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Examines how parties have fared as membership organizations over the past half century. The most comprehensive series of party‐reported membership and survey data for the OECD nations finds that party membership rolls generally had decreased by the end of the 1990s. The chapter concludes by investigating the extent to which membership declines have diminished the organizational capacity of local parties and with a warning against overstating either the rise or obsolescence of membership‐based party organizing. It is true that membership parties are not what they once were, but it is also the case that strong membership parties were never as widespread as some accounts suggest.

Concerned with the development of party organizations in twentieth‐century democracies, and deals specifically with the shifting balance of power between what has earlier been termed the three organizational ‘faces’ of party: the party on the ground, the party in central office, and the party in public office. An evaluation is made of the changing balance among these three faces in the context of four models of party organization: the cadre (or elite) party, which was the dominant form of party organization prior to mass suffrage; the mass party, which emerged with, or in anticipation of and to militate for, mass suffrage, and which was widely regarded, particularly in Europe, as the ‘normal’ or ‘ideal’ form of party organization for most of the twentieth century; the catch‐all party, development towards which was first commented upon in the literature in the 1960s, and which has come to rival the mass party not only in prominence but also in the affections of many analysts; and finally, what is called here the cartel party, a new and emerging model of party organization, which Katz and Mair believe to be increasingly evident among established democracies in recent years. In tracing the shifting balance of power among the three faces and across the four models of party organization, the authors contend that the most recent stage of development has resulted in the ascendancy of the party in public office, and the concomitant ‘relegation’ or subordination of the other two faces. Moreover, while parties on the ground sometimes continue to flourish, they suggest that the ostensible empowerment of party memberships, or even their greater autonomy, may nevertheless, be compatible with an increased privileging of the party in public office. Finally, both the sources and implications of party organizational change are briefly discussed, and it is suggested that there is an association between the most recent shifts in the internal balance of intra‐party power, on the one hand, and the apparent growth in popular feelings of alienation from parties, on the other.

The first introductory section discusses the evolution of the current party system in New Zealand, from a system dominated by the two parties around which it had aligned in the 1930s, to the consequences for party composition and representation of the change from the first past the post (FPTP) or single‐member plurality (SMP) electoral system, to the new mixed‐member proportional (MMP) system under which the 1996 and 1999 elections were fought. The second introductory section discusses theoretical issues associated with party system dealignment that has resulted. The next three sections cover the same topics as those in the other country case studies in the book, and examine party legitimacy, party organizational strength (party finance, staffing, membership activity, and media), and systemic functionality (governance, interest articulation and aggregation, political recruitment, and political communication and education).

Spain has made a number of experiments with democracy, but only since the mid‐1970s has this been successful. At that time, strenuous efforts were made to ensure that political parties would come forward, and as a result the new democracy had two key aspects: the creation of synthetic parties (in the sense that they are supported more from above than below), and the building of a parties state. The introductory part of the chapter discusses these changes and also has a section looking at the institutional framework that had such a shaping effect on party politics; this discusses the electoral system, and the rules governing parliamentary group organization and party finance. The next three sections cover the same topics as those in the other country case studies in the book, and examine party legitimacy (party membership, electoral turnout and volatility, popular assessments, party–voter ties, and evaluating party legitimacy), party organizational strength (parliamentary party organization, mass party organization, party finance, ‘goods in kind’ received by parties, and evaluating party organizational strength), and the systemic functionality of parties (governance, political recruitment and patronage, interest articulation and aggregation, political participation, political communication and education, and evaluating the systemic functionality of parties). The concluding section assesses the viability of Spain's parties state and gives a comparative analysis of its experience of democracy.

Belgium and the Netherlands are often taken and presented together as the ‘Low Countries’, and there are good reasons for treating the two countries as part of a single category, since both are textbook examples of divided societies, which display the subcultural vertical segmentation that has travelled conceptually as verzuiling (desegmentation or pillarization) and share the well‐known features of consociational democracy. Being neighbours, moreover, Belgium and the Netherlands share much common history, although the border separating the two countries is highly significant, and explains a number of important differences between them. In both countries, the major parties can be grouped into three party families: religious (Christian), liberal, and socialist, and in both there has been party change since the 1960s, in which the losers have been the Christian and Socialist parties, and the Liberals have gained support; however, specific patterns have been quite different. Most symptomatic of the passing of the old politics has been the formation of the so‐called ‘purple’ governments, which exclude Christian Democrats, but draw together the ‘red’ socialists and the ‘blue’ liberals. The introduction discusses these changes (including depillarization and the erosion of consociationalism), and the differences between the two countries; the next three sections cover the same topics as those in the other country case studies in the book, and examine party legitimacy (voter turnout, party membership, partisan identification, bridging the ‘gap’ between voters and office‐holders, and the Belgian legitimacy crisis), the strength of party organizations, and the systemic functionality of parties (in governance and recruitment, and linkage functions—participation, aggregation, and communication).

