PhD Catch-All Parties
Summary in English
Samenvatting (Ned)
 

Catch-all parties or partial catch-allism?

In the 19th century, people's representatives, assembled in national parliaments, founded the first extra-parliamentary organisations which became known as 'political parties'. Throughout the nineteenth and twentieth century Western Europe has witnessed the genesis of hundreds of political organisations attempting to rally voters behind their platform in order to gain access to parliamentary and governmental power. An analysis of the diversity in organisational format of these parties, the differences in their ideological dispositions and policy preferences, their varying methods of elite recruitment as well as the significant disparity in the social basis of the electoral appeal of these political parties would be impossible without some theoretical framing. This study tested one of the seminal theories in the study of transformation of West European political parties, Otto Kirchheimer's catch-all thesis, as a means of analysing party change at the organisational, ideological and electoral level.

Departing from the conviction that the social structure of society should be reflected at the political level, Kirchheimer asserted that politicians in post-war Europe no longer compete against each other but instead form a co-optive oligarchy as their political parties progressively converge on ideology and policy. This would culminate in the waning or even total vanishing of principled political opposition against the dominant political and economic system. Since it is much easier to reach agreement over incremental policy adjustments than on a major framework for society, political leaders of catch-all parties would no longer offer distinct political alternatives to the public, resulting in immutable and unchallenged ruling political elites. According to Kirchheimer, the sovereignty of the people is clearly undermined by this ‘oligarchisation’ of power. Kirchheimer perceived a shift from the painstaking business of building effective and democratic institutions and an accountable civil service by the traditional mass parties towards the ‘personification’ of political power in catch-all parties, in which political leaders seem increasingly oriented towards their own political careers, instead of concerned with the responsiveness and accountability of the party system as a whole. 

Empirical analyses in the previous chapters have revealed that, despite the portrayal of the mass party as an ideal model in political rethorics, in reality the mass-party mould is indeed no longer applicable to most political parties in Western Europe. Mass parties, characterised by their strong embeddedness in civil society through mass membership and their representation of clearly defined social or religious groups, if they ever existed in the first place, have by now been replaced by new types of political organisation. Yet, the dominant party type which constitute West European party systems is not the catch-all party Kirchheimer predicted would emerge. This does not mean, however, that certain developments Kirchheimer depicted have not occurred in West European party systems. In fact, it will be argued in this final chapter that although catch-all parties as such do not generally exist, a partial transformation towards catch-allism can nevertheless be observed. Certain developments Kirchheimer described did occur, while other features of catch-allism did not fully materialise in Western Europe. Moreover, the transformation towards catch-allism has not been a linear process, but was at times interrupted or even reversed.

Catch-allism in Western Europe

One of the major findings in this study is first and foremost that no uniform and continuous trend of party transformation towards the catch-all model is discernible in Western Europe. In journalistic as well as scientific accounts of politics certain developments Kirchheimer identified are often accentuated, sometimes leading to the conclusion that catch-all parties thrive in West European party systems. Certainly, at the time Kirchheimer unfolded his thesis some of the developments he sketched were clearly manifesting themselves within certain parties. In the period spanning 1954 to 1966, during which the catch-all thesis was developed, the aim of building democratic extra-parliamentary membership organisations was precipitously abandoned. Political elites began to professionalise their organisations and started to allocate state finance to their own political parties. Kirchheimer also correctly perceived that political parties in post-war political systems were downgrading their old ideological rigidity and put less emphasis on their traditional issues. The centripetal movement of German parties, the SPD in particular, was not missed by many political observers either. Still, Kirchheimer misinterpreted certain other developments or simply misconstrued them. Party members have not been progressively excluded from all internal decision-making processes, although their influence has remained scanty. Neither is there evidence of an unvarying trend of parties moving towards the centre (space) in their party system, nor of a constant tendency towards political consensus. Kirchheimer was also mistaken in believing that a smaller number of parties would come to increasingly dominate the political systems in West European countries. Shortly after Kirchheimer had sketched his gloomy picture of cartel-forming powers, vanishing opposition and political apathy on behalf of the population, the opposite occurred. Since the mid-1960s a process of social protest set in, expressing popular demands for new forms of political participation and representation. Furthermore, the emergence of radical political parties and social movements, rhetorical polarisation and parliamentary fragmentation seemed to be part of the grit of increasing electoral change as well as governmental instability. This all leads to the conclusion that West European political parties did not totally transform along the lines of the catch-all theory.

Catch-allism at the organisational level

In essence, Kirchheimer was correct in his claim that the importance of membership declined as a substructure for the human and financial resources for most parties in Western Europe. In most West European countries party membership declined over the post-war period. Despite the rapid professionalization of political parties since the 1950s, however, party members have not been totally marginalised and still remain important to the elites of political parties. At party conferences and other public meetings party members legitimise the party leadership by vesting them with authority and by publicly ratifying their decisions. Furthermore, membership remains important as it provides a pool from which the future party leadership can be selected. In addition, many party members find executive power at the lower echelons of public government. Indeed, major political parties often pride themselves in that their policies can be carried out so effectively and efficiently because of their network of loyal and influential local politicians. Although membership is still valued for these reasons, overzealous membership participation is not encouraged by modern party leaders as it seriously reduces the flexibility in policy stances of their parties and radical party activism can also hamper a party's ability to enter into government.

