A variety of classifications have been used for political parties. The most important
of these are the following:
222 P O L I T I C S
CONCEPT
Political party
A political party is a
group of people that is
organized for the purpose
of winning government
power, by electoral or
other means. Parties
typically exhibit the
following characteristics
(1) They aim to exercise
government power by
winning political office
(small parties may
nevertheless use
elections more to gain a
platform than to win
power). (2) They are
organized bodies with a
formal ‘card carrying’
membership. (3) They
typically adopt a broad
issue focus, addressing
each of the major areas
of government policy
(small parties, however,
may have a single-issue
focus). (4) To varying
degrees, they are united
by shared political
preferences and a general
ideological identity.
P A R T I E S A N D P A R T Y S Y S T E M S 223
cadre and mass parties
representative and integrative parties
constitutional and revolutionary parties
left-wing and right-wing parties.
The most common distinction is that between cadre parties and mass parties.
The term cadre party originally meant a ‘party of notables’, dominated by an
informal group of leaders who saw little point in building up a mass organization.
Such parties invariably developed out of parliamentary factions or cliques at
a time when the franchise was limited. However, the term ‘cadre’ is now more
commonly used (as in communist parties) to denote trained and professional
party members who are expected to exhibit a high level of political commitment
and doctrinal discipline. In this sense, the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
(CPSU), the Nazi Party in Germany, and the Fascist Party in Italy were cadre
parties, as are the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and, in certain respects, the
Indian Congress Party in the modern period. The distinguishing feature of cadre
parties is their reliance on a politically active elite (usually subject to quasimilitary
discipline) that is capable of offering ideological leadership to the
masses. Although strict political criteria are laid down for party membership,
careerism and simple convenience are often powerful motives for joining such
parties, as both the CPSU and the Nazis found out.
A mass party, on the other hand, places a heavy emphasis on broadening
membership and constructing a wide electoral base. Although the extension of
the franchise forced liberal and conservative parties to seek a mass appeal, the
earliest examples of mass parties were European socialist parties, such as the
German Social Democratic Party (SPD) and the UK Labour Party, which
constructed organizations specifically designed to mobilize working-class
support. The key feature of such parties is that they place heavier stress on
recruitment and organization than on ideology and political conviction.
Although such parties often have formally democratic organizations, except for
a minority of activists, membership usually entails little in the way of participation
and only general agreement about principles and goals.
Most modern parties fall into the category of what Otto Kirchheimer (1966)
termed ‘catch-all parties’. These are parties that drastically reduce their ideological
baggage in order to appeal to the largest possible number of voters.
Kirchheimer particularly had in mind the Christian Democratic Union (CDU)
in Germany, but the best examples of catch-all parties are found in the USA in
the form of the Republicans and the Democrats. Modern de-ideologized socialist
parties such as the German Social Democrats and the Labour Party in the UK
also fit this description. These parties differ from the classic model of a mass
party in that they emphasize leadership and unity, and downgrade the role of
individual party members in trying to build up broad coalitions of support,
rather than relying on a particular social class or sectional group.
The second party distinction, advanced by Sigmund Neumann (1956), is that
between so-called parties of representation and parties of integration.
Representative parties see their primary function as being the securing of votes
in elections. They thus attempt to reflect, rather than shape, public opinion. In
this respect, representative parties adopt a catch-all strategy and therefore place
pragmatism before principle and market research before popular mobilization.
CONCEPT
Faction,
factionalism
A faction is a section or
group within a larger
formation, usually a
political party. Its aims
and organizational status
must therefore be
compatible with those of
its host party; otherwise
the group is a ‘party
within a party’. A
distinction is sometimes
drawn between ‘factions’
and ‘tendencies’, the
latter being looser and
more informal groups,
distinguished only by a
common policy or
ideological disposition.
Factionalism refers either
to the proliferation of
factions, or to the
bitterness of factional
rivalry. The term faction
is often used pejoratively;
the term factionalism is
always pejorative,
implying debilitating
infighting.
The prevalence of such parties in modern politics gave considerable force to
arguments based on rational choice models of political behaviour, such as those
of Joseph Schumpeter (see p. 202) and Anthony Downs (1957), which portray
politicians as power-seeking creatures who are willing to adopt whatever policies
are likely to bring them electoral success.
Integrative parties, in contrast, adopt proactive, rather than reactive, political
strategies; they wish to mobilize, educate and inspire the masses, rather than
merely respond to their concerns. Although Neumann saw the typical mobilizing
party as an ideologically disciplined cadre party, mass parties may also
exhibit mobilizing tendencies. For example, until they became discouraged by
electoral failure, socialist parties set out to ‘win over’ the electorate to a belief in
the benefits of public ownership, full employment, redistribution, social welfare
and so on. This approach was also, rather ironically, adopted by the UK
Conservatives under Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s. Abandoning the party’s
traditional distaste for ideology (see p. 28) and abstract principle, Thatcher
embraced ‘conviction politics’ in pursuing a mobilizing strategy based on firm
support for cutting taxes, encouraging enterprise, promoting individual responsibility,
tackling trade union power and so forth.
The third type of classification distinguishes between constitutional parties
and revolutionary parties. Constitutional parties acknowledge the rights and
entitlements of other parties and, thus, operate within a framework of rules and
constraints. In particular, they acknowledge that there is a division between the
party and the state, between the party in power (the government of the day) and
state institutions (the bureaucracy, judiciary, police and so on) that enjoy formal
independence and political neutrality. Above all, constitutional parties acknowledge
and respect the rules of electoral competition. They recognize that they can
be voted out of power as easily as they can be voted in. Mainstream parties in
liberal democracies all have such a constitutional character.
Revolutionary parties, on the other hand, are antisystem or anticonstitutional
parties, either of the left or of the right. Such parties aim to seize power and overthrow
the existing constitutional structure using tactics that range from outright
insurrection and popular revolution to the quasi-legalism practised by the Nazis
and the Fascists. In some cases, revolutionary parties are formally banned by
being classified as ‘extremist’ or ‘anti-democratic’, as has been the case in postWorld
War II Germany. When such parties win power, however, they invariably
become ‘ruling’ or regime parties, suppressing rival parties and establishing a
permanent relationship with the state machinery. In one-party systems, whether
established under the banner of communism, fascism, nationalism or whatever,
the distinction between the party and the state is so weakened that the ‘ruling’
party, in effect, substitutes itself for the government, creating a fused‘party–state’
apparatus. It was common in the USSR, for instance, for the General Secretary
of the CPSU to act as the chief executive or head of government without bothering
to assume a formal state post.
The final way of distinguishing between parties is on the basis of ideological
orientation, specifically between those parties labelled left-wing and those
labelled right-wing (see p. 225). Left-wing parties (progressive, socialist and
communist parties) are characterized by a commitment to change, in the form
of either social reform or wholesale economic transformation. These have
traditionally drawn their support from the ranks of the poor and disadvantaged
224 P O L I T I C S
Rational choice: An
approach to politics based on
the assumption that individuals
are rationally self-interested
actors; an ‘economic’ theory of
politics (see p. 14–15).
(in urban societies, the working classes). Right-wing parties (conservative and
fascist parties, in particular) generally uphold the existing social order and are,
in that sense, a force for continuity. Their supporters usually include business
interests and the materially-contented middle classes. However, this notion of a
neat left–right party divide is, at best, simplistic and, at worst, deeply misleading.
