How Do Mainstream Parties ‘Become’ Mainstream, and Pariah Parties ‘Become’ Pariahs? Conceptualizing the Processes of Mainstreaming and Pariahing in the Labelling of Political Parties

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-19
Author(s):  
Benjamin Moffitt

Abstract How does a political party become ‘mainstream’? And what makes some parties receive arguably the opposite designation – ‘pariah party’? This conceptual article examines the processes by which parties’ mainstream or pariah status must be constructed, negotiated and policed, not only by political scientists in the pursuit of case selection, but by several actors actively involved in the political process, including media actors and political parties themselves. It explains how these actors contribute to these processes of ‘mainstreaming’ and ‘pariahing’, considers their motivations and provides illustrative examples of how such processes take place. As such, the article moves beyond the literature on the ways in which mainstream parties seek to deal with or respond to threats from a variety of pariah parties, instead paying attention to how those parties have been constructed as pariahs in the first place, and how these processes simultaneously contribute to the maintenance of mainstream party identities.

2021 ◽  
Vol 27 (5) ◽  
pp. 63-67
Author(s):  
T. Beydina ◽  
◽  
N. Zimina ◽  
A. Novikova ◽  
◽  
...  

Political parties today are important elements of the regional political process. Parties, along with other political institutions, participate in the implementation of state policy within the region. The practice of recent years shows a negative trend in the creation of political parties, but those parties that are already registered and are actively fighting for political power at all stages of the Russian elections. Political parties participate in the regional political process to embrace the advantages of the political party space. These advantages are due to both objective factors (territorial potential, the economy of the region) and subjective reasons (personal factors associated with the rating of the leader, both the governor and the party coordinator, the nature of his acquaintance with the central financial department, and more). The study of the organization of power in the regions allows us to talk about its various modifications due to these factors. Political parties are a political institution, they represent an ideological, conceptual, personnel and electoral resource of any government. Regional branches of political parties in today’s political situation fully personify the needs of the regions and represent them at elections. They reflect regional interests, as well as the degree of democracy of the regional government


1994 ◽  
Vol 9 (0) ◽  
pp. 105-116
Author(s):  
Kyung Woo Chang

Korean society is struggling with confusion and pains on the direction to reform our political institution. We should establish the political party and election system that encourages general public to participate in political process freely. This paper reviews the problems in current system and suggests some ideas for the amendment in politics-related laws to achieve political development. The Political Party Act limits the freedom of political activities and access of general public to political parties. It should allow employees in school and mass media and labor union to participate in political parties. Political parties should shift power from central party to district parties. The National Assembly Members Election Act allows major parties to over-represent in national constituency and the disparity between the percentage of votes and seats a party obtains should be reduced. Public management of election affairs should be changed in order to increase the scope of freedom for election campaigns. Most official political funds are distributed to governing party and opposition parties have difficulties in collecting funds. The Political Funds Act should be amended to achieve more equal distribution of political funds among political parties.


1992 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 123-145
Author(s):  
Sheldon Maram

Brazilian specialists have long recognised the importance of the 1960 presidential elections, which set in motion a process that culminated in a 21—year military dictatorship. Only in 1989 did Brazilians witness once again the direct election of a president. Nonetheless, scholarly literature on this event is sparse and often tends toward the ahistorical view that the election of Jânio Quadros in 1960 was part of an inexorable process. Almost entirely ignored are the reasons why Brazil's largest political party, the Partido Social Democrático or PSD, nominated for president a weak candidate, Marshal of the Brazilian Army Henrique Teixeira Lott.1Clearly, Lott himself was not part of a praetorian guard that imposed his candidacy. Indeed, the Marshal was a reluctant candidate, who offered to withdraw in October 1959 in favour of a ‘national unity candidate’.2 In my view Lott's nomination had much more to do with a complex series of manoeuvres carried out by Brazil's president Juscelino Kubitschek (1956–61) than with his own actions. For Kubitschek, the political parties and presidential aspirants in 1960 were merely pawns in his highly personalistic vision of the political process. Constitutionally barred from seeking immediate re—election, Kubitschek initially manoeuvred to induce his party, the PSD, not to run its own presidential candidate. When this effort failed, he displayed, at the very least, ambivalence regarding the fate of the party's candidate.An analysis of Kubitschek's actions and motivations presents methodological challenges to the historian. Historians traditionally rely heavily on written documentation to support their analysis of actions and motivations.


