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This book examines the representativeness of party membership and
analyses the potential consequences of changing representativeness.
Parties with high membership ratios, as well as those experiencing
severe decline, are compared and examined across countries with
varying constitutional arrangements and party systems. The book
discusses whether changing representative capacities lead to
declining political representation of (group) interests, less
representative party candidate selection processes and declining
legitimacy for the political system. The book bridges two subareas
that are usually not in conversation with each other: literature on
the decline of party membership and that on group representation
(gender, ethnic minorities and other social groups). This text will
be of key interest to students and scholars of party politics,
political parties, representation and elections, and more broadly
to people interested in European and comparative politics.
Norway is by history and culture very much a Scandinavian nation
with its own unique profile. This book analyzes the factors that
have shaped the sociocultural fabric of Norwegian politics. One of
the most important themes Heidar analyzes is the power of the
periphery, both in social as well as geographic terms. In the
geographic sense, Norway is a small nation, and although it has
been able to remain economically and politically stable, it is
situated on the European flank. It is therefore dependent upon and
vulnerable to external economic and political developments. In
critical periods of its history, Norway's size has made it an
object rather than an initiator of change. In the social sense,
Norway has existed as a ?periphery nation?. It is this
multi-dimensional center-periphery situation that has been crucial
in shaping institutional structures and practices. Another theme
that Heidar explores is Norway's enduring egalitarian culture. This
book focuses on the primacy of politics in Norway and the role
played by the nineteenth-century peasant movement and the
twentieth-century labor movement in shaping modern Norway. Today,
political and cultural traditions are challenged by the force of
globalization. Norway is defined as a stable, parliamentary,
multiparty system with a social democratic tradition. It was named
a Choice Outstanding Academic Book of 2001.
Parliamentary party groups are central actors in most European
democracies. This volume analyzes the manifestations and operations
of these actors across thirteen different countries and in the
European parliament. The partisan groups in parliament form the
link between mass suffrage, parties and parliaments, and are
generally accepted today as necessary instruments of parliamentary
business. The study of parliamentary party groups (PPGs) is
connected with our understanding of liberal, representative
democracy. Moreover, debates about the contempt and apathy towards
contemporary politics and politicians, in which the alleged gap
between voters and representatives, a decline in trust in the
political elite, and complaints about partitocrazia prominently
figure, have put PPGs in the limelight. How do MPs deal with the
tension between being a representative of the people and a member
of a political party? And how do they fulful their task to control
government when fellow partisans are participating in that
government? This book reveals that PPGs have increasing importance.
The "parliamentary party complexes", resulting from the growing
generosity of the state, and the
Norway is by history and culture very much a Scandinavian nation
with its own unique profile. This book analyzes the factors that
have shaped the sociocultural fabric of Norwegian politics. One of
the most important themes Heidar analyzes is the power of the
periphery, both in social as well as geographic terms. In the
geographic sense, Norway is a small nation, and although it has
been able to remain economically and politically stable, it is
situated on the European flank. It is therefore dependent upon and
vulnerable to external economic and political developments. In
critical periods of its history, Norway's size has made it an
object rather than an initiator of change. In the social sense,
Norway has existed as a "periphery nation." It is this
multi-dimensional center-periphery situation that has been crucial
in shaping institutional structures and practices. Another theme
that Heidar explores is Norway's enduring egalitarian culture. This
book focuses on the primacy of politics in Norway and the role
played by the nineteenth-century peasant movement and the
twentieth-century labor movement in shaping modern Norway. Today,
political and cultural traditions are challenged by the force of
globalization. Norway is defined as a stable, parliamentary,
multiparty system with a social democratic tradition. It was named
a Choice Outstanding Academic Book of 2001.
This book examines the representativeness of party membership and
analyses the potential consequences of changing representativeness.
