Review: The Life of the Party
Author(s): Sheri Berman
Source: Comparative Politics, Vol. 30, No. 1 (Oct., 1997), pp. 101-122
Published by: Ph.D. Program in Political Science of the City University of New York
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Review Article
The Life of the Party
Sheri Berman
Paul R. Abramsonand Ronald Inglehart,ValueChange in Global Perspective, Ann
Arbor,University of Michigan Press, 1995.
HerbertKitschelt, The Transformationof EuropeanSocial Democracy, New York,
CambridgeUniversity Press, 1994.
Kay Lawson, ed., How Political Parties Work.Perspectives from Within,Westport,
Praeger, 1994.
Andrei S. Markovits and Philip S. Gorski, The German Left. Red, Green, and
Beyond, New York, Oxford University Press, 1993.
Duringthe 1970s politics in the advancedindustrializednations seemed to be undergoing a fundamentaltransformation.After over two decades of economic growth
and political stability, "things startedto unravel."'Established coalitions, parties,
and programswere found wanting; new forms of political organizationemerged;
voters' loyalties seemed to have been ripped from their moorings. The very nature
of political participation and competition, in short, appeared to be changing.
"Virtuallyeverywhereamong the industrializeddemocracies,"scholars noted, "the
old orderis crumbling."2 A majorcasualtyof the tumult,furthermore,seemed to be
one of the hardieststandbysof western political life, the party. "It may be that the
institutionof the partyis graduallydisappearing,"some said, "slowly being replaced
by new political structures."3Others worried whether democracy itself might be
endangeredas a result. "Throughoutthe twentieth century, the strengthof democracy has varied with the strengthof political parties.... The decay of partysystems
... poses the question:How viable is democraticgovernmentwithoutpartiesor with
greatly weakened . .. parties?"4
Academic studentsof politics, accordingly,scurriedto keep pace. Whereassocial
scientists in the 1950s and 1960s tried to explain electoral stability,their successors
in the 1970s and 1980s triedto explain the sources and trajectoryof electoralvolatil101
ComparativePolitics October 1997
ity and party development.5Many argued that parties of the left were particularly
vulnerable,but since the crisis appearedto be a cross-nationalphenomenon,scholars
looked increasingly for answers to broad structural variables that shaped the
environmentsin which parties operated. What came to be the single most widely
accepted explanation(particularlyin the field of Europeanpolitics) was put forthby
RonaldInglehart,who arguedin a series of books and articles that the crisis was the
result of a "cultureshift" among westernpopulations.6
Especially in his early work, Inglehartrelied on psychologist AbrahamMaslow's
insight that "people work to fulfill a numberof differentneeds, which are pursued
in hierarchicalorder,accordingto theirrelativeurgencyfor survival."'Applying this
insight to the West's postwarboom, he claimed that, as prosperityallowed western
publics to fulfill their basic materialneeds, they began to pursue "postmaterialist"
goals, such as increasingthe role of citizens in the governing of their communities,
creating more humane and less impersonalsocieties, and improving the quality of
the environment.The troublesmainstreamparties faced duringthe 1970s, therefore,
were best understoodas political fallout from this broadshift in values; social democraticand laborpartieswere hit the hardestbecause many postmaterialistsfelt themselves to be on the left but did not share the traditionalleft's materialistagenda.
Inglehartpredicted,moreover,that postmaterialistvalues would increasinglydominate and reshapepolitics in western societies as economic deprivationcontinuedto
fade from memory.
On a theoretical level, however, many found such explanations unsatisfying,
because they focused exclusively on factors shaping parties' environments and
ignoredthe role played by the political actors themselves. It is now clear, moreover,
that the empiricalfacts of party system dynamics since the 1970s simply can not be
accounted for satisfactorilywithin a frameworkthat focuses almost exclusively on
the structuralenvironmentparties face. While the "value shift" noted by Inglehart
may have continued, the broad trends it was supposedly causing have not.
Traditionalparties are still with us; most of the "new"political organizationshave
faded away or grown "old"quickly; and the fortunesof individual left partieshave
varied significantlyfrom countryto country,dependingprimarilyon theirresponses
to the challenges they confronted.8
A new body of literature,which embodies a differenttheoreticalapproachto the
study of party developmentand electoral change, is emerging. It challenges not so
much the fact of the postmaterialistvalue shift as its significance, and it treatsparties
not simply as dependentvariables, the hapless victims of their economic or demographicenvironments,but also as independentvariables, the active shapersof their
own fates. The new literatureexamines country-level trends and variables in conjunction with cross-nationalones and explores the interactionbetween individual
partiesand theirenvironmentsratherthanfocusing exclusively on the characteristics
of eitherthe system or unit alone. Finally, one can draw from this new literaturesat102
Sheri Berman
isfying answersto the threecentralpuzzles aboutthe experiencesof the 1970s. What
was the crisis all about? Why were traditionalelectoral and political patternsdisruptedso dramatically?Why were some partiesable deal with these disruptionsbetter than others?
The postmaterialistvalue shift, from the perspectiveof the new literatureon parties, did not condemn traditionalparties to obsolescence but ratherpresentedthem
with challenges to overcome. The economic slowdown that hit all advanced industrial nations during the 1970s presentedeven greaterchallenges, and in retrospect
primarilythis latterblow triggeredthe political crisis. The key to understandingwhy
this exogenous shock created such grave problems for traditionalleft parties (and
fostered challengerslike the Greens), the new literaturecontends, lies in appreciating those parties' history and electoral appeal, whose very essence was called into
questionduringthe crisis. To explain why certainpartieswere able to respondbetter
than others, meanwhile, one has to look carefully inside the parties themselves, to
their institutionalstructures,ideological traditions,and leadership.And to understandwhy the "newpolitical organizations"grew old quickly, one has to relearnjust
what parties do to survive.
The new literatureon parties, in sum, suggests that the phenomena of the post1970s era can be explained only througha multilayeredtheoreticalapproachwhich
takes full accountnot only of history and nationalcontext, but also of the important
role parties themselves play in determiningtheir destinies. This essay will develop
these argumentsmore fully, focusing in particularon the case of the Europeanleft.
Before turningto the new literatureon parties,however, it is instructiveto examine
the latest offering from the postmaterialistcamp as an intellectualfoil.
Postmaterialism
In Value Change in Global Perspective, Inglehartand Paul Abramsonrespond to
previous critics and expand their analysis to countriesof the former Soviet empire
and the Third World. The book includes much interestingdata that should prove
extremely useful to comparative scholars. In accordance with Inglehart's earlier
work, the book focuses on a "socialization"hypothesis which argues that people's
basic values are shapedby the conditionsprevailingin their childhood.Generational
replacementis seen as the basic mechanism for the advance of value change. Postmaterialismis gaining ground because "[o]lder Europeanswith Materialistvalues
are continuously leaving these societies throughdeath, while younger cohorts with
Postmaterialistvalues are coming of age."' Estimating the rate at which older
cohortsare dwindlingand being replaced,the authorspredicta gradualbut continuous movement towardspostmaterialismin years to come.
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ComparativePolitics October 1997
Abramson and Inglehartargue that their data confirm the relationshipbetween
prosperityand postmaterialism.Although "therehave been short-termfluctuations
in values [which] ... result mainly from short-termchanges in economic conditions," they write, "thereis a clear and underlyingcomponent of long-termchange
as well."'' Despite periodic economic downturnsin the West, they conclude, the
underlying,unprecedentedprosperitycharacterizingpostwarindustrializedsocieties
continues to exert the dominantinfluence over value formation.As for the former
Soviet empire and the Third World, the authorsfind that the more rapid and successful the economic development process is, the more pronounced is the shift
towardspostmaterialism.
