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Political Recruitment and Party Structure: A Case Study*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 August 2014

Lester G. Seligman
Lester G. Seligman*
Affiliation:
University of Oregon
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Extract

The recruitment of political candidates is a basic function of political parties: a party that cannot attract and then nominate candidates surrenders its elemental opportunity for power. Two stages may conveniently be distinguished in the process of recruitment. Certification includes the social screening and political channeling that results in eligibility for candidacy, while selection includes the actual choice of candidates to represent parties in the general election. Selection is at the focus of the contest for power within parties, and is my focus here.

Considering its importance we know too little about the dynamics of the nominating process. Most of what we do know derives from the analysis of two modal institutional types of political selection: the convention system and the primary system. Experience indicates that despite their manifest purposes, these contrasting institutional types have not necessarily resulted in widely different internal party structures. A variety of party patterns in one-party states—from the tightly controlled machines in Virginia to the transient and multiple factionalism of Florida—flourish in the framework of the direct primary system. Patterns of diffusing factionalism on the one hand, and of disciplined party organizations on the other are also found in states without primaries. Perhaps a closer look at the active participants in the processes of selection, and their interrelationships, may shed some further light on significant factorsin party structure. By interviewing candidates in party primaries we hoped to disclose the steps in nomination and the precise political relationships involved.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 55 , Issue 1 , March 1961 , pp. 77 - 86
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1961

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Footnotes

*

Grateful acknowledgment is made to the Political Behavior Committee of the Social Science Research Council for a grant that made this research possible. Neither the Council nor the Committee is responsible for the content. I am indebted also for the assistance of Gary Field and Darrell Wilson, Fellows in the Department of Political Science, University of Oregon. I received assistance, too, from the Graduate Council of the University of Oregon.

References

1 Schattschneider, E. E., Party Government (New York, 1940), p. 64 Google Scholar; MacDonald, Neil, The Study of Political Parties (New York, 1955), p. 25 Google Scholar; Neumann, S., ed., Modern Political Parties (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1956), p. 397 Google Scholar; Leiserson, A., Parties and Politics (New York, 1958), ch. 3Google Scholar; McKenzie, R. T., “Parties, Pressure Groups and British Political Parties” Pol. Q., Vol. 39 (1958), p. 7 Google Scholar.

2 In the machine-convention type, candidates are chosen by the party elite, using several criteria: (1) readiness for nomination as demonstrated by long service in party positions at graduated levels of party organization; (2) strong acceptability to the party's potential electoral support; (3) loyalty to party organization leadership; (4) conformity to an organizational code; (5) representativeness of an ethnic, religious group, or geographic area. More democratic entry is expressed in the idealized model of the direct primary. In a general way, the primary may be characterized as follows: (1) The party electorate chooses the candidates. (2) All candidates may freely enter into the selection contest. (3) No group or individual controls access to the party electorate. (4) The party officials and organization are formally neutral in the selection process.

3 Key, V. O., Southern Politics (New York, 1949), pp. 410–12Google Scholar.

4 Lockard, D., New England State Politics (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1959)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

5 Key, V. O., Politics, Parties and Pressure Groups (New York, 1956), p. 416 Google Scholar.

6 Seligman, L., “A Prefatory Analysis of Leadership Selection in Oregon,” Western Pol. Q., Vol. 12 (03, 1959), p. 167 Google Scholar.

7 Some of the questions follow: (1) With whom did you first discuss your candidacy? (2) What was the response of these people? (3) Did you make the first move about your candidacy, or were you solicited? (4) Whose support (name individuals and/or groups) were you most interested in obtaining? Candidates were also questioned about their expectations of party competition from the opposing party in the general election.

8 “Political Opportunity and Political Mobility,” M. A. thesis by Darrell Wilson, Department of Political Science, University of Oregon, 1960 Google Scholar.

9 Looked at in another light, however, there may be a virtue in free wheeling recruitment groups. A prevailing ideology extols party “integration” and “responsibility,” while political entrepreneurship is dismissed as unprogrammatic and irresponsible. What may be overlooked is that in contexts of considerable social and economic change, a political environment conducive to political entrepreneurship may be highly functional. Individuals and small groups that can respond to new social and political opportunity may be catalytic agents of political change. By not having resistant and cohesive organizations, parties may thus develop greater responsiveness to such social changes.

10 Seligman, L., “Recruitment in Politics”, PROD, Vol. 1 (03, 1958), pp. 14–17 Google Scholar.

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