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Country or party? Variations in party membership around the globe

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 June 2022

Emilie van Haute Open the ORCID record for Emilie van Haute [Opens in a new window]  and
Pedro Floriano Ribeiro
Emilie van Haute*
Affiliation:
Centre d’étude de la vie Politique (Cevipol), Université Libre de Bruxelles, Avenue F.D. Roosevelt 50 – CP124, B – 1050, Brussels, Belgium
Pedro Floriano Ribeiro
Affiliation:
Federal University of São Carlos, São Paulo, Brazil
*
*E-mail: emilie.van.haute@ulb.be
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Abstract

This paper explores external (country-level) and internal (party-level) drivers of membership variations across parties. Relying on the Political Party Database combined with other datasets, we provide original, cross-sectional analyses of membership variation across 223 parties in 38 countries, innovatively covering third-wave democracies, post-communist countries, and advanced democracies. It allows for a unique analysis of recruitment patterns of parties under quite different contexts. Departing from the dominant view that parties are the powerless victims of external trends, we show that, while context matters, parties’ choices regarding affiliation rules and organization structure also matter. They are more powerful determinants of membership ratios than country-level variables. Especially, the representation of sub-groups in the party structure is a key driver of membership recruitment. We also show how party origins, and the foundational environment in which they emerged, are important to understand how membership varies across parties today. Overall, this study strongly advocates for a broad comparative, multilevel approach to party membership.

Keywords

party membershipparty organizationrepresentationincentivesparty members
Type
Research Article
Information
European Political Science Review , Volume 14 , Issue 3 , August 2022 , pp. 281 - 295
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of European Consortium for Political Research

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