Article contents
Do Parties Matter? The Impact of Parties on the Key Decisions in the Political System*
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 March 2014
Extract
TO AN ORDINARY DEMOCRATIC CITIZEN THE QUESTION ‘DO parties matter’ might seem a typical pseudoproblem of scholars. Everybody knows that parties matter, otherwise nobody would leave home on election day and cast his vote. Even the enlightened politicians have hardly any doubts that parties matter. When Margaret Thatcher was asked before her first electoral victory what her access to power would change in Britain, she answered in one word: ‘everything’. This means that she firmly believed that parties almost exclusively matter in a political system. How did scholars come to ask such a stupid question – so contrary to democratic common sense? New and unfamiliar questions normally rise when a change of paradigm in science takes place. The change of aradigm in this case was the shift of attention from the study of politics to policy analysis.
- Type
- Articles
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © Government and Opposition Ltd 1984
References
1 Castles, F. G./McKinlay, R. D., ‘Public Welfare Provision. Scandinavia and the Sheer Futility of the Sociological Approach to Politics’, British Journal of Political Science, 1979, pp. 157–171 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Scase, R., Social Democracy in Capitalist Society, London, Croom Helm, 1977, pp. 162 ff.Google Scholar
2 Esping-Andersen, G., ‘Social Class, Social Democracy, and the State. Party Policy and Party Decomposition in Denmark and Sweden’, Comparative Politics, 1978, pp. 42–58.Google Scholar
3 Wilensky, H. L., ‘Leftism, Catholicism, and Democratic Corporatism: The Role of Political Parties in Recent Welfare State Development’, in Flora, P./ Heidenheimer, A. J. (eds), The Development of Welfare States in Europe and America, New Brunswick, Transaction Books, 1981, pp. 345–82 at p. 368.Google Scholar
4 W. Dewachter et al., ‘The Effect of the Opposition Parties on the Legislative Output in a Multi‐Party System. The Belgian Case from 1965 to 1971’, European Journal of Political Research, 1977, pp. 245–65 at p. 259.
5 Cazzola, F., Governo e opposizione nel Parlamento italiano, Milan, Giuffrè, 1974, p. 99.Google Scholar
6 Cf. Pesonen, P./Rantala, O., ‘Change and Stability in the Finnish Party System’, in Daalder, H. et al. (ed.), The Party Systems of Western Europe, London, Sage, 1983 Google Scholar, part 3 (in print).
7 Tarrow, S., Between Center and Periphery. Grassroots Politicians in Italy and France, New Haven, Yale UP, 1977, p. 256.Google Scholar
8 Katznelson, I., ‘Consideration on Social Democracy in the United States’, Comparative Politics, 1978, pp. 77–99.Google Scholar
9 Alber, J., Vom Armenhaus zum Wohlfahrtsstaat. Anaalysen zur Entwicklung der Sozialversicherung in Westeuropa, Frankfurt, Campus, 1982, p. 197.Google Scholar
10 Schmidt, M. G., Wohlfahrtsstaatliche Politik unter bürgerlichen und sozialdemokratischen Regierungen. Ein internationaler Vergleich, Frankfurt, Campus, 1982, pp. 211 ff.Google Scholar
11 Offe, C., ‘Competitive Democracy and the Keynesian Welfare State. Factors of Stability and Disorganization’, Policy Science, 1983, pp. 225–246.Google Scholar
12 von Beyme, K., ‘Neo-Corporatism. A New Nut in an Old Shell?’, International Political Science Review, 1983, pp. 173–96 at p. 191.Google Scholar
13 Heidenheimer, A. et al., Comparative Public Policy, London, Macmillan, 1976, p. 273.Google Scholar
14 Schmidt, M. G., CDU und SPD an der Regierung. Ein Vergleich iherer Politik in den Ländern, Frankfurt, Campus, 1980, p. 74.Google Scholar
15 Cameron, D. R., ‘The Expansion of Public Economy. A Comparative Analysis’, American Political Science Review, 1978, pp. 1243–1261.Google Scholar
16 von Beyme, K., Das Kulturdenkmal zwischen Wissenschaft und Politik. Deutsche Kunst‐ und Denkmalpflege, 1981, pp. 89–98.Google Scholar
17 Tufte, E. R., Political Control of the Economy, Princeton UP, 1978, p. 12.Google Scholar
18 Fry, B./Winters, R., ‘The Politics of Redistribution’, American Political Science Review, 1970, pp. 508–523.Google Scholar
19 Bunce, V., ‘Elite Succession. Petrification and Policy Innovation in Communist Systems’, Comparative Political Studies, 1976, pp. 3–42.Google Scholar
20 J. Kohl, ‘Trends and Problems in Postwar Public Expenditure Development in Western Europe and North America’, in Flora/Heidenheimber. op. cit. note 3, pp. 307–44 at p. 327
21 Kohl, ibid., p. 327.
22 Kohl, ibid., p. 321.
23 Bosanquet, N./Townsend, P. (eds), Labour and Equality. A Fabian Study of Labour in Power 1974‐1979, London, Heinemann, 1980, p. 10.Google Scholar
24 Pryor, F., Public Expenditures in Communist and Capitalist Nations, London, Allen & Unwin, 1968 Google Scholar. For a detailed criticism see von Beyme, K., Economics and Politics within Socialist Systems. A Comparative and Developmental Approach, New York, Praeger, 1982, pp. 332 ff.Google Scholar
25 Ibid., p. 31 et passim.
26 Hibbs, D. A. Jr., ‘Political Parties and Macroeconomic Policy’, American Political Science Review, 1977, pp. 1467–1478.Google Scholar
27 Stephens, J. D., The Transition from Capitalism to Socialism, London, Macmillan, 1979, p. 197.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
28 Parkin, F., Class Inequality and Political Order, London, Paladin, 1972, p. 121.Google Scholar
29 Jackman, R. W., ‘Parties and Income Inequality in Western Industrial Societies’, Journal of Politics, 1980, pp. 133–49, at p. 147Google Scholar.
30 Figures in A. Pelinka, Sozialdemokratie in Europa, Vienna, Herold, 1980, p. 108.
31 Cf. Scharpf, F. W. et al. Implementationsprobleme offensiver Arbeitsmarktpolitik, Frankfurt, 1982, pp. 155 ffGoogle Scholar. and unpublished papers by the same author.
32 R. Dahrendorf, Lebenschancen, Frankfurt, Suhrkamp, 1979, pp. 147 ff. Idem, , Die Chancen der Krise, Stuttgart, DVA, 1983. p. 59.Google Scholar
- 19
- Cited by