ValueChange in Global Perspective marshalsa greatdeal of evidence to support
a trendtowardspostmaterialistvalues, and the authorsassert that their findings are
"all the more impressive when one recalls that Inglehartwas making ex ante predictions, not expost predictionsin which a theorycan be designed to fit the observed
results.The theorypredictingthe shift to Postmaterialistvalues was publishedmany
years before most of the data used to test it had been collected."" Quoting Gabriel
Almond, the authorspoint out that "Inglehart'swork is one of the few examples of
successful predictionin political science."'2Nevertheless, the readeris left unsatisfied, because the practicalsignificance of the postmaterialistphenomenonremains
unclear.
By itself, a shift in values along the lines posited seems neitherparticularlysurprising nor unpredictable.It has long been accepted, for example, that the rise of
capitalismhad a formativeimpacton the developmentof western culture;it would
be strikingif the massive economic growthand social changesof the postwarera did
not also exert a large impacton the values and political attitudesof western publics.
Even the generationalargumentseems less than startling,as it has become almost
platitudinousto trace the Germandesire for financial stability to the events of the
interwaryears and to link the commitmentto Europeanintegrationof leaders such
as Kohl and Mitterrandto theirage cohort's experienceof the second world war and
its immediate aftermath.Much of political scientists' interest in the trend towards
postmaterialistvalues, therefore, concerns its purportedeffects on other political
phenomena,in particular,on the developmentof political parties, especially on the
left. Here, unfortunately,Value Change in Global Perspective is largely silent, perhaps because, when confrontedwith such questions, the postmaterialistthesis and
much of the literatureit generatedruns into trouble."
To the extent that socioeconomic development, culturalchange, and the rise of
postmaterialismwere the primaryforces behind recentpolitical changes, we should
see a relatively clear and close connection between these factors and the changing
fortunesof traditionalleft parties,yet no such connectionis visible. If unprecedented
postwarprosperitycaused a long-termshift in westernvalue structuresand led to the
problemsof the traditionalleft and the rise of the new left, then why were electoral
104
Sheri Berman
and political patternsdisruptedso dramaticallyonly in the 1970s and not earlieror
later?Similarly,on the basis of nationalsocioeconomic or attitudinaldata alone one
could not predictaccuratelyhow well individualtraditionalleft partieswould fare at
the polls: whethera new left challengerwould appearin the 1970s, and, if one did,
how successful it would be.
The disappointingempiricaltrackrecordof postmaterialismas a theoryof political change stems directly from its concentrationon broad socioeconomic and culturalfactors.Although these variablesare of course relevantto the fortunesof political parties,they would only tell the whole story if parties were essentially passive,
neutralvessels throughwhich social interestswere channeled and if they could be
counted on to react in similar ways to similar external stimuli. This view is indeed
implicit in much of the postmaterialistliteratureon parties(as well as in much political science theorizingin general).
Although Inglehartdeclaredthathis researchled him to believe in "the diminishing marginalutility of economic determinism"and "thedecline of Marxism,"in fact
his work encourageda type of partyanalysis quite similarto that of certainMarxists
and neo-Marxists.14 The latter often argue that the size of the traditionalworking
class is directlycorrelatedwith social democraticsuccess and concomitantlythatthe
numericaldecline in this class broughtabout by changes in capitalism over the last
decades is the most importantfactor behind these parties' electoral difficulties.
Postmaterialists, meanwhile, argue that "postindustrial"development and the
growth of a new (postmaterialist)class have been the key factorsbehind the decline
of old left and the rise of new left parties. In essence, both perspectivesposit essentially similar causal chains: macro-level socioeconomic trendscause changes in the
class structuresof different societies, which are reflected in the distribution of
political preferencesand attitudesand translatedinto system-level political consequences." Parties as actors disappear from both Marxist and postmaterialist
analyses.
Focusing on exogenous structuraltrendsand forces can simplify analysis considerablyby avoiding the need to considerin detail the peculiaritiesof individualcases.
However, while exogenous socioeconomic and culturalchanges may shapethe environments political parties face and may force parties to confront a distinct set of
challenges, they do not determinehow parties will actually respond to those challenges. There may be no direct link between the externalenvironmentand a political actor's perceptionof it. Even if we leave aside the issue of perception,there are
still several ways of reactingto any particularsituation,including crises. As Robert
Jervis, discussing a similar problem in internationalrelations theory, put it, even
people in a burninghouse, who will predictablyrushfor an exit, might leave through
differentwindows and doors.'6Purely structuralanalyses also leave unexamineda
centralissue in political science: the possibilities for and limits to strategicpolitical
change." The tension between structuraldeterminismand free will appearsto be as
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ComparativePolitics October 1997
fundamentala problem for political scientists as it is for theologians and can not
simply be assumed away.
The New Literature on Political Parties
The generaltheoreticalcontributionof the new literatureon partieslies in its understanding that, given these dilemmas, the wisest analytical course is to consider
neitherexogenous structuraland environmentalvariables nor the characteristicsof
political actors in isolation, but rathertheir interactionin generatingpolitical behavior. This approachmay be somewhat more complex but it is often necessary to
capturethe true dynamicof events. As Marx famously put it: "Menmake their own
history, but they do not make it just as they please; they do not make it under circumstanceschosen by themselves, but ratherundercircumstancesfound, given, and
transmitted."'8
Three of the works underreview explicitly or implicitly advocate expandingthe
focus of attentionfrom the structuralenvironmentto include political actors themselves. In The GermanLeft.-Red, Green, and Beyond, Andrei Markovitsand Philip
Gorski trace the developmentof the Germanleft duringthe postwarera and discuss
the rise and assimilationof the Greens, the new left political organizationpar excellence. In The Transformationof European Social Democracy, HerbertKitschelt
describes the challenges Europeansocial democratic parties have faced since the
1970s and the responses of differentorganizationsto them; he also tries to explain
why the differentresponses were chosen and how they affected the parties' subsequent electoral fortunes. Finally, the contributorsto How Political Parties Work,
edited by Kay Lawson, describe party institutionsaroundthe globe; they examine
why and how they develop and how organizationalstructuresinfluence political performance.These works exemplify a shift in the way political scientists study party
developmentand electoral change.
The new literatureoffers three specific theoreticalinsights. First,parties' shifting
fortunes are intimately connected to their history and appeal, not simply to broad
structuraltrends in their external environments.Second, organizationalstructures,
ideological traditions,and leadershelp shape parties'responsesto challenges.Third,
what one might call "Michelsredux,"in a competitivepolitical system "alternative"
political organizationswill either solidify into traditionalforms or pass from the
scene. From this party-centricperspective,the upheavalsof the 1970s take on a different look. Ratherthan emerging as the consequence of a gradualpostmaterialist
value shift, they seem to have resulted from traditionalleft parties' inability to fulfill the demands of their constituencies in a time of economic crisis. However, to
understandwhy the traditionalleft partieswere so vulnerable,it is necessary to consider in some detail their role in the postwarpolitical system.
