Beyond Party Members

Abstract For more than a century members of political parties have played a central role in many parliamentary democracies, helping parties to mobilize voters, and visibly linking party leaders with their grassroots supporters. Yet in the twenty-first century, party memberships are shrinking. In response, many parties have been changing both the obligations and the rights of party members. This book investigates the changing status of party membership in nineteen established parliamentary democracies, asking when and why party memberships started falling, and why members have gained new political rights even as their numbers have declined. The examination shows that both supply-side and demand-side forces are encouraging political parties to offer party members more, and more meaningful, opportunities for political participation. These forces also lead parties to offer new and lower-cost modes of affiliation. The resulting changes are producing multi-speed membership parties, ones that offer supporters multiple ways to connect with a party, and that encourage individuals to connect in different ways at different points in the political cycle. This book examines the consequences of these ongoing transformations for political parties, and for the democracies in which they compete.