Political Parties in the New Europe

The scope and intensity of the challenges currently faced by western European political parties is exceptionally large, threatening the viability of the manner in which they have traditionally operated and causing them to seek new behaviours and strategies. This volume brings together some of the foremost scholars of European party politics, whose evaluation of political parties in 'the new Europe' is organised under four broad headings: 'Parties and Society';'Parties as Purposive Organisations'; 'Parties and National Government' and 'Parties, the Nation State and Beyond'. The contributors review the latest empirical findings and provide a concise, critical review of the theoretical and methodological 'state of the art'. They also highlight the analyticalchallenges confronting party researchers and suggest new avenues for party research.

The result is a set of highly rewarding and challenging contributions. This really is a very, very good book, and it constitutes a major contribution to party studies. It comes as close as I have yet seen to a 'state of the art' in the field, and it is a credit to the editors and to their Summer School work over the years., ... this is a worthy book, both for the wealth of empirical material and as a contribution to further theorizing on the various dimensions of political parties., One strength of this volume is that it is more coherent than many of the recently published competitor volumes on political parties, and its theoretical frameworks and empirical analyses are more encompassing and carried out more systematically. It is furthermore marked by the consistently high quality of the contributions., This is a very, very good book, and it constitues a major contribution to party studies. It comes as close as i have yet seen to 'a state of the art' in the field, and is a credit to those editors and to their Summer School work over the years. Party Politics, Volume 10, January 2004