Parties with high membership ratios, as well as those experiencing
severe decline, are compared and examined across countries with
varying constitutional arrangements and party systems. The book
discusses whether changing representative capacities lead to
declining political representation of (group) interests, less
representative party candidate selection processes and declining
legitimacy for the political system. The book bridges two subareas
that are usually not in conversation with each other: literature on
the decline of party membership and that on group representation
(gender, ethnic minorities and other social groups). This text will
be of key interest to students and scholars of party politics,
political parties, representation and elections, and more broadly
to people interested in European and comparative politics.
Political parties provide continuity at the elite level and among
the mass electorate in times when "populist" forces threaten the
stability of many western democracies. The parties, however, have
experienced turbulent times with declining memberships among the
established parties, volatile electorates and the emergence of new
parties. This edited collection aims to make an analytical
contribution to what "party democracy" means, how to study it and
add to our knowledge of who the party members are, what they do and
how influential they are in policy-making processes. Clearly,
elections provide linkage at regular intervals. Does party
membership, even after membership decline, provide a supplementary,
representative linkage that supports democracy and stability in
"post-cleavage" societies? Nordic party systems have kept central
elements of their old "five party systems", with (mostly) large
social democratic parties and a variable geometry of the
conservative, liberal, agrarian and left socialist forces. They
have experienced the electoral rise of new parties and - in
particular - the increasing strength of vote-catching,
anti-establishment parties; in most countries nurtured by
anti-immigration sentiments. In contrast to much recent
scholarship, this book investigates the stable element in Nordic
mass politics, namely the parties as membership organisations: How
many members? Why do they join parties? How much do they
participate? Do they experience political influence? The overall
question is to what extent the party organizations, which have been
heavily "statified" by public subsidies, keep up linkage to civil
society through their membership.
Political parties provide continuity at the elite level and among
the mass electorate in times when "populist" forces threaten the
stability of many western democracies. The parties, however, have
experienced turbulent times with declining memberships among the
established parties, volatile electorates and the emergence of new
parties. This edited collection aims to make an analytical
contribution to what "party democracy" means, how to study it and
add to our knowledge of who the party members are, what they do and
how influential they are in policy-making processes. Clearly,
elections provide linkage at regular intervals. Does party
membership, even after membership decline, provide a supplementary,
representative linkage that supports democracy and stability in
"post-cleavage" societies? Nordic party systems have kept central
elements of their old "five party systems", with (mostly) large
social democratic parties and a variable geometry of the
conservative, liberal, agrarian and left socialist forces. They
have experienced the electoral rise of new parties and - in
particular - the increasing strength of vote-catching,
anti-establishment parties; in most countries nurtured by
anti-immigration sentiments. In contrast to much recent
scholarship, this book investigates the stable element in Nordic
mass politics, namely the parties as membership organisations: How
many members? Why do they join parties? How much do they
participate? Do they experience political influence? The overall
question is to what extent the party organizations, which have been
heavily "statified" by public subsidies, keep up linkage to civil
society through their membership.
This book examines whether parties' ability to channel voter
interests into political institutions has in fact declined in the
wake of decline of party membership figures and the increase of
state finance of parties. It first looks at relevant empirical
studies to summarize what we already know. Second, it presents an
in-depth study of Norwegian voters and parties, based on a number
of voter, member and parliamentarian surveys conducted between 1990
and 2010. The existing literature is scarce and indecisive, whereas
the Norwegian parties still seem to represent voters fairly well,
despite the waning of mass parties. The party organizations-the
members, activists, and representatives-continue to channel voter
opinions into the Parliament. This book argues that the high and
persistent policy congruence between voters and parties revealed
might be related to party members and mid-level activists still
resemble voters socially and politically to a large degree. At the
same time, the party competition for votes is also still relatively
efficient, and there appears to be some interaction in terms of
what happens within party organizations and the stimuli offered by
competing parties. Hence, this book challenges the "decline
thesis". It argues that parties can continue to represent, even
"after the mass party". At the same time, it suggests that the
persistence of the formal representative structures and the closed
candidate selection processes that you still find in Norway and
elsewhere could make some parties somewhat more resistant to
representative decline than others.
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