Candidacy tells us who is eligible to present himself/herself in the candidate selection process of a single political party at a particular point in time. The restrictions and requirements applied to potential candidates are the defining elements that will allow us to classify candidacy on a continuum according to the level of inclusiveness or exclusiveness. An age limit is a common restriction, while a minimum period of party membership is a frequent requirement. Incumbents are a special category of candidates, and some parties have sought to shake up their lists of candidates either by making automatic reselection less common or by adding hurdles to the reselection of incumbents. Democratization is one of the more recent and interesting trends in candidate selection. In order to democratize candidacy, parties have to reduce the restrictions on eligibility, thereby creating a much larger pool of potential candidates.

The first part of this chapter discusses retrenchment, recent institutional changes, and senior civil servants in Sweden; it attributes the recent changes in the senior civil service to the budgetary crisis of the state and the emergence of a less interventionalist control regime, in which the heyday of state‐driven economic and social change has gone. The main source of uncertainty now concerns the final destination of the rapid changes in many core aspects of Swedish politics and public administration. The different sections of the chapter look at: the size and structure of the Swedish civil service; ranks of senior civil servants; systems of recruitment and promotion; party membership among senior civil servants; inter‐ministerial mobility of civil servants; status in the civil service; the social and educational backgrounds of top officials; informal contacts across ministries and between ministries and agencies; the relationship between national and sub‐national officials and those working in agencies; political party policies towards the civil service; and the social status of the senior civil service.

The Danish senior civil service has a mixture of older and newer traditions, in which history and tradition are very important. Accordingly, this chapter starts by summarizing the historical background to the Danish central public administration and the historical role of Danish civil servants. Further sections then introduce the common organizational principles governing the central public administration. The different sections discuss: ranks and numbers of senior civil servants at the top levels; methods of recruitment and promotion; inter‐ministerial mobility; pay; party membership and the senior civil service; the status in the civil service of high status ministries; the social and educational background of top officials; women at the top; interaction and formal contacts within and between ministries; and political party policies towards the senior civil service.

The chapter provides a short history of the growth and consolidation of party membership organizations in nineteen established democracies. Whereas many accounts point to falling membership numbers as evidence of political party decline, this chapter shows that, for many parties, large memberships have long been more of an aspiration than a reality. Yet the ideal itself has been important, and has shaped political parties’ organizational decisions even where it has been imperfectly realized.

This chapter investigates whether variations in party affiliation rules have political consequences, looking in particular at their effects on partisan participation. The research presented here combines data from the Political Party Database (PPDB) with surveys of party members and party supporters, looking for evidence of whether potential affiliates’ behaviour is sensitive to the relative costs of party membership. The data suggest that such sensitivity exists, with supporters being more likely to join parties which offer more benefits, and which offer membership at a lower price. They are also less likely to acquire traditional membership if cheaper affiliation options exist. Conversely, when membership is relatively costly, those who do join are more likely to use their membership by being active in the party. Our findings provide some support for demand-side views of party membership, according to which political parties are able to use membership rules to affect who joins a party.

Contemporary parties are responding to membership losses and electoral setbacks by rethinking their approaches to grassroots organizing. Using a nineteen-country survey of party web pages, this chapter examines party efforts to make traditional membership more accessible by diversifying affiliation options, and by reducing the costs of joining. These multi-speed membership parties offer their supporters an array of options for political participation. The chapter concludes that the growing array of digital affiliation opportunities may change how parties relate to supporters, and which supporters they are trying to mobilize.

