TY - JOUR

T1 - Party rules, party resources and the politics of parliamentary democracies

T2 - How parties organize in the 21st century

AU - Poguntke, Thomas

AU - Scarrow, Susan

AU - Webb, Paul

AU - Allern, Elin H

AU - Aylott, Nicholas

AU - Biezen, Ingrid van

AU - Calossi, Enrico

AU - Costa Lobo, Marina

AU - Cross, William P

AU - Deschouwer, Kris

AU - Enyedi, Zsolt

AU - Fabre, Elodie

AU - Farrell, David M

AU - Gauja, Anika

AU - Pizzimenti, Eugenio

AU - Kopecky , Petr

AU - Koole, Ruud

AU - Kosiara-Pedersen, Karina

AU - Müller, Wolfgang C

AU - Rahat, Gideon

AU - Szczerbiak, Aleks

AU - van Haute, Emilie

AU - Verge, Tania

PY - 2016

Y1 - 2016

N2 - This article introduces the first findings of the Political Party Database Project, a major survey of party organizations in parliamentary and semi-presidential democracies. The project’s first round of data covers 122 parties in 19 countries. In this article, we describe the scope of the database, then investigate what it tells us about contemporary party organization in these countries, focusing on parties’ resources, structures and internal decision-making. We examine organizational patterns by country and party family, and where possible we make temporal comparisons with older data sets. Our analyses suggest a remarkable coexistence of uniformity and diversity. In terms of the major organizational resources on which parties can draw, such as members, staff and finance, the new evidence largely confirms the continuation of trends identified in previous research: that is, declining membership, but enhanced financial resources and more paid staff. We also find remarkable uniformity regarding the core architecture of party organizations. At the same time, however, we find substantial variation between countries and party families in terms of their internal processes, with particular regard to how internally democratic they are, and the forms that this democratization takes.

AB - This article introduces the first findings of the Political Party Database Project, a major survey of party organizations in parliamentary and semi-presidential democracies. The project’s first round of data covers 122 parties in 19 countries. In this article, we describe the scope of the database, then investigate what it tells us about contemporary party organization in these countries, focusing on parties’ resources, structures and internal decision-making. We examine organizational patterns by country and party family, and where possible we make temporal comparisons with older data sets. Our analyses suggest a remarkable coexistence of uniformity and diversity. In terms of the major organizational resources on which parties can draw, such as members, staff and finance, the new evidence largely confirms the continuation of trends identified in previous research: that is, declining membership, but enhanced financial resources and more paid staff. We also find remarkable uniformity regarding the core architecture of party organizations. At the same time, however, we find substantial variation between countries and party families in terms of their internal processes, with particular regard to how internally democratic they are, and the forms that this democratization takes.

KW - Faculty of Social Sciences

KW - politiske partier

KW - partifinansiering

KW - partimedlemskab

KW - partiinternt demokrati

KW - intra-party democracy

KW - party finance

KW - party membership

KW - party organization

KW - party strength

U2 - 10.1177/1354068816662493

DO - 10.1177/1354068816662493

M3 - Journal article

SP - 661

EP - 678

JO - Party Politics

JF - Party Politics

SN - 1354-0688

M1 - 1

ER -