The Development of Political Party Models in Western Europe:
Katz and Mair’s Approach to Modern Party Organization

Introduction

In recent years more than ever, it has become clear that European party systems and European politics itself are characterized by an extensive change. With the economical, cultural and social changes in most of the countries and with the rapid expansion of the European Union, parties face a big number of alterations according to which they have to adjust their focuses and structures. The long term consequences of these changes are varied; some parties quickly emerge, others suddenly decline, the level of volatility is rising and it is evident that generally the vulnerability of political parties is constantly growing. The changes also shape the electorate’s behaviour as is demonstrated by the falling levels of party identification since the 1990s. The increasing number of effects of socio-economic, cultural and technological developments appear to have eroded the once steady cleavage structures in most European societies, on which voting loyalties were based and not only reformed the structures of political parties but also redefined the relationship between them, the states and societies (Mair&Smith:1990:1).

This change has resulted in the demand for attention in recent years to be turned towards the research of political party organization and the study of different party models both with regard to the theoretical importance of them and to the dominant positions parties actually take in the functioning of political democracies. Still, in the traditional area of concern most of the significant research on political parties in Western Europe dates back to after the World War II and since then the process of the evolvement of political parties has been tracked by many different scholars (Maisel&Cooper:1978:7).

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