Party organization and election campaigning

1
Party organization and election campaigning

• North American and European Comparisons

2
Problem Why do parties organize in the ways
that they do?

• How much organization do they need?
• Do they need
• thick organization with large of members?
• to be organized at all times or only when
  elections are called?
• professionals rather than amateurs?
• Organization at all levels of government?
• How do their needs change over time?

3
Starting points

• Epsteins critique of Duverger
• Models of change in Western Europe
• Where, if anywhere,

4
Epsteins critique

• Contagion from the left vs. contagion from the
  right
• Leon Epstein (Political Parties in Western
  Democracies, 1967) argues that the mass party is
  not the wave of the future
• Parties are not dependent on numbers or mass
  organization
• They can rely on the media instead

5
Catchall and electoral professional parties

• Problem
• How do parties change over time?
• What are they like in middle age?

6
Otto Kirchheimer and the catch-all party

• Parties of mass integration adapt to a more
  affluent and consumer oriented society by
• Abandoning attempts at the intellectual and
  moral encadrement of the masses
• Bidding for the support of interest groups
• Emphasizing the qualities of their leaders
• Scuttling excess ideological baggage
• Moving to the centre
• The success of one catch-all party forces others
  to imitate it, transforming the party system

7
Panebiancos Political Parties

• Parties reflect genetic types
• Parties forced to transform themselves into
  electoral-professional parties

8
The cartel party

• Katz and Mair 1995
• Parties share power with each other
• Parties have become part of the state
• Parties draw on state resources e.g. state
  finance
• Party members are involved, but only at a
  distance