Not only are both the left and the right often divided along reformist/revolutionary
and constitutional/insurrectionary lines, but also all parties,
especially constitutional ones, tend to be ‘broad churches’, in the sense that they
encompass their own left and right wings. Moreover, electoral competition has
the effect of blurring ideological identities, once-cherished principles
commonly being discarded in the search for votes. The definitions of left and
right have also changed over time, and often differ from one political system to
the next. Finally, the shift away from old class polarities and the emergence of
new political issues such as the environment, animal rights and feminism has
perhaps rendered the conventional ideas of left and right redundant (Giddens,
1994).
P A R T I E S A N D P A R T Y S Y S T E M S 225
Focus on . . .
The left/right divide
The left–right political spectrum is a shorthand method
of describing political ideas and beliefs, summarizing
the ideological positions of politicians, parties and
movements. Its origins date back to the French
Revolution and the positions that groups adopted at
the first meeting of the French Estates-General in
1789. The terms ‘left’ and ‘right’ do not have exact
meanings, however. In a narrow sense, the linear political
spectrum (see Figure 10.1) summarizes different
attitudes to the economy and the role of the state:
left-wing views support intervention and collectivism,
right-wing views favour the market and individualism.
This supposedly reflects deeper ideological or value
differences, as listed below:
An alternative, horseshoe-shaped political spectrum
(see Figure 10.2) was devised in the post-World War II
period to highlight the totalitarian and monistic
(anti-pluralist) tendencies of both fascism and communism,
by contrast with the alleged tolerance and openness
of mainstream creeds. Those, like Hans Eysenck
(1964), who have developed a two-dimensional political
spectrum (see Figure 10.3) have tried to compensate
for the crudeness and inconsistencies of the
conventional left–right spectrum by adding a vertical
authoritarian–libertarian one. This enables positions on
economic organization to be disentangled from those
related to civil liberty.
Left Liberty
Equality
Fraternity
Rights
Progress
Reform
Internationalism
Authority Right
Hierarchy
Order
Duties
Tradition
Reaction
Nationalism
226 P O L I T I C S
Communism
Socialism
Fascism
Conservatism
Liberalism
Authority
Left Right
Liberty
Anarcho-capitalism
New Right
Communism Socialism Liberalism Conservatism Fascism
Stalinism
Social
democracy
Figure 10.1 Linear political spectrum
Figure 10.2 Horseshoe political spectrum
Figure 10.3 Two-dimensional political spectrum
Linear spectrum
Horseshoe spectrum
Two-dimensional spectrum
Functions of parties
Although political parties are defined by a central function (the filling of political
office and the wielding of government power), their impact on the political
system is substantially broader and more complex. It goes without saying that
there are dangers in generalizing about the functions of parties. Constitutional
parties operating in a context of electoral competition tend to be portrayed as
bastions of democracy; indeed, the existence of such parties is often seen as the
litmus test of a healthy democratic system. On the other hand, regime parties
that enjoy a monopoly of political power are more commonly portrayed as
instruments of manipulation and political control. Moreover, controversy
continues to surround the wider impact of political parties. For instance,
Thomas Jefferson and the other ‘founding fathers’ of the US constitution – and,
in the modern period, supporters of so-called ‘anti-party parties’ – have
portrayed parties in deeply negative terms, seeing them as a source of discord
and political regimentation (see p. 230). A number of general functions of
parties can nevertheless be identified. The main functions are as follows:
representation
elite formation and recruitment
goal formulation
interest articulation and aggregation
socialization and mobilization
organization of government.
Representation
Representation (see p. 197) is often seen as the primary function of parties. It
refers to the capacity of parties to respond to and articulate the views of both the
members and the voters. In the language of systems theory, political parties are
major ‘inputting’ devices that ensure that government heeds the needs and
wishes of the larger society. Clearly, this is a function that is best carried out,
some would say only carried out, in an open and competitive system that forces
parties to respond to popular preferences. Rational-choice theorists, following
P A R T I E S A N D P A R T Y S Y S T E M S 227
Anti-party party: Parties
that set out to subvert
traditional party politics by
rejecting parliamentary
compromise and emphasizing
popular mobilization.
Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
US political philosopher and statesman. A wealthy Virginian planter who was
Governor of Virginia 1779–81, Jefferson served as the first US Secretary of State,
1789–94. He was the third president of the USA, 1801–09. Jefferson was the principal
author of the Declaration of Independence, and wrote a vast number of addresses and
letters. He developed a democratic form of agrarianism that sought to blend a belief
in rule by a natural aristocracy with a commitment to limited government and
laissez-faire, sometimes called Jeffersonianism. He also demonstrated sympathy for
social reform, favouring the extension of public education, the abolition of slavery and
greater economic equality.
Anthony Downs (1957), explain this process by suggesting that the political
market parallels the economic market, in that politicians act essentially as entrepreneurs
seeking votes, meaning that parties behave very much like businesses.
Power thus ultimately resides with the consumers, the voters. This ‘economic
model’ can, however, be criticized on the grounds that parties seek to ‘shape’ or
mobilize public opinion, as well as respond to it; that the image of voters as wellinformed,
rational and issue-orientated consumers is questionable; and that the
range of consumer (or electoral) choice is often narrow.
Elite formation and recruitment
Parties of all kinds are responsible for providing states with their political leaders.
Exceptions to this include parties that are, effectively, the creation of powerful
politicians and are used as political vehicles to mobilize support for them, such as
Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia, established in 1993 but rebranded as the People of
Freedom party in 2009, and Vladimir Putin’s United Russia party, founded in
2001. Much more commonly, however, politicians achieve office by virtue of their
party post: contestants in a presidential election are usually party leaders, while in
parliamentary systems the leader of the largest party in the assembly normally
becomes prime minister. Cabinet and other ministerial posts are usually filled by
senior party figures, though exceptions are found in presidential systems such as
the USA’s, which allow non-party ministers to be appointed.
In most cases, parties therefore provide a training ground for politicians,
equipping them with skills, knowledge and experience; and offering them some
form of career structure, albeit one that depends on the fortunes of the party. On
the other hand, the stranglehold that parties exert over government offices can be
criticized for ensuring that political leaders are drawn from a relatively small
pool of talent: the senior figures in a handful of major parties. In the USA,
however, this stranglehold has been weakened by the widespread use of primary
elections, which reduce the control that a party has over the process of candidate
selection and nomination.
Goal formulation
Political parties have traditionally been one of the means through which societies
set collective goals and, in some cases, ensure that they are carried out.
Parties play this role because, in the process of seeking power, they formulate
programmes of government (through conferences, conventions, election manifestos
and so on) with a view to attracting popular support. Not only does this
mean that parties are a major source of policy initiation, it also encourages them
to formulate coherent sets of policy options that give the electorate a choice
amongst realistic and achievable goals.
This function is most clearly carried out by parties in parliamentary systems
that are able to claim a mandate (see p. 200) to implement their policies, if they
are elected to power. However, it can also occur in presidential systems with
usually non-programmic parties, as in the case of the Republicans’‘Contract with
America’ in the US congressional elections of 1994. Nevertheless, the tendency
towards de-ideologized catch-all parties, and the fact that electoral campaigns
increasingly stress personality and image over policies and issues, has generally
228 P O L I T I C S
CONCEPT
Primary election
A primary election is an
intraparty election in
which candidates are
selected to contest a
subsequent ‘official’
election. During the
twentieth century,
primaries became the
principal nominating
device used in the USA,
also being used to choose
convention delegates and
party leaders. Most US
states hold ‘closed’
primaries, in which
participation is restricted
to registered supporters
of the party; ‘open’
primaries allow all voters
to participate, regardless
of party affiliation.