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Sheri Berman
Historical Context and Situation After WorldWar II Europeansocial democratic parties based their appeal on the benefits of a Keynesian compromise which
promisedto deliver increasingmaterialsecurity for workerswhile at the same time
increasingthe prosperityof society as a whole.'"The crucial elements of this compromise were an expandingwelfare state, governmentinterventionin the economy,
and institutionalizedbargainingbetween capital and labor. There was little if any
trade-off, in this view, between increasing equality and economic growth; social
democratscould thus accept capitalismwhile claiming thatthey were remainingtrue
to the ultimate values of the socialist movement. Indeed, a central component of
Europe'spostwarpolitical stabilitywas the acceptanceby mainstreampartiesof the
left of the institutionof privateownershipof the means of productionin returnfor a
series of policies which would help sever the life chances of workersfrom the whims
of the marketplace.The steady electoral growth of the postwar era solidified this
bargain and enabled Social Democrats to appeal to a widening share of the electorate.By using theirpolitical power to institutean expandingstreamof government
programs,social democraticpartieswere able to integratesignificant sectors of the
middle class into their electoralcoalitions and make the final transitionfrom "worker's" to "people's"parties.
In contrast, therefore, to the situation during the late nineteenth and early
twentieth centuries, the dominant sector of the European left became explicitly
accommodationistafterthe second world war. Mainstreamsocial democraticparties
increasinglycame to be seen as integralpartsof the bourgeois-capitalistsystem, and
in many Europeancountriesthere was thereforeno significant political force offering a leftist alternativeto the existing order.
So long as traditionalleft parties could deliver on their promises, this situation
was relatively unproblematic.However, the economic crisis which began in the
early 1970s made the social democraticcompromiseappearincreasinglyuntenable.
Each ingredientof the compromise- the welfare state, Keynesianism,corporatism
- came underharsh attack,and Social Democratsfound it difficult to satisfy their
diverse coalitions. With social democraticparties' long-termprogramand ability to
satisfy progressiveaspirationsboth called into question, a space opened up to their
left for a force offering a real alternativeto the existing political and economic order.
In countries where there were powerful Communistparties in the 1970s, such as
Franceand Italy, this discontentfound an existing outlet and so did not result in the
formationof new left organizations.But where Communist parties were weak or
nonexistent,a significantGreen or new left challengerwas more likely to emerge.
Had economic growth continued, I believe social democraticparties would not
have faced any greaterproblems incorporatingpostmaterialistsinto the fold than
they had with other middle class groups. Successful social democraticparties had
long recognized the need to expand their appeal outside their traditionalworking
class constituencies,and while there were a few "zero-sum"issues dividing materi107
ComparativePolitics October 1997
alists and postmaterialists,such as nuclear power, most of the demands of these
groups could have been reconciled if good times had continued. Social democrats
always had to make trade-offsand compromisesto satisfy their diverse constituencies; only when economic growth began to slow dramaticallydid these trade-offs
and compromisesbecome increasinglyproblematicand divisive.20
In short, long-standingpolitical patternswere disruptedin the 1970s because the
oil crisis and its aftermathduring that decade underminedthe traditionalrole and
programof social democracyand left disaffected voters searchingfor new political
alternatives.In some countries,it is worthnoting,not "new left"but "newright"parties arose to capturedissatisfiedvoters. In Franceand Austria,for example, Le Pen
and Haider rely largely, if not exclusively, on voters with traditional"materialist"
concerns,who duringan earlierera would probablyhave voted for social democratic or communistparties.
In The GermanLeft Markovitsand Gorskido an exemplaryjob of describinghow
this general dramaunfolded in one critical instance. Their book explains why and
how a new left alternativeemerged in Germany and helps us understandits particularnatureand political program.Since the Germancase is so centralto the study
of both the "old"and "new"left in Europe,moreover,the book should appealto any
comparativistinterestedin partydevelopment.A principletheme of their analysis is
how the Greensrelateto the internaldynamics of the postwarGermanpolitical system: "theGreensmust be viewed as partof the West GermanLeft and, more particularly, in theirrelationto Germansocial democracy.... [U]nderstandingthe Greens
along theirmost criticaldimensions- theirhistoricalemergence,the political landscape in which they operate and the set of policy concerns which they attemptto
address- requires,above all, situatingthem within the developmentand dilemmas
of German social democracy."21 In Markovits' and Gorski's view, therefore,
althoughthe decline in the blue collar work force and the rise of a "new class" with
new values are importantcharacteristicsof the postwarperiod, such variablesalone
can tell us little abouteitherthe particularproblemsof the SPD or the rise and nature
of the Greens.
The German story begins in the 1950s, when some on the left became disillusioned that the destructionof National Socialism did not lead directly to a socialist,
pacifist regime. Policy defeats for the left duringthese years, such as the failure of
socializationand an expandedcodeterminationlaw, the beginningof Germanrearmament, and the drive to station nuclear weapons on German soil, fostered several
movements. Yet the SPD and the the main Germanunion conextraparliamentary
federation,the DGB, distancedthemselves from these movements,not least because
tactics as a result of their
many of their leaderswere wary about extraparliamentary
experiences duringthe WeimarRepublic and the ThirdReich. While this incipient
extraparliamentaryleft was forming, mainstreamGerman Social Democracy was
undergoinga conscious reorientationwhich culminatedin the Bad Godesbergpro108
Sheri Berman
gram of 1959. This reorientationrenderedthe SPD "unserviceableas a nexus for
creating and reproducingutopian aspirations,or for that matter,for providing any
systematic criticism of the status quo." By the end of the 1950s, therefore,a "political space to the left of accommodationistsocial democracy"was already opening
up in the FRG.22
These trendscontinuedduringthe 1960s. The SPD and DGB became furtherintegrated into the economic and political system of the Federal Republic, leading
activists on their left to form an ausserparlamentarischeOpposition (extraparliamentary opposition, APO). Radical ranks were swelled by protests against the
Vietnam War and by various governmentactions on issues such as rearmamentand
the emergency laws. The SPD's swing towardsthe center eventually led to its participation in a grand coalition with the CDU/CSU in 1966, a move which further
confirmed the party's integrationinto the status quo and increased radicals' dissatisfactionwith existing political alternatives.
The 1970s opened with high hopes, as the Brandt-Scheelgovernmentpromised
the dawn of a new era. Yet this "reformeuphoria"was soon quashedby the realities
of the oil crisis and a worldwide recession. As Markovitsand Gorskinote:
Willy Brandt'spoignantdescriptionof the Greensas the "SPD'slost children"perthe predicament
facedby the SocialDemocratsduringthe 1970s.
fectlysummarized
Theeconomiccrisisforcedthepartyto choosebetweenits governingmandateandthat
of its grass-rootsconstituents.
Putdifferently,the SPDhadto makea painfulchoice
betweentwoidentities:oneas a partyof government,
theotheras a partyof movement.
It was theformerwhichtriumphed.23
The disappointmentand alienationof those on the left acceleratedwith the transition
from Brandt's"daremore democracy"to Schmidt'sModell Deutschland and stabilization. The latter'sposition on the Euromissileissue represented"thefinal andperhaps decisive factorwhich proved responsiblefor sending a last and critical contingent of voters into the green/alternativecamp."Duringthe late 1970s leftist discontent began to coalesce into a new political formation.The first Green electoral lists
appearedin 1977, and by 1980 a numberof Greenelectoral groups officially joined
togetherto form a new party.