2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Desriadi Desriadi

Abstract Individual candidacy in local elections is expected to produce more aspirational, qualified, and strongly committed regional leaders. Individual candidates in the Regional Head Election are also an alternative to accommodate the human rights of every Indonesian Citizen who does not run through a political party. The existence of individual candidates will surely break the partitocracy (political party dominated democracy) and the oligarchy of political parties so that the aspirations of the bottom get a place in the political process. With the allowance of individual candidates, it will enable the birth of candidates from the public who are considered more qualified public than just a figure who carried a handful of political party elites. On the other hand, the increased support of the people towards the existence of individual candidates should be seen as an effort to increase people's political participation in the regional head elections and the implementation of more accommodative and democratic regional elections. Up to now it should be recognized that the nomination of regional head is dominated by political parties. The absence of a transparent and democratic recruitment system led to this process being influenced more by political party elites and political brokers. The position of the political party becomes very central because all candidates must pass there and of course a candidate will not get the ticket of the political party for free. With the regulation allowing individual candidates will directly push the process of internal democratization of political parties to be more selective and democratic in determining the candidates. The type of research conducted is descriptive qualitative research, namely research conducted describes the situation of elections of regional heads. The analysis conducted in this research is qualitative analysis by drawing deductive conclusions that is drawing conclusions from things that are general to things that are special. Keywords: pemilukada, regional autonomy Abstrak Pencalonan perseorangan dalam pemilihan kepala daerah diharapkan menghasilkan pemimpin daerah yang lebih aspiratif, berkualitas, dan berkomitmen kuat menyejahterakan rakyat. Calon perseorangan dalam Pilkada juga sebagai alternatif untuk mengakomodasi Hak Asasi Manusia (HAM) politik setiap Warga Negara Indonesia (WNI) yang tidak mencalonkan diri melalui partai politik. Adanya calon perseorangan tentunya akan mendobrak partitokrasi (demokrasi yang didominasi partai politik) dan oligarki partai politik agar aspirasi dari bawah mendapatkan tempat dalam proses politik. Dengan diperkenankannya calon perseorangan, maka akan memungkinkan lahirnya calon dari masyarakat yang dianggap publik lebih berkualitas daripada sekedar figur yang diusung segelintir elit partai politik. Di sisi lain, meningkatnya dukungan rakyat terhadap keberadaan calon perseorangan harus dilihat sebagai upaya meningkatkan partisipasi politik rakyat dalam pemilihan kepala daerah dan terselenggaranya pemilihan kepala daerah yang lebih akomodatif dan demokratis. Hingga kini harus diakui pencalonan kepala daerah lebih banyak didominasi partai politik. Tidak adanya sistem rekuitmen yang transparan dan demokratis menyebabkan proses ini lebih banyak dipengaruhi oleh elit partai politik dan para broker politik. Posisi partai politik menjadi sangat sentral karena semua calon harus lewat sana dan tentunya seorang calon tak akan memperoleh tiket partai politik tersebut dengan gratis. Dengan adanya regulasi yang memperkenankan calon perseorangan secara langsung akan mendorong proses demokratisasi internal partai politik untuk lebih selektif dan demokratis dalam menentukan calon-calonnya. Jenis Penelitian yang dilakukan adalah penelitian deskriptif kualitatif, yaitu penelitian yang dilakukan menggambarkan situasi pemilihan kepala daerah. Analisis yang dilakukan dalam penelitian ini adalah analisis kualitatif dengan menarik kesimpulan secara deduktif yaitu menarik kesimpulan dari hal-hal yang bersifat umum kepada hal-hal yang bersifat khusus. Kata Kunci : pemilukada, otonomi daerah


2021 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 52-56
Author(s):  
N. Zimina ◽  

Modern political parties and their regional branches become an integral part of the political system of society, an important participant in public administration. They have their own organizational and legal basis, have their own charter, program, leaders, their own goals and objectives, and perform certain functions. One of the goals of any political party is to participate in the political life of society, in solving its issues. One of the party’s tasks is to participate in public administration, as a means of representing the interests of the population during elections at various levels and in the inter-election period. Political parties are a political institution and represent the ideological, conceptual, personnel and electoral resources of any government. The analysis of the political parties’ functionality shows how dynamic they are and how they follow their statutory goals and objectives. In this context, the research interest is the political parties’ functionality in the regional political process in the light of the changing legal field. The adopted amendments to the federal legislation on elections and on political parties have radically changed a number of conditions governing the procedure for the establishment and functioning of political parties and their regional branches in the regional dimension. The amendments made to the federal law “On Political Parties” have changed the conditions for the creation and operation of political parties, in particular, the minimum number of members of a political party when it is created has been reduced to 500 members; the approaches to voting have been changed. These changes correspond to the state of the modern political process and are aimed at the development of political institutions, including political parties