Primary elections give
rank-and-file voters more
of a voice in party affairs
and lead to a more
candidate-orientated and
less party-orientated
style of politics.
reduced the impact that parties have on policy formulation. Party programmes,
moreover, are almost certain to be modified by pressure from the civil service
and interest groups, as well as in the light of domestic and international circumstances.
Policy implementation, on the other hand, is usually carried out by
bureaucracies rather than parties, except in one-party systems such as those in
orthodox communist states, where the ‘ruling’ party supervises the state apparatus
at every level.
Interest articulation and aggregation
In the process of developing collective goals, parties also help to articulate and
aggregate the various interests found in society. Parties, indeed, often develop as
vehicles through which business, labour, religious, ethnic or other groups
advance or defend their various interests. The UK Labour Party, for instance, was
created by the trade union movement with the aim of achieving working-class
political representation. Other parties have, effectively, recruited interests and
groups in order to broaden their electoral base, as the US parties did in the late
nineteenth and early twentieth centuries with immigrant groups.
The fact that national parties invariably articulate the demands of a multitude
of groups forces them to aggregate these interests by drawing them together
into a coherent whole, balancing competing interests against each other.
Constitutional parties are clearly forced to do this by the pressures of electoral
competition, but even monopolistic parties articulate and aggregate interests
through their close relationship with the state and the economy, especially in
centrally planned systems. However, not even in competitive party systems are all
interests articulated, those of the poor being most vulnerable to exclusion.
Socialization and mobilization
Through internal debate and discussion, as well as campaigning and electoral
competition, parties are important agents of political education and socialization.
The issues that parties choose to focus on help to set the political agenda,
and the values and attitudes that they articulate become part of the larger political
culture (see p. 172). In the case of monopolistic parties, the propagation of
an ‘official’ ideology (be it Marxism–Leninism, National Socialism, or simply the
ideas of a charismatic leader) is consciously acknowledged to be a central, if not
its supreme, function.
Mainstream parties in competitive systems play no less significant a role in
encouraging groups to play by the rules of the democratic game, thus mobilizing
support for the regime itself. For example, the emergence of socialist parties in
the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was an important means of
integrating the working class into industrial society. Nevertheless, the capacity of
parties to mobilize and socialize has been brought into doubt by evidence in
many countries of partisan dealignment (see p. 217) and growing disenchantment
with conventional pro-system parties. The problem that parties have is
that, to some extent, they themselves are socialized (some would say corrupted)
by the experience of government, making them, it appears, less effective in
engaging partisan sympathies and attracting emotional attachments. (These
issues are discussed more fully in Chapter 20.)
P A R T I E S A N D P A R T Y S Y S T E M S 229
230 P O L I T I C S
So common are parties in modern politics that it is often forgotten how controversial they were when they first emerged.
Although some welcomed them as the agents of a new age of mass politics, others warned that they would deepen
conflict and subvert the politics of individual consciousness. The trend towards falling party membership and declining
party identification in the modern period has served to revive such criticisms.
YES NO
Debating . . .
Do parties breed discord
and constrain political debate?
Sacrificing personal conscience. By their nature, parties
are collective entities, groups of people who agree a
common platform, and advance shared views and opinions.
Without unity and cohesion, parties have very little
reason to exist. And yet this unity comes at the price of
personal conscience, as it is inconceivable that any
member would genuinely support all of a party’s policies
in all circumstances. Over matter small and sometimes
large, parties therefore come to ‘think for’ their members,
whether this comes about through party discipline and
the fear of punishment (including expulsion from the
party) or, more insidiously, through an emotional or
ideological attachment to the party and its goals.
Disharmony and adversarialism. Party politics is based
on partisanship, adherence and, maybe, even devotion to
a particular cause or group. This inevitably breeds a
tribal mentality in which the flaws and failings of other
parties are exaggerated, while those of one’s own party
are consistently denied. Parties thus promote a one-sided
view of politics in which political issues and debates are
constantly distorted by considerations of party advantage.
This tendency towards mindless adversarialism –
disagreement for the sake of disagreement – is hardly a
sound basis for advancing the public good.
Domination by the cunning and ambitious. Parties serve
to concentrate political power rather than disperse it. In
the ‘iron law of oligarchy’ (see p. 232), this tendency is
explained in terms of organization. However, elite rule
also reflects the fact that, within parties, ‘foot soldiers’ are
required to do little other than obey and follow, encouraged
by the knowledge that loyalty and discipline will be
rewarded, while dissent and, in particular, criticism of the
leadership will be punished. Those who climb the ‘greasy
pole’ and gain advancement within the party are therefore
likely, in George Washington’s words, to be ‘cunning,
ambitious and unprincipled men’. Political parties are, in
this sense, a particular example of the corruption of
power (as discussed in Chapter 20).
Forums of debate. The image of parties as austere,
monolithic bodies, in which free debate is sacrificed in
the cause of party unity, is accurate only in the context of
authoritarianism. In other circumstances, parties are
vibrant and multifarious; indeed, the existence of rival
factions and tendencies ensures unending debate about
policy issues and strategic concerns. Rather than requiring
members to sacrifice personal conscience, parties
provide their members with an education in politics,
helping them to strengthen their knowledge and skills
and making them more engaged citizens. Party membership
is therefore an important vehicle for the aspect of
personal self-development.
Engaging the people. Parties provide a channel of
communication through which political leaders both
mobilize citizens and respond to their needs and
concerns. This applies most clearly when the electoral
process forces parties to compete for the popular vote in
order to win or retain government power, but it can also
occur (albeit to a limited extent) in authoritarian
systems, through attempts by ‘ruling’ parties to maintain
legitimacy. The need to engage with the ideas and interests
of the people generates pressure within parties to
permit, even encourage, internal debate and argument
among their members, rather than uncritical obedience.
Cross-party interaction. Bipartisanship is more common
than is often supposed. For instance, the use of proportional
electoral systems typically creates a bias in favour
of consensus-building and alliances amongst parties
based on the fact that no single party is likely to have
parliamentary strength to rule on its own. The resulting
coalition governments are held together by the fact that
conflicts between the parties involved are resolved
through a process of ongoing cross-party dialogue. A
similar dynamic can develop in presidential systems due
to the phenomenon of cohabitation, whereby the executive
is in the hands of one party while the assembly is
dominated by another party.
Organization of government
It is often argued that complex modern societies would be ungovernable in the
absence of political parties. In the first place, parties help with the formation of
governments, in parliamentary systems, to the extent that it is possible to talk of
‘party government’ (see p. 236). Parties also give governments a degree of stability
and coherence, especially if the members of the government are drawn from
a single party and are, therefore, united by common sympathies and attachments.
Even governments that are formed from a coalition of parties are more
likely to foster unity and agreement than those that consist of separate individuals
each with his or her own priorities.
Parties, furthermore, facilitate cooperation between the two major branches
of government: the assembly and the executive. In parliamentary systems, this is
effectively guaranteed by the fact the government is usually formed from the
party or parties that have majority control of the assembly. However, even in
presidential systems the chief executive can wield some influence, if not control,
through an appeal to party unity. Finally, parties provide, in competitive systems
at least, a vital source of opposition and criticism, both inside and outside
government. As well as broadening political debate and educating the electorate,
this helps to ensure that government policy is more thoroughly scrutinized and,
therefore, more likely to be workable.
