In one of his last publications, Peter Mair documented how party membership had declined
substantially in virtually all European democracies. As his collaborators on this piece, it …

For decades, scholars have sought to understand why citizens join political parties and what
influence can be achieved through party membership. Whether we think of political parties …

Imagine two different kinds of political party. One is a skeletal organization, intermittently
active. Constituency associations exist throughout the country, but most of the time the party …

The study of parties and party systems still constitutes one of the largest and most active
subfields within comparative politics (for example, Janda, 1993). It is also a study which …

Until recent years, two major trends in European politics‐the growth of state services and
increased political participation‐have complemented the central role of parties. This paper …

While the collapse of party membership in the last half‐century has consumed much of the
focus of party scholarship, the notion of membership itself is surprisingly under‐theorised …

In Continental Europe a New Debate Has Emerged Over the interpretation of the major
changes that have taken place in political parties during the 1990s. A 'fourth wave'of …

This article reports a comprehensive overview of new data on the levels of individual
membership of political parties in twenty contemporary European democracies. Among the …

From Duverger onward, students of party organization have failed to address systematically
the question of what party members actually do for 'mass' parties. This article argues that a …