2021 ◽  
Vol 27 (6) ◽  
pp. 58-62
Author(s):  
N. Zimina ◽  

The basis of the political analysis of political parties is the observance of the relevant norms regulating the activities of the party, the formation of their goals and objectives. Political parties have their own organizational and legal basis, have their own charter, program, leaders, their own goals and objectives and perform certain functions. One of the goals of any political party is to participate in the political life of society, in solving its issues. One of the tasks of the party is to participate in public administration by representing the interests of the population during the elections of various levels. The legislative field regulating political parties is constantly being updated; laws are being amended in accordance with the realities of society’s life. The adopted amendments to the federal legislation on elections and on political parties have radically changed a number of conditions regulating the procedure for the creation and functioning of political parties, setting their goals and defining tasks. Today, approaches to the formation and activity of political organizations, including parties, have been largely changed, for example, the procedure for creating a political party has been changed, now only 500 members are needed when creating it; approaches to voting have been changed. These changes correspond to the state of the modern political process and are aimed at the development of political institutions, including political parties. The definition of the goals and objectives of the party is within the competence of its statutory documents and is reflected in the party’s program. In general, the setting of the goals and objectives of the party determines its main areas of activity and its essence


Author(s):  
Piero Ignazi

Chapter 3 investigates the process of party formation in France, Germany, Great Britain, and Italy, and demonstrates the important role of cultural and societal premises for the development of political parties in the nineteenth century. Particular attention is paid in this context to the conditions in which the two mass parties, socialists and Christian democrats, were established. A larger set of Western European countries included in this analysis is thoroughly scrutinized. Despite discontent among traditional liberal-conservative elites, full endorsement of the political party was achieved at the beginning of the twentieth century. Particular attention is paid to the emergence of the interwar totalitarian party, especially under the guise of Italian and German fascism, when ‘the party’ attained its most dominant influence as the sole source and locus of power. The chapter concludes by suggesting hidden and unaccounted heritages of that experience in post-war politics.


Author(s):  
Piero Ignazi

Chapter 1 introduces the long and difficult process of the theoretical legitimation of the political party as such. The analysis of the meaning and acceptance of ‘parties’ as tools of expressing contrasting visions moves forward from ancient Greece and Rome where (democratic) politics had first become a matter of speculation and practice, and ends up with the first cautious acceptance of parties by eighteenth-century British thinkers. The chapter explores how parties or factions have been constantly considered tools of division of the ‘common wealth’ and the ‘good society’. The holist and monist vision of a harmonious and compounded society, stigmatized parties and factions as an ultimate danger for the political community. Only when a new way of thinking, that is liberalism, emerged, was room for the acceptance of parties set.


Author(s):  
Benjamin von dem Berge ◽  
Thomas Poguntke

This chapter introduces a new, two-dimensional way of measuring intra-party democracy (IPD). It is argued that assembly-based IPD and plebiscitary IPD are two theoretically different modes of intra-party decision-making. Assembly-based IPD means that discussion and decision over a certain topic takes place at the same time. Plebiscitary IPD disconnects the act of voting from the discussion over the alternatives that are put to a vote. In addition, some parties have opened up plebiscitary decision-making to non-members which is captured by the concept of open plebiscitary IPD. Based on the Political Party Database Project (PPDB) dataset, indices are developed for the three variants of IPD. The empirical analyses here show that assembly-based and plebiscitary IPD are combined by political parties in different ways while open party plebiscites are currently a rare exception.


Author(s):  
Annika Hennl ◽  
Simon Tobias Franzmann

The formulation of policies constitutes a core business of political parties in modern democracies. Using the novel data of the Political Party Database (PPDB) Project and the data of the Manifesto Project (MARPOR), the authors of this chapter aim at a systematic test of the causal link between the intra-party decision mode on the electoral manifestos and the extent of programmatic change. What are the effects of the politics of manifesto formulation on the degree of policy change? Theoretically, the authors distinguish the drafting process from the final enactment of the manifesto. Empirically, they show that a higher autonomy of the party elite in formulating the manifesto leads to a higher degree of programmatic change. If party members constrain party elite’s autonomy, they tend to veto major changes.


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