Party organization: where does power lie?
Because of the crucial role that political parties play, considerable attention has
been focused on where power lies within parties. The organization and structure
of parties thus provides vital clues about the distribution of power within society
as a whole. Can parties function as democratic bodies that broaden participation
and access to power? Or do they simply entrench the dominance of leaders and
elites?
One of the earliest attempts to investigate internal party democracy was undertaken
in Mosei Ostrogorski’s Democracy and the Organization of Political Parties
(1902), which argued that the representation of individual interests had lost out to
the growing influence of the party machine and control exerted by a caucus of
senior party figures. This view was more memorably expressed by Robert Michels
in Political Parties ([1911] 1962) in the form of the ‘iron law of oligarchy’ (see p.
232), or, as Michels put it, ‘he who says organization says oligarchy’. Michels
(1876–1936), a prominent elite theorist, wished to analyse the power structure of
the German SPD; he argued that, despite the party’s formally democratic organization,
power was concentrated in the hands of a small group of party leaders.
For Michels, the ‘law’ explained the inevitable failure of democratic socialism
and, indeed, exploded the myth of political democracy. Critics, however, point
out that Michels’ observations are generalizations made on the basis of a single
political party at a particular moment in time, and also rest on questionable
psychological theories. In practice, party elites have often proved to be more
faction-ridden, and mass memberships less deferential and quiescent, than
Michels suggested.
Attempts have been made to strengthen the democratic and participatory
features of parties through reform. One of the clearest examples of this occurred
P A R T I E S A N D P A R T Y S Y S T E M S 231
CONCEPT
Party democracy
Party democracy is a
form of popular rule that
operates through the
agency of a party. There
are two models of party
democracy. In the first
(intraparty democracy),
parties are democratic
agents, in that power
within them is widely
and evenly dispersed. This
implies, for instance, that
there should be broad
participation in the
election of leaders and
selection of candidates.
In the second model,
democracy dictates that
policy-making power
should be concentrated
in the hands of party
members who are elected
and, therefore, publicly
accountable. In this view,
the first model may lead
to the tyranny of nonelected
constituency
activists.
232 P O L I T I C S
in the USA in the 1970s and 1980s. US parties differ in many respects from their
European counterparts. Being loose coalitions of sometimes conflicting interests
held together by little more than the need to contest presidential elections, they
are highly decentralized and generally non-programmic. Traditionally, state-based
or city-based party bosses (a legacy of the machine politics of the early twentieth
century) acted as power brokers and exercised a decisive influence at nominating
conventions. Following protests and clashes at the 1968 Democratic national
convention in Chicago, however, a reform movement sprang up aimed at weakening
the power of local party leaders and strengthening the role of rank-andfile
members.
This was accomplished largely through the wider use of nominating primaries
and caucuses. These, first with the Democrats and later with the Republicans,
attracted a growing number of issue and candidate activists into party politics,
leading to the nomination of more ideological candidates such as George
McGovern for the Democrats in 1972 and Ronald Reagan for the Republicans in
1980. Such tendencies have, nevertheless, generated concern, particularly amongst
Democrats, who feared that more open and participatory structures could simply
result in the nomination of unelectable ‘outsider’ candidates. Both the main US
parties have responded to this by modernizing and strengthening their committee
structures, especially at national, congressional and senatorial levels.Although this
has been portrayed as a process of ‘party renewal’, it is evidence of the parties’
desire to provide better electoral support for individual candidates, rather than of
the emergence of European-style, party-focused elections.
The existence of factions and tendencies is as important as formal organization
in determining the location of power within a party. While all parties, even
those with an apparently monolithic character, embrace some measure of political
and ideological rivalry, the degree to which this rivalry is reflected in conflict
between organized and coherent groups is crucial in determining the degree of
authority of party leaders. In some cases, factions can break away from parties in
the manner that European communist parties often emerged out of socialist
Focus on . . .
The iron law of oligarchy
Oligarchy is government or domination by the few. The
‘iron law of oligarchy’, formulated by Robert Michels
([1911] 1962), suggests that there is an inevitable
tendency for political organizations, and by implication
all organizations, to be oligarchic. Participatory or
democratic structures cannot check oligarchic tendencies;
they can only disguise them.
Michels advanced a number of arguments in support of
his law:
Elite groups result from the need for specialization.
Elite members have greater expertise and better
organizational skills than those possessed by ordinary
members.
Leaders form cohesive groups because they recognize
that this improves their chances of remaining
in power.
Rank-and-file members of an organization tend to
be apathetic and are, therefore, generally disposed
to accept subordination and venerate leaders.
Machine politics: A style of
politics in which party ‘bosses’
control a mass organization
through patronage and the
distribution of favours.
Caucus: A meeting of party
members held to nominate
election candidates, or to
discuss legislative proposals in
advance of formal proceedings.
parties in the years following the 1917 Russian Revolution. Factionalism is often
linked to the weight that parties place on political ideas and ideological direction.
Whereas pragmatic right-wing parties usually merely have to balance or
conciliate rival tendencies, more ideological parties of the left often have to deal
with open disagreement and institutionalized rivalry. Together with their inclination
to endorse internal democracy, this has generally made socialist parties
more difficult to lead than liberal or conservative parties.
Perhaps a more significant consideration, however, is the extent to which
parties have a secure hold on power. Factionalism is, in a sense, a luxury that only
long-time parties of government can afford. This is why monopolistic communist
parties were able to keep factionalism at bay only by exercising ruthless discipline
enforced through the strictures of democratic centralism. It also explains
the deeply factional nature of ‘dominant’ parties such as the Liberal Democratic
Party (LDP) in Japan and the Italian Christian Democratic Party (DC). The UK
Conservative Party is an example of a party with an ethos that once stressed,
above all, deference and loyalty. However, the Party became increasingly factionalized
in the 1980s and 1990s through a combination of its more ideological
character and its prolonged electoral success after 1979. Bottom-up pressures thus
gave the Conservative Party a more democratic character than its formal leaderdominated
structure suggested was possible. The most conspicuous casualty of
this process was Margaret Thatcher, who was forced to stand down as party
leader in 1990 despite having won three successive general elections. Albeit to
different degrees, all subsequent Conservative leaders have experienced difficulties
in confronting factional resistance inside and outside of Parliament.
PARTY SYSTEMS
Political parties are important not only because of the range of functions they
carry out (representation, elite recruitment, aggregation of interests and so on),
but also because the complex interrelationships between and among parties are
crucial in structuring the way political systems work in practice. This network of
relationships is called a party system. The most familiar way of distinguishing
between different types of party system is by reference to the number of parties
competing for power. On this basis, Duverger (1954) distinguished between
‘one-party’, ‘two-party’ and ‘multiparty’ systems. Although such a typology is
commonly used, party systems cannot simply be reduced to a ‘numbers game’.
As important as the number of parties competing for power is their relative
size, as reflected in their electoral and legislative strength. As Sartori (1976)
pointed out, what is vital is to establish the ‘relevance’ of parties in relation to the
formation of governments and, in particular, whether their size gives them the
prospect of winning, or at least sharing, government power. This approach is
often reflected in the distinction made between ‘major’, or governmentorientated,
parties and more peripheral, ‘minor’ ones (although neither category
can be defined with mathematical accuracy). A third consideration is how these
‘relevant’ parties relate to one another. Is the party system characterized by cooperation
and consensus, or by conflict and polarization? This is closely linked to
the ideological complexion of the party system, and the traditions and history of
the parties that compose it.
