The authors present a theory that seeks to explain why parties change their political strategies, organizational characteristics and issue positions. Whereas most of the existing literature on party change deals with party systems, the focus here is on individual parties. Whereas much of the literature views parties as responding more or less gradually to socioeconomic change, change is here regarded as a discontinuous outcome of specific party decisions linked to party goals. This approach is placed in the literature by reviewing extant theories of party change. Our theory itself is initially advanced in a discursive section which suggests that change does not `just happen', but instead results from leadership change, a change of dominant faction within the party, and/or an external stimulus for change. The article then presents a more formal exposition of this theory, consisting of definitions, assumptions, and a series of testable propositions. It concludes with illustrative examples of this theoretical framework.

After describing the universe of 233 new parties formed in 19 West European and Anglo-American democracies from 1960 through 1980, the authors use data on those parties to address several hypotheses concerning system-level causes and conditions for new party formation and electoral success. It is found that although the propensi ty for forming new parties is not associated with structural variables, new party suc cess is related to the type of electoral system.

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Other works have asked whether parties matter; this article asks whether parties' dominant factions matter. Special focus is placed on whether change in dominant faction or coalition within the party tends to produce other significant party change, and under what circumstances. Three specific hypotheses are developed and tested, one involving motivation for change and the other two involving 'resources' which are necessary to make dramatic change possible. Empirical analysis rests upon original data covering seven changes in dominant faction and several dimensions of party change within five parties in the United Kingdom and Germany for the period 1950 to 1990. The authors conclude that not all of the hypothesized factors have equal impact on degree of party change, with ability of the newly dominant faction to control its coalition being primary.