By the 1970s, therefore,the SPD became so integratedinto the political system
and so inflexible and ideologically exhaustedthat the final discreditingof the social
democraticcompromisebroughtaboutby the economic crisis of the 1970s made the
formationof a new left alternativehighly probableif not inevitable.Yet some traditional left parties in other Europeancountriesfared betterthan the SPD duringthis
era, and consequentlynot all countrieswitnessed the rise of a dynamicnew left alternative like the Greens. How can this cross-nationalvariation be explained? Why
could some social democraticpartiesadjustto a changingenvironmentwhile others
could not? To answer these questions we need to turnour attentionto the make-up
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October 1997
and decision makingof the partiesthemselves, the secondproblkmatiqueof the new
literatureon parties.
Institutional Party Structures, Ideological Traditions, and Leadership The
books by Kitschelt and Lawson explore how internal institutionalconfigurations,
ideological traditions,and individual leadershipshape parties' policy choices and
electoral performance.Kitschelt's book is ultimately more ambitious and impressive. It begins with an analysis of the changing environmentsocial democraticparties faced in the 1970s and after, then discusses how parties' internalstructuresled
them to cope with varying degrees of success. As he puts it: "The future of social
democracylies to a large extent in the hands of partyleaders and activists. External
social, economic and institutional settings within which parties operate are less
importantfor determininga party's fortunesthan its own choice of objectives and
strategiesin the arenaof party competition."25
Lawson's collection focuses less on electoral performanceand more on the nuts
and bolts of party institutions.Despite its uneven quality, its very appearanceis a
good example of just how far the literaturehas come in the last few years. In 1988
Lawson and Peter Merkl opened WhenParties Fail.- EmergingAlternativeOrganizations, by stating: "The phenomenon of major party decline . . is becoming
increasinglyapparent..... All over the world, single-issue movements are forming,
special interestgroups are assumingparty-likestatus,and minorparties are winning
startlingovernightvictories as hithertodominantpartieslose the confidence of their
The introductionto How Parties Work,in contrast,states:
electorates."26
Radicalchangesin worldevents,andthe development
of numerousnew partiesand
partysystems,seriouslyundermine
anyclaimsthatearlierstudiestoldus all we needed
to know .... What has been lacking ... are works that explore the internaldynamics
of politicalpartieswiththeintentionof findingouthowpartiesreallywork.... Incomof thischanging,frusbination,thestudiesin thisvolume... offernewunderstanding
thepoliticalparty.27
modeminstitution,
trating,andapparently
indispensable
What do these books tell us about how parties respond to their environments?
First, they confirm that, like other institutions,political parties have a tendency to
identify and interpretproblemswithin existing frameworksand to try to matchproblems with solutions they have applied in the past.28 Therefore,parties will tend to
favor certain courses of action over others simply because they have traditionally
been partof theirpolicy repertoire.At least initially,partieswill usually look to their
past behavior for help in devising responses to new challenges. Sometimes, however, traditionalstrategiesprovide inappropriateor even counterproductiveresponses to problems.A party's sensitivity to changing environmentalimperativesand its
ability to formulateresponses to them, the new literaturesuggests, will depend on
the party's internalconfiguration.Kitschelt, along with several authorsin Lawson's
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Sheri Berman
volume, stresses that in order to be successful parties must be able to absorb new
demands and recognize the need to devise new strategies when old ones are no
longer satisfactory.Those partieswith institutionalstructurescapableof recognizing
new challenges quickly and reactingto them efficiently are more likely to perform
well in difficult and changing environments.
Kitschelt argues that organizationally"entrenched"parties, that is, parties with
mass membership,formalized interactionsamong members, and a large bureaucracy, and particularlythose with close ties to powerful unions, had troubleresponding flexibly to challenges and thereforelost supportduringthe 1980s. Such parties
lacked channels through which changing demands from the electorate could be
expressed and had difficulty in adjustingto changing environments.More loosely
organizedparties,on the other hand,were able to respondquickly and efficiently to
similar challenges.
He sees the electoral problems of the Austrian and German social democratic
parties, for example, emerging from their inability or unwillingness to adopt new
strategiesto respondto a changingenvironment,which, in turnstemmedat least partially from their particularinternalconfigurations.The hierarchicaland entrenched
organizationof the AustrianSPO "amplifiedthe party's inertiavis-a-vis new political demands,"while the GermanSPD's "ties to the DGB curtailedthe partyleadership's freedom to respond to left-libertarianor market-efficiency challenges."29
Conversely,the SpanishPSOE's rapidshift from radicalEurosocialismto pragmatic
moderation can be explained at least partially by its lack of "organizational
entrenchment,"the influx of new activists, and its growing distancefromthe unions.
He similarly attributesthe success of the French PS in the 1980s, to its loose-knit
cadre organization,series of fluid political clubs, and set of internalrules designed
to breakdown the strategicimmobilism of the old leadership.
Kitscheltis correctto redirectour attentiontowardthe independentimpactdifferent organizationalstructurescan have on partyresponsivenessand decision making,
but he is less convincing about which internalconfigurationsare most auspicious.
One problem stems from his definition of "success"and "failure."When characterizing social democraticparties as "winners,""losers,"and "stabilizers,"Kitschelt
looks only at the average electoral loss or gain experiencedduringthe 1980s, rather
than at absolute levels of support. He thus labels the Spanish, French, and Italian
partiesas successes, while he lists Europe'stwo largestsocial democraticparties,the
Austrianand the Swedish, respectively as "loser"and "stabilizer,"a categorization
thatwill puzzle many. In addition,Kitschelt's analysis has limited predictivecapacity. Partiescharacterizedas "successes"in the 1980s did not necessarily fare well in
the 1990s (for example, the Italian,French,and Spanishparties),while some of his
"stabilizers"and "losers" significantly improved their electoral performance(for
example, some of the Nordic social democratic parties). If, as Kitschelt himself
admits, the institutionalcharacteristicsthat led to electoral growth in the 1980s had
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ComparativePolitics
October 1997
little connectionto previous success, overall levels of support,or ability to adjustto
future challenges, one is left wondering about their wider or longer-termsignificance for electoral and political performance.In fact, since the rise of social democracy in the late nineteenthcentury,the most successful partieshave had many of the
characteristicsKitschelt finds problematic: mass membership, extensive ties to
ancillary organizations (particularlyunions), and a well developed bureaucracy.
Such characteristicshave helped these partiesmobilize voters, spreadtheir message,
and absorb and channel demands from their constituencies. There seems little reason to believe that severing ties to their membershipsand associated organizations
would enhance the ability of social democraticparties to maintainelectoral support
duringa time of economic and political flux.
Kitschelt layers an ideationalanalysis on to his organizationalone. The ability of
social democraticpartiesto choose particularstrategies,he feels, was "limitedby the
ideological alternativesthat had become part of each party's political history of
internaland external debate long before the strategic challenges of the 1970s and
1980s emerged."30
Ideasare importantbecausepast ideological debatesinfluencethe
type of policies partiesfind acceptableand appropriate.One reasonfor this influence
is cognitive: political actorstend to look for analogies in past behaviorand therefore
tend to respondto challenges with solutions they have applied in the past. But this
preferencefor consistency has a "rational"aspect as well. "The credibilityof ideas
is analogousto the notion of 'reputation'in iteratedgames. Actors are able to make
certainstrategicmoves with some prospectof success only because they have accumulateda reputationamong otherplayers throughthe behavior(and talk) they have
exhibited in the past.""
