The Role of Political Parties in
Democratic Political Systems
Three purposes of political parties:
• to organize individuals in order to
• capture government so they may
• make public policy
The Model of Responsible Party Government:
• the party must evolve and enunciate an explicit statement of philosophy and policy ideals (platform)
• the party must nominate candidates who are loyal to its platform and who are willing to enact it once elected
• the party must conduct electoral campaigns in such a way that voters will grasp the programmatic differences between it and the opposition party or parties and will make their voting decisions on that basis
• the party must guarantee that officeholders elected under its label will carry out the platform devised by the membership

The Realities of the American Party System
In order to fulfill their democratic purposes, American political parties have traditionally engaged in a number of specific activities:
• contesting [winning] elections
• aggregating diverse interests
• communication
• education
• recruiting and selecting candidates
• spreading ideologies

Explanations for Two-Partyism in the United States
• history or tradition
• a natural dualism
• dominance of liberal political culture
• distinctive institutional arrangements

Decline of the American Party System
• the direct primary as the usual method for nominating party candidates*
• increasing apathy among voters and low levels of voter turnout
• a rise in “independent” voting*
• the pervasiveness of television as a political medium
• an increase in the number and influence of PACs
• the rise of the political “maverick”
* see appropriate slide

Threats of the Direct Primary to Political Parties
• the direct primary increases the costs of campaigning;
• the direct primary diminishes the party’s ability to “reward” faithful with nomination;
• the direct primary denies the party powerful leverage for ensuring loyalty of officeholders;
• the direct primary may permit weak, or perhaps even hostile, candidates to be nominated;
• the direct primary creates divisiveness within the party (exacerbates party rifts/factions) by pitting two or more of the party’s candidates (and their supporters) against one another

By the early 1980s, the number of voters who called themselves “independents” had increased to rank second only to the number of voters who called themselves
“Democrats.” More significantly, when “independent” voters are lumped together with
“weak Democrats” and “weak Republicans,” the percentage of the electorate that is functionally “independent” swells to about 70%.
Strong Democrats
Weak Democrats
Independents
Weak Republicans
Strong Republicans
Others
1982
14.7%
24.8
35.8
14.2
8.9
1.6
70%
SOURCE: William Crotty, American Parties in Decline

Voter Turnout in 20 Democratic Nations*
Malta
Australia
Sweden
Austria
Italy
Iceland
West Germany
Belgium
Denmark
Holland
France
Norway
94.4%
92.6
91.9
91.9
91.4
90.8
89.9
88.3
88.2
87.5
83.5
82.8
New Zealand
Israel
Ireland
Canada
Great Britain
Japan
82.7%
78.2
75.7
74.9
72.8
72.6
India 60.5
U.S. (presidential) 50.4
U.S. (mid-term) 37.0
SOURCE: Wm. Crotty, American Parties in Decline
*average voter turnout for national elections during the 1970s and 1980s (W.
Germany before reunification)

….Political parties, with all their well-known human and structural shortcomings, are the ONLY devices thus far invented by the wit of western man that can, with some effectiveness, generate countervailing collective power on behalf of the many (who are) individually powerless against the relatively few who are individually or organizationally powerful. Their
(the political parties) disappearance as active intermediaries….would only entail the ascendancy of the already powerful.
SOURCE: Walter Dean Burnham, The End of
American Party Politics .
(emphasis added)

….The American parties - and all others for that matter mobilize sheer numbers against organized minorities with other political resources (most notably economic resources), and they do so in the one avenue of political action in which sheer numbers of individuals count most heavily - elections. Thus the parties have classically been the mechanism by which newly enfranchised and powerless electorates have risen to power. In a more fluid politics….with a large number of political organizations (interest groups) and millions more uncommitted
(independent) voters, the fear is that the advantage will be on the side of the well-organized minorities with other political resources….The political party is the political organization of the masses who lack the cues and information - as well as the political resources of status, skills, and money - to make a major impact on public decisions via other means.
SOURCE: Frank Sorauf, Party Politics in America .
(emphasis added)