P A R T I E S A N D P A R T Y S Y S T E M S 233
Democratic centralism:
The Leninist principle of party
organization, based on a
supposed balance between
freedom of discussion and strict
unity of action.
Party system: A relatively
stable network of relationships
between parties that is
structured by their number, size
and ideological orientation.
The mere presence of parties does not, however, guarantee the existence of a
party system. The pattern of relationships amongst parties constitutes a system
only if it is characterized by stability and a degree of orderliness. Where neither
stability nor order exists, a party system may be in the process of emerging, or a
transition from one type of party system to another may be occurring. For
instance, this can be said of early postcommunist Russia. The collapse of
communist rule in 1991 and the initial banning of the CPSU was always going to
make the emergence of a competitive party system a difficult, perhaps tortuous,
business. Russia’s problem was a proliferation of parties and political groupings,
none of which came close to establishing a mass membership or a nationwide
organization. No fewer than 43 parties contested the 1995 parliamentary elections,
with the largest of these, the Russian Communist Party, gaining just 22 per
cent of the vote. The subsequent introduction of measures such as electoral
thresholds and registration on the basis of petitions greatly reduced the number
of parties, meaning, for instance, that just seven parties contested the 2011
Russian Duma elections. However, some have argued that, in an age of partisan
dealignment and volatile voting patterns, party systems are generally losing their
‘systematic’ character, making it more difficult to distinguish one system from
another. Moreover, where subnational bodies exert significant influence, different
party systems may operate at different levels within the political system.
The major party systems found in modern politics are, nevertheless, as
follows:
one-party systems
two-party systems
dominant-party systems
multiparty systems.
One-party systems
Strictly speaking, the term one-party system is contradictory since ‘system’
implies interaction amongst a number of entities. The term is, nevertheless,
helpful in distinguishing between political systems in which a single party enjoys
a monopoly of power through the exclusion of all other parties (by political or
constitutional means) and those systems characterized by a competitive struggle
amongst a number of parties. Because monopolistic parties effectively function
as permanent governments, with no mechanism (short of a coup or revolution)
through which they can be removed from power, they invariably develop an
entrenched relationship with the state machine. This allows such states to be
classified as ‘one-party states’, their machinery being seen as a fused ‘party–state’
apparatus. Two rather different types of one-party system can be identified,
however.
The first type has been found in state socialist regimes where ‘ruling’ communist
parties have directed and controlled virtually all the institutions and aspects
of society. Such parties are subject to strict ideological discipline, traditionally
linked tenets of Marxism–Leninism, and they have highly-structured internal
organizations in line with the principles of democratic centralism. These are
cadre parties, in the sense that membership is restricted on political and ideological
grounds. Almost 6 per cent of the Chinese population are members of the
234 P O L I T I C S
Threshold: A minimum level
of electoral support needed for
a party to be eligible to win
seats.
Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and around 9 per cent of the Soviet population
belonged to the CPSU. In this type of party, the party core consists of well-paid
full-time officials, the apparatchiki, who run the party apparat, or apparatus, and
exercise supervision over both the state machine and social institutions.
A central device through which communist parties control the state,
economy and society, and ensure the subordination of ‘lower’ organs to
‘higher’ ones, is the nomenklatura system. This is a system of vetted appointments
in which, effectively, all senior posts are filled by party-approved candidates.
The justification for both the party’s monopoly of power, and its
supervision of state and social institutions, lies in the Leninist claim that the
party acts as the ‘vanguard of the proletariat’ in providing the working masses
with the ideological leadership and guidance needed to ensure that they fulfil
their revolutionary destiny. Vanguardism has, however, been criticized for
being deeply elitist and providing the seed from which Stalinism later grew.
Trotsky (1937), on the other hand, offered an alternative interpretation by
suggesting that, far from the ‘ruling’ party dominating Soviet development, its
formal monopoly of power merely concealed the burgeoning influence of the
state bureaucracy.
The second type of one-party system is associated with anticolonial nationalism
and state consolidation in the developing world. In Ghana, Tanzania and
Zimbabwe, for example, the ‘ruling’ party developed out of an independence
movement that proclaimed the overriding need for nation-building and
economic development. In Zimbabwe, one-party rule developed only in 1986
(six years after independence) through the merger of the two major parties,
ZANU and ZAPU, both former guerrilla groups. In other cases, such parties have
developed as little more than vehicles through which a national leader has tried
to consolidate power, as with General Ershad’s People’s Party in Bangladesh in
the 1980s and President Mobutu’s Popular Movement of the Revolution in Zaire,
1965–97.
One-party systems in Africa and Asia have usually been built around the
dominant role of a charismatic leader and drawn whatever ideological identity
they have possessed from the views of that leader. Kwame Nkrumah, the leader
of the Convention People’s Party (CPP) in Ghana until his overthrow in 1966, is
often seen as the model such leader, but other examples have been Julius Nyerere
in Tanzania and Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe. Not uncommonly, these parties
are weakly organized (very different from the tight discipline found in communist
one-party states), and they play, at best, only a peripheral role in the process
of policy-making. Their monopolistic position, nevertheless, helps to entrench
authoritarianism (see p. 277) and to keep alive the danger of corruption.
Two-party systems
A two-party system is duopolistic in that it is dominated by two ‘major’ parties
that have a roughly equal prospect of winning government power. In its classical
form, a two-party system can be identified by three criteria:
Although a number of ‘minor’ parties may exist, only two parties enjoy
sufficient electoral and legislative strength to have a realistic prospect of
winning government power.
P A R T I E S A N D P A R T Y S Y S T E M S 235
Vanguardism: The Leninist
belief in the need for a party to
lead and guide the proletariat
towards the fulfilment of its
revolutionary destiny.
The larger party is able to rule alone (usually on the basis of a legislative
majority); the other provides the opposition.
Power alternates between these parties; both are ‘electable’, the opposition
serving as a ‘government in the wings’.
The UK and the USA are the most frequently cited examples of states with
two-party systems, though others have included Canada, Australia and, until the
introduction of electoral reform in 1993, New Zealand. Archetypal examples of
two-party politics are, nevertheless, rare. The UK, for instance, often portrayed
as the model two-party system, has conformed to its three defining criteria only
for particular (and, some would argue, untypical) periods of its history. Even the
apparent Labour–Conservative two-partyism of the early post-World War II
period (power alternating four times between 1945 and 1970) was punctuated by
13 years of continuous Conservative rule (1951–64), a period during which time
Labour’s electability was called into question. Moreover, despite persistent major
party domination of the House of Commons in the UK, it is more doubtful that
a two-party system has existed ‘in the country’ since 1974. This is suggested by
the decline of combined Labour–Conservative support (down from over 95 per
cent in the early 1950s to consistently below 75 per cent since 1974).
Even the seemingly incontrovertible two-partyism of the USA – which, for
instance, sees the Republicans and Democrats usually holding between them all
the seats in the House of Representatives and the Senate – can be questioned. On
the one hand, the presidential system allows one party to capture the White
House (the presidency) while the other controls one or both houses of Congress,
as, for instance, occurred between 1984 and 2000, meaning that it may not be
possible to identify a clear government–opposition divide. On the other hand,
‘third’ party candidates are sometimes of significance. Ross Perot’s 16 per cent of
the vote in the 1992 presidential election not only highlighted the decline of the
Republican and Democratic parties, but also, arguably, proved decisive in securing
victory for Bill Clinton.