Kitschelt's ideational analysis focuses on the importanceof "communitarian,"
"libertarian,"and "traditionalsocialist" traditions within particularsocial democraticpartiesand nationalpolities. Because I have troublewith Kitschelt's definition
of these terms,32 and because I think he misrepresentsthe ideological traditionsof
certainparties,33I would argue that a betterpredictorof social democraticsuccess
after the 1970s would be the degree to which a party had previously reached out
across classes and thus positioned itself to coopt the postmaterialiststratumand its
agenda. This factor may help explain, for example, why the Swedish SAP and the
German SPD reacted very differently to the challenges posed by postmaterialism.
Fromearly in its historythe SAP pursueda strategyof cross-class outreachand was
very successful in capturingmiddle class votes. After a disastrouselectoraldefeat in
1976, the partydevoted increasingenergy to environmentaland otherpostmaterialist
issues and was quite successful in undercuttingthe Swedish Greenparty.34The SPD,
in contrast,has been more tentativeand divided over postmaterialistissues. Having
a much strongeridentificationas a working class party and less experience in explicit cross-class outreach,it found itself disorientedwhen confrontedwith a challenge outside its traditionalsphereof competence.Although the SPD has made sev112
Sheri Berman
eral attemptsover the past decade to embraceaspects of the postmaterialistagenda,
they have received neither the energy nor supportof comparableSAP initiatives. I
would argue that these differences stem at least partially from the SAP's greater
experience in dealing with and assimilating the demands of middle class groups,
which left it relatively well positioned both ideologically and organizationallyto
adopt aspects of the postmaterialistagenda.
Lawson's collection examines not only how internal party structures shape
responsesto environmentalchallenges, but also how these structurescan themselves
be changed.It thereforeprovidesus with anotherperspectivefrom which to analyze
parties' "strategicmaneuverability."The ability to consciously reshape their own
institutionalframeworksand decision-making structuresgives parties a powerful
tool in their struggle to remainpolitically competitive. Collectively, the chaptersin
How Political Parties Workhighlightthe large degree of institutionalflexibility that
has always been inherentin traditionalparties.Farfrom being overwhelmedby their
environments,they have actually exhibited an impressive adaptabilityduring the
contemporaryera.
This collection also focuses on the role of leadershipin affecting partybehavior,
an importantthough often overlooked subject. As one contributorputs it: "The
notion that parties are transformedby unseen socioeconomic, cultural or political
forces while their leaders remain unaware is misleading. Parties change primarily
because their leadersand memberssee the need to change and work within the parties to change them."" However, not all leaders are equally positioned to affect
change, and analyzing the qualities and preferencesof party leaders is more useful
in some situationsthan others.
For example, individuals are more likely to play a large role in shaping party
behaviorwhen a party's environmentis confused and difficult. During crises, when
thereis a perceivedneed for a dramaticcourse shift or breakwith the past, the power
of individuals to influence policymaking and political development is likely to
increase. Thus, continualelectoral decline or a particularlystinging electoral defeat
should open up space for leadersto act. The same will be trueof any situationwhich
seems to call for an immediate and rapid response, since traditionalbureaucratic
structuresand decision-makingprocesses are not likely to produce the necessary
results.
The role and power of political leaders will also be shaped by the nature of a
party's organizationalstructure.Individualsare less likely to determinepartybehavior where party decision making is hierarchicallyand/orbureaucraticallyorganized
or leaders are beholden to particularconstituencies for their positions. In contrast,
individualsare aptto be influentialwherepartydecision makingis not rigidly organized and the leadershipis insulatedfrom the demandsof lower organizationallevels.
Thus, both Kitschelt and FrankWilson in Lawson's volume find that party leaders
played a criticalrole in shaping the actions of the Frenchand Spanish socialist par113
ComparativePolitics October 1997
ties. FrangoisMitterrandtook control of the French Socialists in 1972 after a series
of disastrous electoral defeats. Frustrationover these losses, combined with the
party's loosely organizedinternalstructure,gave him the opportunityto reshapethe
PS, which he seized. He stocked the party's upperechelons with younger members
committed to his views and changed the rules for selecting the party directorate.
Once in control,he firstpushedthe partytowardsan orthodoxsocialist programand
an alliance with the French Communists,then radically changed gears and moved
towardsthe political center.
Thechangesin the socialistpartywereverymuchdueto Mitterrand's
personalabilities as a partyleaderactingwithinhis party.He saw the politicaladvantageof party
renewalanddoctrinalchanges.Hispersuasiveskillsovercametheoppositionof reluctant partyactiviststo organizational
changesand doctrinalrevisionsand welded
togethera faction-ridden
party.Indeed,the majorchallengenow facingthe Socialist
Partyis to finda leaderwith thatsameskill in operatingwithinthe partyto achieve
consensusandunityamongthewell-developed
factions.36
Felipe Gonzalez played an equally pivotal role in reshaping the socialist party in
Spain. Duringthe 1970s the PSOE adopteda radicalEurosocialiststance, offering a
clear alternativeto Franco's authoritarianism.This stance proved a burden when
Spain held elections in 1979, and Gonzalez and others interpretedthe party's disappointingshowing as a rejection of radicalism.He threatenedto resign unless the
party changed course, and an extraordinaryparty congress approveda new moderate program."[T]heparty's strategicreversal . . became possible because it lacked
organizationalentrenchmentbut was swampedwith new pragmaticactivists ... who
began to displace the radicalcore membershipfrom the resistanceera. With the aid
of these new members, the leadershipengineered a basic change in organizational
relations in 1979." Once reconfirmed in power, Gonzalez established "the undisputed hegemony of the moderatepragmatistscemented [through]rule changes
that reducedthe representationof minoritycurrents."37
During the 1980s the PSOE
continuedalong a moderatepath, embracingeconomic neoliberalismand membership in NATO, "largely due to the charismaand leadershipskills of Gonzalez in
bringingchange to his party.38
Adaptation and Survival So far we have exploredthe first and second theoretical
concerns of the new literatureon parties- how the historicalcontext and situation
of a party shape its options, and how internalstructures,ideological traditions,and
leadershiphelp determinewhich options will be selected. The thirdconcerninvolves
what parties and political organizationsmust do to survive over time. Traditional
political parties have exhibited a large degree of adaptabilityduring the contemporary era. In contrast, many of the new social movements and political parties
formed in the 1970s have moderatedtheir political appeals and radically reshaped
114
Sheri Berman
theirinternalstructuresand practices,hewing much more closely in both ways to the
traditionalpartiesthanmost people expected. Moreover,movementsand partiesthat
have not followed this path have simply disappeared.
The most striking example of this phenomenon comes from the poster child of
"new left" organizations,the GermanGreens. In little more than a decade it moved
from radicallyopposing traditionalparties and much of the postwarGermanpolitical consensus to generally accepting the existing rules of the game, while organizing its behavior and internalstructuresaccordingly.To appreciatejust how far the
Greenshave traveled,one has to rememberwhere they started.Contestingtheir first
election in 1979, the Greenswere so eager to breakwith traditionthat they rejected
the very label "party";candidates ran instead under the banner "Other Political
Organization- the Greens."They built their identityaroundthe idea of grass-roots
democracyand createda radicallynew type of organizationthat rejectedtraditional
leadershipstructures,proclaimedadherenceto the idea of "amateurpolitics," set MP
salaries at the level of a skilled worker,and insisted on a two-year limit in office for
all its elected officials.39These institutionalinnovationswere supposed to help the
Greens retaintheir position as a radicalpolitical alternative.