This chapter presents three sets of concepts that are useful for studying party membership development. First, membership can be seen through an economic lens, as the product of supply-side and demand-side forces. Second, membership structures can be seen as artifacts of ideas about how party competition should work, and about how members contribute to party legitimacy. Finally, the chapter introduces the idea of studying party membership organizing as a multi-speed phenomenon. This multi-speed membership model views individuals’ and parties’ choices about membership as dynamic decisions, and posits that political parties have options to cultivate multi-faceted modes of affiliation. These different modes can affect partisan mobilization and individual decisions about political participation.

Discussion of intraparty democracy often starts from the presumption that citizens want to be influential within political parties, so that declining party membership and participation must indicate some failing by the parties. By addressing the prior question of why citizens might decide to become involved in parties in the first place, I suggest that forces largely exogenous to the internal arrangements of the parties have made partisan involvement less attractive to citizens, and so should have been expected to result in declining party membership. Moreover, many of the social changes that underlie these forces are themselves widely regarded as desirable, suggesting that they ought not to be reversed, even if that were possible.

This chapter addresses the role of public funding in party organizational transformation. Focusing mainly on European democracies, and using the new systematic data obtained from the Political Party Database, this chapter makes two contributions to the party politics literature. First, a range of existing findings about the importance of state subsidies for party life are re-examined, probing in particular the extent to which party incomes depend on public funding, as opposed to private donations and membership fees. Second, the association between parties’ dependence on state subsidies and party organization is explored, probing in particular the relationship between public monies and the size of parties’ memberships. Unlike the first exploration, which largely confirms most existing conclusions about the patterns of party financing, the findings from the second exploration appear to be more challenging: contrary to usual expectations, state funding of political parties does not necessarily undermine party membership.

If political parties want to make party membership more attractive to new and existing members, they should boost the benefits that seem to most appealing to potential members. But which benefits are these? This chapter starts by examining the arguments that parties make to prospective members to persuade them to enlist. It then examines party members’ explanations for why they joined. Finally, it reviews evidence of how much existing members use specific types of benefits, and whether parties have much latitude to increase those that seem to be most attractive. It concludes that contemporary parties have only modest social and material membership incentives to offer to prospective members.

Rather than being unitary actors, each party is a political system in itself, with three major “faces”: the party in public office; the party central office; and the party on the ground. Over time, the balance of power within parties has shifted, to support the dominance of the party in public office. This evolution has been accompanied by institutional changes, and it has been supported by the growing similarity of the positions of members of the party in public office (responsibilities of governing; exigencies of professional political careers) regardless of the political complexion of their parties or the demands of their members.

This chapter aims to answer the question of how exactly internally democratic parties should look, developing a ‘deliberative model of intra-party democracy’. The main justification of such a model is first, that deliberation can cater better to the demand for political self-expression many citizens share than merely aggregative democratic practices, and second, that deliberation can perform an important critical function within parties, allowing the status quo to be questioned and transformed. The challenge is to devise mechanisms and institutions that can enhance deliberation within parties, and the chapter looks here to the more practice-oriented literature on deliberative democracy and democratic innovations for inspiration. As an instantiation of bottom-up democracy, it is suggested, a deliberative model of intra-party democracy must empower the active members on the ground and offer numerous fora in which they can make their voices heard and bring them to bear on decisions. Chief amongst the institutional design paths suggested are problem-oriented fora, partisan deliberative networks, and larger deliberative conferences. These proposals are discussed in turn, and empirical illustrations of how they could be realised are provided.

This chapter addresses the following question: How do contemporary party members view themselves, their party, and their role in it? This question is important because the success of party reforms depends centrally on whether the newly-created channels of participation and engagement are recognized as meaningful and valuable by those who engage in parties (or are generally inclined to engage in them); and to find out what could be considered meaningful and valuable by these individuals we need to understand what they expect from a party in terms of participation and opportunities to make one’s agency felt. The basis of the study, as will be explained in detail, are focus group interviews held with party members of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) and the Social Democratic Party of Austria (SPÖ), two parties that were chosen as empirical cases because Social Democratic parties are arguably on top of the list of the parties that may be considered ‘victims’ of the trend of shifting participatory norms, having lost much of their once-great electoral support across most of Europe. An important finding the chapter presents is the tendency of party members to demand (not more direct participation like membership ballots or the like but) more face-to-face contact and two-way communication with party elites and their fellow activists—which strengthens the general case for a more deliberative understanding of parties that the book advances.