Two-party politics was once portrayed as the surest way of reconciling responsiveness
with order, representative government with effective government. Its key
advantage is that it makes possible a system of party government, supposedly
characterized by stability, choice and accountability. The two major parties are
able to offer the electorate a straightforward choice between rival programmes
and alternative governments. Voters can support a party knowing that, if it wins
the election, it will have the capacity to carry out its manifesto promises without
having to negotiate or compromise with coalition partners. This is sometimes
seen as one of the attractions of majoritarian electoral systems that exaggerate
support for large parties. Two-party systems have also been praised for delivering
strong but accountable government based on relentless competition between the
governing and opposition parties. Although government can govern, it can never
relax or become complacent because it is constantly confronted by an opposition
that acts as a government in waiting. Two-partyism, moreover, creates a bias in
favour of moderation, as the two contenders for power have to battle for‘floating’
votes in the centre ground. This was, for example, reflected in the so-called‘socialdemocratic
consensus’ that prevailed in the UK from the 1950s to the 1970s.
However, two-party politics and party government have not been so well
regarded since the 1970s. Instead of guaranteeing moderation, two-party
236 P O L I T I C S
CONCEPT
Party
government
Party government is a
system through which
single parties are able to
form governments and
carry through policy
programmes. Its key
features are as follows.
(1) Major parties possess
a clear programmic
character and thus offer
the electorate a
meaningful choice
between potential
governments. (2) The
governing party enjoys
sufficient ideological and
organizational unity to
deliver on its manifesto
commitments.
(3) Responsibility is
maintained by the
government’s
accountability to the
electorate through its
mandate, and by the
existence of a credible
opposition that acts as a
balancing force.
systems such as the UK’s have displayed a periodic tendency towards adversary
politics (see p. 324). This is reflected in ideological polarization and an emphasis
on conflict and argument, rather than consensus and compromise. In the UK in
the early 1980s, this was best demonstrated by the movement to the right by a
‘Thatcherized’ Conservative Party and the movement to the left by a radicalized
Labour Party, although a new, post-Thatcherite consensus soon emerged.
Adversarial two-partyism has often been explained by reference to the class
nature of party support (party conflict being seen, ultimately, as a reflection of
the class struggle), or as a consequence of party democratization and the influence
of ideologically committed grass-roots activists.
A further problem with the two-party system is that two evenly-matched
parties are encouraged to compete for votes by outdoing each other’s electoral
promises, perhaps causing spiralling public spending and fuelling inflation. This
amounts to irresponsible party government, in that parties come to power on
the basis of election manifestos that they have no capacity to fulfil. A final weakness
of two-party systems is the obvious restrictions they impose in terms of
electoral and ideological choice. While a choice between just two programmes of
government was perhaps sufficient in an era of partisan alignment and class solidarity,
it has become quite inadequate in a period of greater individualism (see
p. 158) and social diversity.
Dominant-party systems
Dominant-party systems should not be confused with one-party systems,
although they may at times exhibit similar characteristics. A dominant-party
system is competitive in the sense that a number of parties compete for power in
regular and popular elections, but is dominated by a single major party that
consequently enjoys prolonged periods in power. This apparently neat definition,
however, runs into problems, notably, in relation to determining how
‘prolonged’ a governing period must be for a party to be considered ‘dominant’.
Japan is usually cited as the classic example of a dominant-party system. Until its
defeat in 2009, the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) had been in power almost
continuously for 54 years, only having been in opposition for a brief 11-month
period between 1993 and 1994. LDP dominance had been underpinned by the
Japanese ‘economic miracle’. It also reflected the powerful appeal of the party’s
neo-Confucian principles of duty and obligation in the still-traditional Japanese
countryside, and the strong links that the party had forged with business elites.
However, economic stagnation and internal divisions have meant that the LDP
has lost members and supporters to a number of newly-formed, smaller parties,
its decline being underlined in 2009 when the Democratic Party of Japan became
the first opposition party since 1945 to win a parliamentary majority.
The Congress Party in India enjoyed an unbroken spell of 30 years in power
commencing with the achievement of independence in 1947. Until 1989 it had
endured only three years in opposition, following Indira Gandhi’s 1975–77 state
of emergency. The African National Congress (ANC) has similarly been the dominant
party in South Africa since the ending of apartheid in 1993, its position being
based on its pre-eminent role in the long struggle against white rule (see p. 238).
The best European examples of a dominant-party system are Sweden, where the
Social Democratic Labour Party (SAP) held power for 65 of the previous 74 years
P A R T I E S A N D P A R T Y S Y S T E M S 237
238 P O L I T I C S
Events: In April 1994, South Africa held its first nonracial
election. The African National Congress (ANC)
won the election, gaining 63 per cent of both votes
and seats. The following month, Nelson Mandela was
inaugurated as the president of South Africa. The
ANC subsequently developed into the ruling party of
post-apartheid South Africa. Its majority in the
National Assembly increased to 66 per cent in the
1999 election, and again to 70 per cent in the 2004
election, only falling slightly in 2009 to 65 per cent.
This has been a remarkable achievement for a political
movement that had been banned until 1990, and
whose leadership had mostly been either in prison or
in exile since the early 1960s.
Significance:What accounts for the ANC’s predominant
position in South African politics? The key explanation
is the leading role the party played in the campaign
against extreme Afrikaner nationalism and in helping to
promote resistance to the policies of apartheid. In describing
itself as a ‘liberation movement’, rather than a conventional
political party, the ANC continues to portray itself as
the leader of South Africa’s ‘national democratic revolution’.
This position has been bolstered by two factors. First,
the ANC responds to and accommodates a broad diversity
of interests and voices. Of particular significance in this
respect have been the ‘tripartite’ alliance the ANC forged
with the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU)
and the South African Communist Party (SACP), and the
ANC’s willingness in 1994 to form not a single-party
government but a government of national unity, including
the (New) National Party (which had abandoned its
support for apartheid) and the Inkatha Freedom Party
(historically, the voice of Zulu nationalism). Second, the
ANC has placed a heavy stress on national reconciliation,
seeking to forge a single South African identity and sense
of purpose amongst a diverse and splintered population.
Made possible by the ANC’s long-standing commitment to
non-racialism, this was reflected in the establishment in
1995 of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which
sought to heal the wounds of the apartheid era by exposing
the crimes and injustices committed by all sides of the
struggle, rather than by handing down punishments.
However, the ANC faces at least three major challenges.
First, the party’s ability to define itself in terms of the
struggle for liberation is certain to decline over time. Not
only is the proportion of the ANC’s membership (and, in
due course, leadership, which has direct experience of
anti-apartheid activism) steadily diminishing; in people’s
wider perceptions, the ANC is certain to be viewed
progressively more as a vehicle for government than as a
vehicle for liberation. Second, and in common with other
dominant parties, the ANC has been afflicted by factionalism
and, at times, tumultuous internal conflicts. The most
dramatic of these was between supporters of Thabo
Mbeki, who became South Africa’s second post-apartheid
president, serving from 1999 to 2008, and supporters of
Jacob Zuma, who defeated Mbeki in 2007 in the contest
for the presidency of the ANC and went on to become the
president of South Africa in 2009. Third, even though postapartheid
South Africa has clearly embraced liberaldemocratic
principles and structures, the ANC’s dominance
has fostered developments more commonly associated
with one-party states. In particular, the ANC’s
apparent electoral invulnerability has blurred the distinction
between the party and the state, creating scope for
corruption. The most high profile corruption scandal in
post-apartheid South Africa emerged in 2005 and led to
the conviction of Jacob Zuma’s financial advisor, Schabir
Shaik, over his role in a 1999 arms deal. Zuma himself
was dismissed as deputy president by President Mbeki
and was subsequently charged with corruption, although
these developments did nothing to diminish Zuma’s
power base within the ANC, or to damage his subsequent
career.