Despite what many hoped and expected, however, the party's structurehindered
its ability to respondto new challenges. As Thomas Poguntkenotes:
Whentheattractiveness
of noveltyandunconventionality
beganwearingoff, and ...
issues [outsidethe ones originallysupportedby the party]beganto dominatethe
nationalandinternational
experiencedthedisadvanagendas,theGreensincreasingly
to partypolitics.Unableto reactefficientlyto changingpolititagesof theirapproach
cal seasons,the party... lost someof its electoralappeal.By andlarge... elections
or evenmoderatedecline.40
[in] the late 1980sweremarkedby electoralstagnation
Within a decade after its founding, many of the Green's institutionalinnovations
were jettisoned or significantlyreshaped.41
Accompanying this institutionalevolution was a political one. During the 1980s
a furious debate raged between Realos and Fundis for the soul of the Greens.
Electoral defeats brought this debate to a head. By the end of the decade a new
Germanpolitical alignment was emerging, characterizedby the opposition of two
relatively clear and evenly matchedpolitical blocks: a Red/Greenone on the centerleft, and a Black/Yellow (CDU/CSU and FDP) one on the center-right.The Realos
pressed for acceptance of political (and even governing) responsibilityand for cooperationwith the SPD, while the Fundis remainedsuspicious of both goals. Certain
electoral successes helped ensure a Realo victory, and duringthe 1990s the Greens
have continued along a Realo course. The number of Red/Greenexperimentshas
increased; the party has provided a growing number of ministers for LUnderand
local governments;afterthe last nationalelection a Greenbecame vice-presidentof
115
ComparativePolitics October 1997
the Bundestag(with the help of the CDU, no less); and, perhapsmost shockingly of
all, half the Green parliamentarydelegation voted to send German troops to the
Balkans, the first time since World War II that Germansoldiers have been allowed
to participatein a mission outside Germany.42
As Germany'sleading news magazine
"The
declared:
have
evolved
from being a party which inspires
Greens
recently
terrorin the bourgeoisie to being a partyof them."43
Like the Greens, many other new parties and social movements from the 1970s
and 1980s have moderatedtheir political appeals and reshapedtheir internalstructures and practices. Those unable or unwilling to make such a transformation,such
as the Danish Progress Party, have simply disappeared.The contrastbetween this
pattern and the flexibility and responsiveness exhibited by many traditional left
political partiesis strikingand shows thatthe structureof the partysystem and political competitiondoes limit what political partiescan do. The Greens found it difficult to resist the lures of political power and so began to enter the very mainstream
they initially opposed. In a strikingparallel to the SPD's fate in postwar Germany,
moreover,the price of Green success over the past decade has been a loss of uniqueness. Somewhere,RobertMichels is laughing.
In addition, the 1990s may well be witnessing a move away from the postmaterialistissues so importantto partieslike the Greens towardsrenewed emphasis
on economic issues and on the need to defend traditionalleft (that is, social democratic)policies from furtheronslaught.The protestsin Franceduringthe fall of 1995
provide the most dramaticexample of this change, but evidence can be found from
across the continent.In Germany,for example, traditionalmaterialistissues such as
unemploymentand crime top voters' concerns,and they have influencedthe appeals
of both the SPD and the Greens.44In Sweden, the SAP won its greatestelectoralvictory in decades in 1994 runningon a platformthat promised to protect traditional
social democraticpolicies; when the party diverged from this course, disappointed
leftist voters flocked to the EnvironmentalParty/TheGreens and the Left Party.45
Futureparty analysts may look back on the 1990s as a time of resurgentmaterialism, when the political agenda became increasingly dominatedby traditionaleconomic issues like unemployment, stagnating wages, and increasing inequality.
Devising successful responses to these traditionalleftist concerns, moreover, has
proven much more difficult for social democracy than handling postmaterialism
ever was. The 1990s may also be seen in retrospectas a time when Europeanintegrationcame to dominateand divide Europeanpolities. Neither materialistnor postmaterialist,this issue is fascinatingfor studentsof partysystem and electoral development because it unites both new left and new right parties against most of their
traditionalcenter-leftand center-rightbrethren.46
116
Sheri Berman
Conclusion
The disarrayof traditionalpartiesand the emergence of alternativechallengersduring the 1970s led several students of comparativepolitics to wonder whether the
very institutionof the party might have become obsolete. The obituaryproved premature. Still, something importantwas happening,and traditionalleft parties have
weatheredthe crisis with distinctlyvaryingdegrees of success. The new literatureon
parties suggests that the properway to understandthese events is by exploring the
interactionbetween individualparties and their environments,ratherthan by focusing exclusively on the characteristicsof either unit or system alone.
Methodologically,this literaturerepresentsa returnto an earliermode of electoral
and party system theorizing, which tried to pay due respect to the conflicting
demands of both theoretical parsimony and generality, on the one hand, and the
uniqueness of political situations, on the other. Stein Rokkan,perhapsthe best example of this approach, argued that one should begin with an investigation of
country-leveltrendsand variablesand then build broader,cross-nationaltheories of
electoral and party system developmentupon this analysis. The first step involved
accumulatingdata on particularcountries
withinthebroaderperspectiveof comparative
development.
.... We [assemblesets of
theseanalyses]. . .so as to establishimportant
datafor a typologyof the
benchmark
macrocontextsof politicalbehavior:in fact,anysuchanalysisof theweightof thecore
variablesin the productionof votes for each partywill help us to characterize
the
differencesamongthe historicallygivenpackagesstill facingthesedifferentnational
citizenries.Our"ultrageneralist"friendswill say thatthis is outrightsurrenderto
of
abject"configurationism":
my replyis thatwe will haveto live with comparisons
butcanstillmakeheadwayin comparative
electoralresearchby
uniqueconfigurations
resolutelytacklingthetaskof identifyingthecriticaldimensionsof variationacrossthe
historicallygivensystemsof politicalinteraction.47
The recent literatureon parties follows precisely this trajectory.Moving away from
the focus on broad structuraltrends and environmentalvariablesthat characterized
much of the literatureof the 1970s and 1980s, many authorsnow argue that crossnational theories of political development must be built upon careful country
analyses. In particular,they stress that focusing on political parties themselves theirideological traditions,organizationalstructures,and leaderships- is necessary
to understandhow broadprocesses of socioeconomic and culturalchange are translated into political outcomes.
The new literaturealso taps into an older traditionof party theorizing that dates
back at least to the late nineteenthcentury.Certainvulgar or orthodoxMarxistsback
then conceived of parties as the representativesof particular social classes, as
vehicles for the transmission of socioeconomic interests. Many other socialists,
117
ComparativePolitics October 1997
however, found this view unsatisfying; revisionists on both the right (social
democrats)and left (Leninists)saw partiesinsteadas instrumentsthat could be used
to reshapetheir environment.The authorsof the new literatureon parties are latter
day advocates of this "revisionist"position; they understandthat successful parties
recognize both the opportunitiesand constraintsoffered by the prevailing political
environmentand design their actions accordingly.Today's traditionalleft parties,in
this view, are not doomed to decline as a resultof socioeconomic and culturaltrends
but ratherretain a significant degree of maneuverabilityand the capacity to shape
their own electoral fates.
