Abstract (may include machine translation)
Serious doubts exist as to whether political parties are playing a positive role in the consolidation of the Hungarian political regime. In order to evaluate the parties’ actual performance, this paper identifies the ways in which parties and party systems may contribute to the well ordered functioning of the political regime, and conceptualizes and operationalizes the process of political institutionalization. Nine dimensions of institutionalization are singled out: elite support, pattern of party competition, organization, adaptability, autonomy, civic support, monopolization of social and political functions, penetration into external subsystems and party-friendly institutional environment. All these dimensions are linked to empirically observable indicators. The model emphasizes trends over time, the intentions of parties and the constraints they face. The scheme incorporates the rules which shape the environment of parties, hypothesizing that these are good reflections of the parties’ efforts to obtain a strong position in the political system. While the links of parties to socio-demographic groups are deemed to have secondary importance, their power position vis-à-vis other political agents is given greater weight. The second part of the paper applies the re-defined concept of party system institutionalization to Hungary. The results show that the Hungarian parties are autonomous and relatively well institutionalized, able to control the power structures surrounding them. The parties have placed themselves in a position from which they can shape the crucial social and political processes of their country, and they use this power to impose a sui generis partisan order on the society. The weakest point of Hungarian parties is that they can’t yet control their electorate. The main strategy of the parties to have a firmer grip on their-voters is not organisational but ideological by nature.
Translated title of the contribution | Party system and political consolidation |
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Original language | Hungarian |
Pages (from-to) | 5-32 |
Number of pages | 28 |
Journal | Politikatudományi Szemle |
Volume | 7 |
Issue number | 3 |
State | Published - 1998 |