POLITICS IN ACTION . . .
The African National Congress: a liberation movement
or a ‘ruling’ party?
until its defeat in 2006; and Italy, where the Christian Democratic Party (DC)
dominated every one of the country’s 52 post-World War II governments until the
party’s effective collapse amidst mounting allegations of corruption in 1992–94.
The most prominent feature of a dominant-party system is the tendency for
the political focus to shift from competition between parties to factional conflict
within the dominant party itself. The DC in Italy, for example, functioned as
little more than a coalition of privileged groups and interests in Italian society,
the party acting as a broker to these various factions. The most powerful of these
groups were the Catholic Church (which exercised influence through organizations
such as Catholic Action), the farming community and industrial interests.
Each of these was able to cultivate voting loyalty and exert influence on DC’s
members in the Italian parliament.
Factions were also an integral institution in the Japanese political process.
Within the LDP, which, until its defeat in 2009, had enjoyed 54 years of virtually
unbroken rule, a perennial struggle for power took place, as various subgroups
coalesced around rising or powerful individuals. Such factionalism was maintained
at the local level by the ability of faction leaders to provide political
favours for their followers, and at the parliamentary level through the allocation
of senior government and party offices. Although the resulting infighting may
have been seen as a means of guaranteeing argument and debate in a system in
which small parties were usually marginalized, in Japan factionalism tended to
revolve more around personal differences than policy or ideological disagreement.
One example of this was the conflict between the Fukuda and Tanaka
factions during the 1970s and 1980s, which continued long after the two principals
had left the scene.
Whereas other competitive party systems have their supporters, or at least
apologists, few are prepared to come to the defence of the dominant-party
system. Apart from a tendency towards stability and predictability, dominantpartyism
is usually seen as a regrettable and unhealthy phenomenon. In the first
place, it tends to erode the important constitutional distinction between the state
and the party in power. When governments cease to come and go, an insidious
process of politicization takes place through which state officials and institutions
adjust to the ideological and political priorities of the dominant party. Second,
an extended period in power can engender complacency, arrogance and even
corruption in the dominant party. The course of Italian and Japanese politics
has, for example, regularly been interrupted by scandals, usually involving allegations
of financial corruption. Third, a dominant-party system is characterized
by weak and ineffective opposition. Criticism and protest can more easily be
ignored if they stem from parties that are no longer regarded as genuine rivals
for power. Finally, the existence of a ‘permanent’ party of government may
corrode the democratic spirit by encouraging the electorate to fear change and
to stick with the ‘natural’ party of government.
Multiparty systems
A multiparty system is characterized by competition amongst more than two
parties, reducing the chances of single-party government and increasing the
likelihood of coalitions. However, it is difficult to define multiparty systems in
terms of the number of major parties, as such systems sometimes operate
P A R T I E S A N D P A R T Y S Y S T E M S 239
CONCEPT
Coalition
A coalition is a grouping
of rival political actors
brought together either
through the perception of
a common threat, or
through a recognition
that their goals cannot
be achieved by working
separately. Electoral
coalitions are alliances
through which parties
agree not to compete
against one another, with
a view to maximizing
their representation.
Legislative coalitions are
agreements between two
or more parties to
support a particular bill
or programme. Governing
coalitions are formal
agreements between two
or more parties that
involve a cross-party
distribution of ministerial
portfolios. A ‘grand
coalition’ or ‘national
government’ comprises
all major parties.
through coalitions including smaller parties that are specifically designed to
exclude larger parties from government. This is precisely what happened to the
French Communist Party (PCF) in the 1950s, and to the Italian Communist
Party (PCI) throughout its existence. If the likelihood of coalition government
is the index of multipartyism, this classification contains a number of subcate-
gories.
Germany, for example, tends to have a ‘two-and-a-half-party’ system, in that
the CDU and SDP typically have electoral strengths roughly equivalent to those
of the Conservative and Labour parties in the UK. However, they were forced
into coalitions with the small Free Democrat Party by the workings of the
mixed-member proportional electoral system (see p. 211). Italian multipartyism
traditionally involves a larger number of relatively small parties. Thus, even the
DC rarely came close to achieving 40 per cent of the vote. Sartori (1976) distinguished
between two types of multiparty system, which he termed the ‘moderate’
and ‘polarized’ pluralist systems. In this categorization, moderate pluralism
exists in countries such as Belgium, the Netherlands and Norway, where ideological
differences between major parties are slight, and where there is a general inclination
to form coalitions and move towards the middle ground. Polarized
pluralism, on the other hand, exists when more marked ideological differences
separate major parties, some of which adopt an anti-system stance. The existence
of electorally strong communist parties (as in France, Italy and Spain until the
1990s), or of significant fascist movements (such as the Movimento Sociale
Italiano (MSI) – reborn in 1995 as the ‘post-Fascist’ Alleanza Nazionale),
provided evidence of polarized pluralism.
The strength of multiparty systems is that they create internal checks and
balances within government and exhibit a bias in favour of debate, conciliation
and compromise. The process of coalition formation and the dynamics of coalition
maintenance ensure a broad responsiveness that cannot but take account of
competing views and contending interests. Thus, in Germany, the liberal Free
Democrats act as a moderating influence on both the conservative CDU and the
socialist SPD. Where SPD–Green coalitions have been formed in the Länder
(provinces), the Green presence has helped to push environmental issues up the
political agenda. Similarly, the multiparty features of the Swedish system, which
make coalition government more common than not, have encouraged the SAP
to build a broad welfare consensus, and to pursue moderate policies that do not
alienate business interests.
The principal criticisms of multiparty systems relate to the pitfalls and difficulties
of coalition formation. The post-election negotiations and horsetrading
that take place when no single party is strong enough to govern alone can take
weeks, or (as in Israel and Italy) sometimes months, to complete. More seriously,
coalition governments may be fractured and unstable, paying greater attention
to squabbles amongst coalition partners than to the tasks of government. Italy is
usually cited as the classic example of this, its post-1945 governments having
lasted, on average, only 10 months. It would, nevertheless, be a mistake to suggest
that coalitions are always associated with instability, as the record of stable and
effective coalition government in Germany and Sweden clearly demonstrates. In
some respects, in fact, the Italian experience is peculiar, owing as much to the
country’s political culture and the ideological complexion of its party system as
to the dynamics of multipartyism.
240 P O L I T I C S
A final problem is that the tendency towards moderation and compromise
may mean that multiparty systems are so dominated by the political centre that
they are unable to offer clear ideological alternatives. Coalition politics tends,
naturally, to be characterized by negotiation and conciliation, a search for
common ground, rather than by conviction and the politics of principle. This
process can be criticized as being implicitly corrupt, in that parties are encouraged
to abandon policies and principles in their quest for power. It can also lead
to the over-representation of centrist parties and centrist interests, especially
when, as in Germany, a small centre party is the only viable coalition partner for
both of the larger conservative and socialist parties. Indeed, this is sometimes
seen as one of the drawbacks of proportional representation electoral systems,
which, by ensuring that the legislative size of parties reflects their electoral
strength, are biased in favour of multiparty politics and coalition government.