Finally, by dwelling on the fate of the GermanGreensand other"new left" organizations, the new literatureon parties remindsus not only of the limits of innovation, but also of Michels' argumentthat organizationaldevelopment and political
competition generate strong pressures for parties to evolve and act in particular
ways. As KennethWaltz has written:
Competitive systems are regulated,so to speak, by the "rationality"of the more successful competitors. What does rationalitymean? It means only that some do better
than others. ... Eithertheir competitorsemulate them or fall by the wayside. ... [For
the losers to avoid disaster,]they must change their ways. And thus the units that survive come to look like one another.... Competitionspurs the actors to accommodate
their ways to the socially most acceptableand successful practices.48
In retrospect, we can see that the new social movements and political parties that
arose in the 1970s did not represent a fundamental threat to traditional political parties, as many predicted and even feared. Indeed, once the turmoil of the 1970s subsided, the new political challengers proved much less flexible and enduring than
their stodgy old counterparts.Survival in western democracies forced these new
social movements and political parties to choose between moderatingtheir policy
positions and internalstructuresor perishing. The evolution of the "new" left confirms something the "old" left began to recognize almost a century ago: once the
choice to participatein elections has been made, the electoral system ineluctably
alters (althoughit does not determine)subsequentpartydevelopment.
NOTES
The author would to thank Nancy Bermeo, Fred Greenstein, Ezra Suleiman, and especially Gideon
Rose for their helpful comments.
1. PeterGourevitch,Politics in Hard Times(Ithaca:Cornell University Press, 1986), pp. 181-83.
2. Russell Dalton, Scott Flanagan, and Paul Allen Beck, eds., Electoral Change in Advanced
Industrial Democracies: Realignment or Dealignment? (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984), p.
118
Sheri Berman
451. See also Russell Dalton and Scott Flanagan,"PartiesunderStress:Realignmentand Dealignmentin
Advanced IndustrialDemocracies,"WestEuropeanPolitics (1982); and Samuel Barnes and Max Kaase,
eds., Political Action and Mass Participation in Five WesternDemocracies (Beverly Hills: Sage, 1979).
3. Kay Lawson and Peter H. Merkl, "AlternativeOrganizations:Environmental,Supplementary,
Communitarianand Anti-Authoritarian,"in Kay Lawson and Peter H. Merkl, eds., WhenParties Fail:
EmergingAlternativeOrganizations(Princeton:PrincetonUniversity Press, 1988), p. 3.
4. Michel Crozier,Samuel P. Huntington,and Joji Watanuki,The Crisis of Democracy (New York:
New York University Press, 1975), p. 166.
5. The two approachesdominatingthis inquirywere a "social structural"paradigmmost extensively
developed by Stein Rokkanand Seymour MartinLipset and a "partyidentification"paradigmelaborated
most influentiallyby Campbell,Converse, Miller, and Stokes. See Angus Campbell, Philip E. Converse,
WarrenE. Miller, and Donald E. Stokes, TheAmerican Voter(New York: Wiley, 1960); Hans Daalder,
"In Memory of Stein Rokkan,"EuropeanJournal of Political Research, 15 (1979); Stein Rokkan and
Seymour M. Lipset, Party Systemsand VoterAlignments(New York:The Free Press, 1967).
6. Ronald Inglehart, The Silent Revolution: Changing Values and Political Styles among Western
Publics (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1977); Culture Shift in Advanced Industrial Society
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990); "The Silent Revolution in Europe: Intergenerational
Change in Post-IndustrialSocieties,"AmericanPolitical Science Review, 65 (1971); "Postmaterialismin
an Environment of Insecurity,"American Political Science Review, 75 (1981); "Value Change in
IndustrialSocieties,"AmericanPolitical Science Review, 81 (1987); and "ChangingValues in Japanand
the West," ComparativePolitical Studies, 14 (1892).
7. Inglehart,TheSilent Revolution,p. 22.
8. Peter Mair has been particularlyvociferous in stressing the overblown nature of party decline.
Peter Mair, "Political Parties, Popular Legitimacy and Public Privilege," West European Politics, 18
(1995); Peter Mair and RichardS. Katz, eds., How Parties Organize: Change and Adaptationin Party
Organizationsin WesternDemocracies (London:Sage, 1994); and Peter Mairand D. Bartolini,Identity,
Competitionand Electoral Availability(Cambridge:CambridgeUniversityPress, 1990). GeraldPomper,
"Alive! The Political Parties after the 1980-1992 Presidential Elections," in Harvey L. Schantz, ed.,
AmericanPresidential Elections (New York: State University of New York Press, 1996), makes a similar point regardingAmerica.
9. Paul R. Abramson and Ronald Inglehart, Value Change in Global Perspective (Ann Arbor:
Universityof MichiganPress, 1995), pp. 27, 41 ff., 89ff. Some might think thatthe attitudinaldifferences
between youngerand older cohortsnoted in ValueChangestem from individuals'naturalevolution from
youthful idealism to older materialism;the authorsargue, however, that their long-termdata show that
value scores for cohorts remainrelatively constantover time.
10. Ibid., pp. 18, 38. Interestingly,Abramsonand Inglehartfind that the most importantfactordriving
short-termchange is variationin the rate of inflation, not unemployment.
11. Ibid., p 38.
12. Statementon the back of Inglehart,CultureShift, quoted in ibid., p. 139.
13. However, Abramson and Inglehartpostulate that the trend towards postmaterialismmay have
advanced the democratic wave of the last two decades. See Ronald Inglehart,"The Renaissance of
Political Culture," AmericanPolitical Science Review, 82 (1988).
14. Chaptertitles in CultureShifi.
15. See, for example, Inglehart's The Silent Revolution, p. 5, and Culture Sh(if, p. 6. Also, Jonas
Pontusson, "Explainingthe Decline of EuropeanSocial Democracy: The Role of StructuralEconomic
Change, WorldPolitics, 47 (1995), and "At the End of the Third Road: Swedish Social Democracy in
Crisis,"Politics and Society, 20 (1992).
16. Robert Jervis, Perception and Misperception in International Politics (Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1976), pp. 19-21.
119
ComparativePolitics
October 1997
17. Bo Rothstein, TheSocial Democratic State: TheSwedish Model and the BureaucraticProblem of
Social Reforms(Pittsburgh:University of PittsburghPress, 1995), p. 24.
18. Karl Marx, "The EighteenthBrumaireof Louis Bonaparte,"reprintedin RobertTucker, ed., The
Marx-EngelsReader (New York: W. W. Norton, 1978), p. 595.
19. CharlesMaier, "The Two PostwarErasand the Conditions for Stability in 20th CenturyWestern
Europe,"American Historical Review, 86 (1981); Claus Offe, "CompetitiveParty Democracy and the
Welfare State: Factorsof Stability and Disorganization,"Policy Sciences, 15 (1983); Adam Przeworski
and Michael Wallerstein, "Democratic Capitalism at the Crossroads,"Democracy, 2 (1982); Walter
Korpi, The WorkingClass in WelfareCapitalism(London:Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1978); and Walter
Korpi, TheDemocratic Class Struggle (London:Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1983).
20. And it is not at all clear that their integrative dilemma was any greater with regard to postmaterialists than it had been with other groups in the past. Around the turn of the century Social
Democratsstruggledto form coalitions with left-liberalsin orderto push forwarddemocratization;in the
1930s the social democraticresponse to the Depression dependedon their ability to form alliances with
small farmersand other membersof the bourgeoisie. And in the 1950s and 1960s social democratsfaced
the challenge of forming alliances with white collar groups to expand the welfare state. Sheri Berman,
"Ideas and Politics: Social Democratic Parties in InterwarEurope"(Ph.D. diss., HarvardUniversity,
1994); Gourevitch;Gosta Esping-Andersen,Politics against Markets: The Social Democratic Road to
Power (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985); Gosta Esping-Andersenand Roger Friedland,
"Class Coalitions in the Making of West EuropeanEconomies,"Political Power and Social Theory,3
(1982); and Adam Przeworski and John Sprague, Paper Stones: A History of Electoral Socialism
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986).
