Developing Party Organizations in East-Central Europe

Abstract

Political parties are central to the process of democratization in east-central Europe. In contrast to the many studies that look at the instability of new parties and party systems, this article focuses on party organizational development. First, a hypothesis is put forward contending that parties in the region are likely to develop as formations with loose electoral constituencies, unimportant membership and a dominant role played by party leaders. Second, this hypothesis is tested on a sample of six parties from the Czech Republic. The analysis shows that certain variations in organizational structure exist, deriving from the distinction between old parties and newly established parties, the former deviating from the hypothesis to a greater extent than the latter.

Are the exceptions really the rule? Questioning the application of ‘electoral‐professional’ type models of party organisation in East Central Europe

“…3 Kopecky's more detailed study hypothesised 'formations with loose electoral constituencies, in which a relatively unimportant role is played by party membership, and the dominant role by party leaders'. 4 Similarly, Szczerbiak in his recent research on Poland postulates '[parties] characterised by a weak grounding in civil society arising from a low membership base and the low priority assigned to building up local structures and a high level of dependence on the state for financial and material resources ... a centralised pattern of decision-making alongside a high level of autonomy given to basic and intermediary structures on local decisions'. 5 Such expectations concerning East Central Europe have been conceptualised almost exclusively using theoretical models first developed in the literature on party organisational development in Western Europe.…”

“…13 Similar conclusions are reached by Kopecky in his detailed survey of party organisation in the Czech Republic, where both the Communist Party and the Christian Democratic Union-Czechoslovak People's Party, a former satellite party, stand out because of the size and density of their organisational networks and the loyalty and stability of their electorates. 14 Szczerbiak's regionally-based analysis of Polish party organisation in 1997 too reveals 'a sharp contrast between the two 'successor' parties and the three 'new' parties' with the former enjoying 'a relatively robust level of membership, organisation and material resources compared with those completely 'new' parties that have emerged since 1989'. 15 Although analysts disagree over the scope and importance of organisational dissimilarities between 'successor' and 'new' parties, 16 on first examination the anomaly seems a relatively simple one, explicable in terms of the 'organisational inheritance' and cultural continuity from the communist regime and, in some cases, the pre-communist period.…”

“…9 Moreover, it is clear that levels of party membership, organisational density, voter-party identification and social implantation in East Central Europe are, in almost all cases, significantly inferior to those in both Western and Southern Europe. 10 Viewed in terms of internal power relationships too, in many cases, there is significant concentration and overlapping of party 456 • Seán Hanley and state/parliamentary elites, who seem to enjoy significant autonomy. 11 Thus as in Poland, so in the region generally, it seems that parties 'exhibit more of the characteristics evident in contemporary models of party organisation -catch-all, electoral-professional and cartel -than those of the traditional mass party'.…”

“…10 Viewed in terms of internal power relationships too, in many cases, there is significant concentration and overlapping of party 456 • Seán Hanley and state/parliamentary elites, who seem to enjoy significant autonomy. 11 Thus as in Poland, so in the region generally, it seems that parties 'exhibit more of the characteristics evident in contemporary models of party organisation -catch-all, electoral-professional and cartel -than those of the traditional mass party'. 12 However, when empirical data on party membership and organisation in East Central European states are examined in detail a more complex picture emerges.…”

Party Arenas in Slovenia and Slovakia

“…The organizational structure and the position of such CEE parties in the CEE countries tend to be on a different level than that in the Western countries. In opposition to Western democracies, the CEE countries present (Kitschelt, 1992;Kopecký, 1995;Mair, 1996;Lewis, 1994):…”