DECLINE OF PARTIES?
Modern concerns about parties principally stem from evidence of their decline as
agents of representation, and as an effective link between government and the
people. Evidence of a ‘crisis of party politics’ can be found in a decline of both
party membership and partisanship, reflected in partisan dealignment. For
example, by 2007 fewer than 1 per cent of people across the UK belonged to political
parties, down from 7 per cent some 50 years before. Membership of the
Labour Party fell from more than 1 million in 1956 to around 166,000 in 2009,
while Conservative Party membership fell from an estimated 2.8 million to
around 250,000 in the same period. A seemingly inexorable rise in the age of
party members is as significant, the average age of Conservative Party members
in 1998 having risen to 63. Dramatic electoral swings against governing parties
have intensified such concerns. Notable examples of this include the slump of the
French Socialists in 1993 from 282 seats to just 70, and the virtual annihilation in
the same year of the Canadian Progressive Conservatives, who were swept out of
office retaining only two seats. Falling voter turnout also illustrates the declining
capacity of parties to mobilize electoral support. For instance, Wattenberg (2000)
found that, in 19 liberal democracies, turnout had declined on average by 10 per
cent between the 1950s and the 1990s, the trend having been particularly prominent
in the USA, Western Europe, Japan and Latin America.
Alongside these changes, there is evidence of what has been called ‘antipolitics’;
that is, the rise of political movements and organizations the only common
feature of which appears to be antipathy towards conventional centres of power
and opposition to established parties of government. This has been reflected in
the emergence of new political movements, the principle attraction of which is that
they are untainted by having held power. Good examples have been the dramatic
success of Berlesconi’s Forza Italia in 1994, and the emergence in the USA since
2008 of the Tea Party movement. The rise of new social movements (see p. 260),
such as the women’s movement, peace movement and environmental movement,
is also part of the same phenomenon. Even when they articulate their views
through party organization, as in the case of green parties, these movements tend
to assume the mantle of antiparty parties. (The role of such parties and movements
in expressing forms of ‘anti-politics’ is examined in Chapter 20.)
P A R T I E S A N D P A R T Y S Y S T E M S 241
How can the decline of parties be explained? One of the problems that parties
suffer from is their real or perceived oligarchical character. Parties are seen as
bureaucratized political machines, whose grass-roots members are either inactive,
or engaged in dull and routine tasks (attending meetings, sitting on committees
and so on). In contrast, single-issue protest groups have been more
successful in attracting membership and support, particularly from amongst the
young, partly because they are more loosely organized and locally based, and
partly because they place a heavier emphasis on participation and activism. The
public image of parties has been further tarnished by their links to government
and to professional politicians. As political ‘insiders’, parties are tainted by the
power, ambition and corruption that is often associated with high office. In other
words, parties are not seen as being ‘of the people’; too often, they appear to be
consumed by political infighting and the scramble for power, so becoming
divorced from the concerns of ordinary people.
An alternative way of explaining party decline is to see it as a symptom of the
fact that complex, modern societies are increasingly difficult to govern.
Disillusionment and cynicism grow as parties seek power by proclaiming their
capacity to solve problems and improve conditions, but fail to deliver once in
government. This reflects the mounting difficulties that confront any party of
government in the form of the expanding power of interest groups and an
increasingly globalized economy. A final explanation is that parties may be
declining because the social identities and traditional loyalties that gave rise to
them in the first place have started to fade. This can certainly be seen in the
decline of class politics, linked to the phenomenon of post-Fordism (see p. 154).
In addition, with the decline of old social, religious and other solidarities, new
aspirations and sensibilities have come onto the political agenda; notably, those
associated with postmaterialism (see p. 177). Whereas broad, programmic
parties once succeeded in articulating the goals of major sections of the electorate,
issues such as gender equality, nuclear power, animal rights and pollution
may require new and different political formations to articulate them. Singleissue
groups and social movements may thus be in the process of replacing
parties as the crucial link between government and society.
242 P O L I T I C S
SUMMARY
A political party is a group of people organized for the purpose of winning government power, and usually
displays some measure of ideological cohesion.The principal classifications of parties have distinguished between
cadre and mass or, later, catch-all parties, parties of representation and parties of integration, constitutional or
‘mainstream’ parties and revolutionary or anti-system ones, and left-wing parties and right-wing parties.
Parties have a number of functions in the political system. These include their role as a mechanism of representation,
the formation of political elites and recruitment into politics, the formulation of social goals and
government policy, the articulation and aggregation of interests, the mobilization and socialization of the
electorate, and the organization of governmental processes and institutional relationships.
The organization and structure of parties crucially influence the distribution of power within society at large.
Party democracy can be promoted either by a wide dispersal of power within the party, or by the concentration
of power in the hands of the party’s elected and publicly accountable members. Oligarchic tendencies
may be an inevitable consequence of organization, or they may arise from the need for party unity and electoral
credibility.
A party system is a network of relationships through which parties interact and influence the political
process. In one-party systems, a ‘ruling’ party effectively functions as a permanent government. In two-party
systems, power alternates between two ‘major’ parties. In dominant-party systems, a single ‘major’ party
retains power for a prolonged period. In multiparty systems, no party is large enough to rule alone, leading to
a system of coalition government.
Party systems shape the broader political process in various ways. They influence the range and nature of
choice available to the electorate, and affect the cohesion and stability of governments. They structure the
relationship between the executive and the assembly, establish a bias in favour of either conflict or consensus,
and shape the general character of the political culture.
Evidence of a crisis in party politics can be found in the decline in party membership and partisanship, as well
as in the rise of ‘antiparty’ groups and movements. This can be explained by the perception that parties are
tainted by power, ambition and corruption, and that they have suffered as a result of general disillusionment
caused by the growing inability of governments to deliver on their promises. They are also seen to have failed
to articulate the aspirations and sensibilities associated with postmaterialism, or generated within post-industrial
societies.
P A R T I E S A N D P A R T Y S Y S T E M S 243
Questions for discussion
Are all modern political parties essentially
catch-all parties?
Is it possible to have ‘post-ideological’
parties?
Could government function in contemporary
circumstances without political parties?
In what ways, and to what extent, do parties
promote democracy?
Why do political parties so often tend to be
leader-dominated?
By what criteria should party systems be
judged?
How have modern parties adjusted to the
decline of class and other loyalties?
Is the age of party politics over?
Further reading
Dalton, R. and D. Farrell, Political Parties and
Democratic Linkage: How Parties Organize
Democracy (2011). An examination of the link
between parties and representative government
that focuses on their impact on the electoral
process and on government.
Katz, R. and W. Crotty (eds), Handbook of Party Politics
(2006).A wide-ranging collection of articles that
discuss the nature, functions and organization of
parties and their relationship to society and the state.
Sartori, G., Parties and Party Systems: A Framework for
Analysis (2005). A classic, if challenging, analysis of
the role of parties and the nature of party systems.
Wolinetz, S. (ed.), Political Parties (1997). A comprehensive
set of articles that examines all aspects of
the workings and significance of political parties.