21. AndreiS. Markovitsand Philip S. Gorski, The GermanLeft: Red, Green, and Beyond (New York:
Oxford University Press, 1993), p. 115.
22. Ibid., pp. 44, 34.
23. Ibid., p. 81.
24. Kitscheltarguesthat the examinationof politics purely throughthe conflict between postmaterialists and materialistsis misleading. Instead,he asserts that duringthe last decades a wide range of socioeconomic trendshave combined with an economic slowdown to engendera twofold shift in voter preferences: to the right on the traditional,economic right-left axis of political competition (towards more
market-basedsolutions) and to the left on the libertarian-authoritarian
dimension towardsmore communitarianvalues on noneconomic issues.These changes pose the new and comparativelymore difficult set
of challenges social democratic parties confronted during the 1980s. See also Mark Franklin et al.
Electoral Change: Responses to Evolving Social and Attitudinal Structures in Western Countries
(Cambridge:CambridgeUniversityPress, 1992).
25. HerbertKitschelt, The Transformationof European Social Democracy (New York: Cambridge
University Press, 1994), p. 4.
26. Lawson and Merkl,"AlternativeOrganizations,"p. 3.
27. Kay Lawson, ed., How Parties Work:Perspectivesfrom Within(Westport:Praeger, 1994), pp. x,
28. James G. March and Johan P. Olsen, Rediscovering Institutions: The Organizational Basis of
Politics (New York: The Free Press, 1989); Peter Haas, ed., Special Issue on Epistemic Communities,
International Organization,46 (1992); Kathleen Thelen and Sven Steinmo, eds., StructuringPolitics
(New York: CambridgeUniversity Press, 1993); JudithGoldstein,Ideas. Interests and American Trade
Policy (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1993); James Alt, "Crude Politics: Oil and the Political
Economy of Unemploymentin Britainand Norway, 1970-1985," BritishJournal of Political Science, 17
(1987).
29. Kitschelt,pp. 245, 249.
30. Ibid., p. 256.
120
Sheri Berman
31. Ibid., p. 265. See also Anthony Downs, An Economic Theoryof Democracy (New York: Harper
and Row, 1957), esp. chs. 7, 8.
32. Kitschelt argues, for example, that parties leaning towards libertarianismprefer communitarian
solutions to social problems. However, most people would see communitarianand libertarianvalues as
in conflict, ratherthanas partof the same political dimension. Such semantic/conceptualconfusions make
it occasionally difficult to follow his characterizationof differentnationalpolitical systems and parties.
33. For example, he claims that the British Labourpartyand the Swedish Social Democratshave had
particulardifficulty in dealing with the demandsof left libertarianvoters because communitarianismhas
not been an integralpartof their ideological tradition.Yet there is hardlya partyof the left in Europethat
has appealedto communityand solidaritymore than the Swedish SAP; since the late 1920s it has characterizedits vision of Swedish society as the "people's home,"developed an explicitly cross-class appeal,
and made social solidarity,equal participationin communitydecision making,and decreasingpower differentialsintegralpartsof its political message. In Britain,meanwhile,the Labourpartyseems to be rushing headlong into an embraceof communitarianism.
34. Interestingly,the fortunesof the Swedish Green party have recoveredover the last year as it has
capturedmany social democraticvoters disaffected with the SAP's welfare state cutbacks, inability to
deal with unemployment,and supportof the EU.
35. FrankWilson, "The Sources of PartyChange:The Social Democratic Partiesof Britain,France,
Germanyand Spain,"in Lawson, ed., How Political Parties Work,p. 280.
36. Ibid., pp. 276-77. See also Kitschelt, The Transformationof European Social Democracy, pp.
234-36; John Gaffney, "French Socialism and the Fifth Republic," WestEuropean Politics, 11 (July
1988); and PatrickMcCarthy,ed., The French Socialists in Power, 1981-86 (New York: Greenwood
Press, 1987).
37. Kitschelt, The Transformationof EuropeanSocial Democracy,p. 233. Also Wilson, "The Sources
of Party Change"; and Richard Gillespie, The Spanish Socialist Partv. A History of Factionalism
(London:Oxford University Press, 1989).
38. Wilson, "The Sources of PartyChange,"p. 278. See also Donald Share,"Spain:Socialists as NeoLiberals,"Socialist Review, 18 (1988).
39. The preambleof the party's programstates:"Grass-rootsdemocracymeans the increasedrealization of decentralized,direct democracy. We believe that the decision of the grass-roots should always
have precedence. .... We are determinedto create a new type of party organizationwith decentralized
structuresthat are designed accordingto the principlesof grass-rootsdemocracy...." Bundesprogramm
1980, quoted in Thomas Poguntke, "Basisdemokratieand Political Realities:The GermanGreen Party,"
in Lawson, ed., How Political Parties Work,p. 4.
40. Ibid., p. 13.
41. Membersof the partyexecutive were given pay raises;Green MPs now have the right to serve out
their full terms in parliament;an increasingnumberof partydecisions are taken behindclosed doors; and
a trendtowardsprofessionalizedpolitics is clear.
42. This vote createdgreat controversywithin the party;see Der Spiegel, 1 (1996); "Machtkampfder
Grunen,"Die Welt, Feb. 10, 1996; "Die Griinenspielen wieder Kassandra,"die tageszeitung, Feb. 10,
1996; and "Wo ist die Friedensbewegung,"die tageszeitung,Jan. 3, 1996.
43. "Wirwerden regieren,"Der Spiegel, 9 (1995).
44. "Survey Finds Angst Moves Closer to Home," Financial Times,Jan. 17, 1996; "Solidarittitstatt
Ellenbogen," die tageszeitung, Feb. 20, 1996; "Biindnisgriine drAingtes in die Wirtschaft," die
tageszeitung,Mar.4, 1996; and "Werbenffireinen neuen Griinton,"SiiddeutscheZeitung,Mar.28, 1996.
45. Another importantreason for the flight from the SAP towardsparties of the left was dissatisfaction with the official pro-EU stance of the SAP. Both the Swedish EnvironmentalParty/TheGreens and
the Left party strongly oppose Sweden's participationin the EU and have benefitted greatly from the
postreferendumanti-Europebacklash.This patternhas been repeatedin other Europeancountries.
121
ComparativePolitics
October 1997
46. See EzraN. Suleiman,"Is DemocraticSupernationalisma Danger?,"in CharlesA. Kupchan,ed.,
Nationalism and Nationalities in the New Europe (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1995); and
ChristianneC. Hardy,"Divided Sovereignties:The Europeanizationof Domestic Political Organization
in WesternEurope"(Ph.D. diss., PrincetonUniversity, 1996).
47. Stein Rokkan, "The Structuringof Mass Politics in the Smaller European Democracies: A
DevelopmentalTypology," ComparativeStudies in Society and History, 10 (1968), 209-10.
48. KennethN. Waltz, Theoryof InternationalPolitics (Reading:Addison Wesley, 1979), pp. 76-77.
122