Promoting Parties and Party Systems in New Democracies: Is There Anything the ‘International Community’ Can Do?

Abstract

A consensus exists among political scientists that parties and competitive party systems are central to democracy and essential agents of democratization. But following early statements of the challenges of democratic transition we have come to appreciate how difficult is the crafting of durable parties and appropriate forms of plural politics in new and emerging democracies. Thus Mainwaring’s (1998) survey concluded that many ‘third wave’ democracies have only weakly institutionalized party systems: the parties have shallow roots and tenuous links to organized interests; they enjoy fragile legitimacy; many parties’ popularity is short-lived. The quality of democracy and the prospects for democratic consolidation both suffer. Others identify the drawbacks of excessive pluralism, claiming that although political factions can help new parties to emerge, persistent factionalism frustrates democratic stability and consolidation (Gillespie et al., 1995). In contrast in Africa the problem is more the persistence of dominant party systems and ineffective opposition (Bogaards, 2000).