Search

This article analyzes the issue of party unity, investigating the factors that favor or discourage party breaks. Three independent variables are proposed, forming a model that seeks to evaluate the possibilities for splitting or maintaining party organization. The variables are the intra-partisan institutional arrangement, internal ideological dissent, and the electoral costs of a split. The model is applied to the case of the Workers' Party (PT), seeking to evaluate which factors are the strongest in this party, those leading to a split or those favoring maintenance of unity in the party's organization. The study draws on various data sources, including party documents and bylaws, theses proposed by party factions, and election results, covering four national events in the 1990s. The study contends that intra-partisan institutional arrangements and the electoral costs of a split have strongly discouraged any break in the PT as a political party, and that if all else remains constant, these factors will continue to produce the same effects in the foreseeable future. Dans cet article, on examine la question de l'unité des partis, en cherchant à déceler les facteurs qui provoquent ou empêchent leur scission. On propose trois variables indépendantes formant un modèle qui tente d'évaluer les chances de scission/maintien d'une organisation de parti. Ces variables sont les suivantes: l'aménagement institutionnel et la divergence idéologique internes au parti ainsi que les pertes électorales d'une scission. On applique ce modèle au cas du Parti des Travailleurs (PT), en cherchant à estimer ce qui y prévaut: les tendances qui mènent à la scission ou celles qui favorisent le maintien de l’unité du parti. La recherche se sert de plusieurs sortes de données, telles que documents et statuts du parti, thèses des factions internes et résultats d'élections, concernant surtout quatre rencontres nationales réalisées dans les années 90. On conclut que les aménagements institutionnels internes au parti et les pertes électorales d'une scission éloignent nettement la perspective du fractionnement du PT en tant que parti politique et, toutes conditions gardées, auront le même effet dans un avenir prévisible.

The recently proposed (ideal) type of a modern political party, the 'cartel party', evokes questions both about the conceptual clarity of the new type and about its empirical validity. The analysis of the relationship between civil society and the state, which constitutes a central element in Katz and Mair's concept of the cartel party, is considered to be too static to grasp the increased intervention by the state in society. The application of a term derived from the level of the party system ('cartel') to individual parties does not seem to be a happy choice, while the reality of western party systems does not show an effective cartel of parties. It is argued that, instead of trying to formulate (again) an alleged dominant party type for the present time, it seems more fruitful to develop a classification scheme of parties that allows for different types of parties to co-exist at the same time, without considering one of them as the most up to date.

This paper has a twofold aim: to disentangle the question of party decline, analysing the current meanings and the empirical evidence offered by the literature; to highlight the different and even opposite outcomes of such decline. As far as the party crisis is concerned, contrary to a shared knowledge it is difficult to give a final word. It is suggested that the crisis concerns more a type of party rather than the party per se. Second, the challenges to the party are analysed. In the last decade a convergent attack against the traditional parties has been carried on: on one side, by the new social movements and their partisan representatives, the left-libertarian or New Politics parties; on the other side, by the newly emerged extreme right parties. This paper tries to demonstrate that both types of party are the by-products of the same structural conditions and both provide a (different) answer to the crisis of the party's expressive function. Copyright © 1996 SAGE Publications.

According to most political scientists and commentators, direct democracy seems to weaken political parties. Our empirical analysis in the 26 Swiss cantons shows that this thesis in its general form cannot be maintained. Political parties in cantons with extensive use of referendums and initiatives are not in all respects weaker than parties in cantons with little use of direct democratic means of participation. On the contrary, direct democracy goes together with more professional and formalized party organizations. Use of direct democracy is associated with more fragmented and volatile party systems, and with greater support for small parties, but causal interpretations of these relationships are difficult.