Description
Book SynopsisRepresentation and party politics is one of the core themes of the comparatvie study of politics. What function do parties serve? What is the essential relationship between people and parties? Are parties simply a way of reproducing a political elite that rules and governs? These are some of the questions Graham asks in his analysis of our understandings of political parties, their internal structures and external realtions.
While surveying a rich literature on parties and party systems, emphasizing the continuing relevance of earlier writings, the author sets out the main problems that should be addressed in the study of political parties. We are then lucidly led through a range of empirical cases illustrating party performance in relation to electoral behaviour, and introduced to a range of theoretically-driven models of performance, behaviour and recruitment. The book culminates in a superb discussion of factionalism within parties, and an epxloration of populism in mass po
Trade Review
"Representation and Party Politics is an impressive tour de force which combines the skills of the historian and the sociologist in order to analyse the organization and evolution of political parties from three continents. Running through the complezities of internal party factions and rallies is a framework that strikes a fine balance between the individual actor driven by the amoral quest for power and the organization that seeks to achieve cohesion by constraining such behaviour through ideology and party discipline. The fact that in spite of this parties sometimes do collapse and rallies take over, only provides a window to the complexity of the political context within which parties are ensconced. Its comparative and cross-cultural framework, engaging style and scholarly range should make it compulsory reading for anyone seriously interested in the secret life of political parties." Dr Subrata K. Mitra, the University of Hull
"This is not only a valuable comparative and historical treatment of party politics, it also incorporates a number a useful case-studies, notably of political parties in France and India." Professor C. A. Bayly, St Catharine's College, Cambridge
Table of ContentsPart I 1. Representative Politics and the Advent of Organized Parties 2. Theories of Party Systems 3. Party Systems in the Abstract 4. Parties as Organizations Part II: Rallies and Parties 5. Exceptional Leaders and Democratic Order 6. The Experience of Rally Politics 7. Rally Politics in France since 1940 Part III: Politics within Parties 8. Conflict and Competition within Parties 9. Conflict within the French Socialist Parties 10. Conflict in the Congress Party of the Uttar Pradesh 11. Sectionalism and Intra-Party Conflict 12. The Stability of Parties 13. Conclusion Footnote References. Table I. India National Congress: Membership Figures of Uttar Pradesh Unit, 1961-1966.