Despite the fact that the room for manoeuvre for the party leadership in general has increased and party members have lost some influence over the selection of parliamentary candidates, members have been given more leverage in the selection of the party leader. My data do not confirm Kirchheimer's assertion that members are progressively excluded from all inner-party decision making structures. What was found instead is that party elites empower individual, unorganised party members rather than marginalising them in the internal decision-making process. Party activists, who have been progressively restricted in the opportunity to speak their mind on the policies of the party, are the real victims of the ambitions of party elites. That said, there are three reasons why the minor democratisation of leadership selection should hardly be heralded as a great victory of democracy.

First, despite the fact that the level of intra-party democracy varies substantially across party systems and among party families, internal decision-making procedures overall have usually been very centralised to begin with and could hardly be further centralised without parties losing all of their democratic substance.
 Secondly, the unorganised member is given more power over that part of the political process which has become increasingly irrelevant to party politics. True, the number of congresses held by parties has not been reduced and neither have procedures to put motions to the national congress been centralised in the majority of West European countries. However, national party conferences can hardly be considered to constitute important policy making bodies in that they have become primarily geared towards public expressions of unity and governability of parties. Open leadership contests and disputes over policy alternatives are a rare sight at party conferences. As media attention increasingly focused on these party congresses, party elites have preferred to maintain tight central control over the agenda and format of these national conference meetings.

Kirchheimer did correctly predict an accumulation of power and resources at the level of the party leadership. This study found that particularly the parliamentary party organisation has become the dominant part of political parties, primarily as a result of the electoral orientation of parties. With the disappearance of the mass-party format, the extra-parliamentary party loses much of its function. Considering the modern means of communication available to the parliamentary leadership, it has less need for the membership party organisation in its interaction with voters. Parliamentary representatives have used their legislative prerogative to accumulate their own resources for political competition. As a result, in financial terms and regarding professional staff, parliamentary party organisations are increasing their resources at an unprecedented rate. Kirchheimer justly asserted that these growing resources would not be generated from membership fees, yet his claim that parties would come to rely primarily on state subsidy is not corroborated. What was found, instead, is that parties did not progressively extract their resources from the state after the 1970s but directly from private and corporate donations or other (economic) activities. Rather than spending their vast resources on expansion of the membership organisation, party elites vigorously professionalised their election campaigns and the parliamentary party organisation, bringing this already most powerful part of the party under even stricter central control of the leadership itself. These increasingly professional party organisations aim primarily at short-term electoral success instead of the long-term integration of citizens into the body politic.

The third reason why the minor internal democratisation of the leadership selection should be not be overstated is that the electoral orientation of parties has resulted in further domination of the parliamentary party over the party organisation, evidenced in that the parliamentary party is more than ever the pool from which ministers are recruited. Decisions on participation in government as well as the route to power remain firmly in the hands of the national elites of the traditional parties of government. This solid central control in the decision-making structures is not a modern trend, as Kirchheimer seems to argue, but rather a consistent characteristic of West European politics. Half a century before Kirchheimer, Roberto Michels (1911) had already pointed this out to us, although he argued it was a feature of all organisations without regard to its ideological or sociological character. The growing influence of the parliamentary party over the party organisation is in one sense beneficial to the democratic process as representative and accountable politicians come to dominate political decision-making, instead of extra-parliamentary party officials. On the negative side, however, as the selection of political leaders remains relatively centralised and parliamentary representatives are accountable only to the electorate at large from whom concerted action is less likely to occur, popular influence on political decisions will be minimal at best.

Catch-allism at the ideological level

Traditional democratic theory assumes that parties present distinct policy programs from which voters choose that closest to their own preferences. As against this, this study shows that, at times, some major parties do converge to more centrist positions within their party system. Nevertheless, Kirchheimer was mistaken in his assertion that this centripetal movement of parties was universal and inexorable. The evidence presented in this book reveals that particularly Christian democratic parties tend to occupy the centre space of party competition. Frequently, social democratic, liberal and agrarian parties can also be found in or close to the centre position, yet no linear centripetal trend is discernible (see also Keman 1992; 1997). Instead, what was found was that over time fewer parties adopt centrist positions and that the range and direction of party competition differ considerably across Western Europe and across time. Parties move in and out of the centre of political competition in accordance with their expectations of electoral rewards or for reasons of governmental control. Moreover, the shift to the left of most political parties during the 1970s and the rightward trend of party competition in the 1980s suggests that the Downsian model of centripetal movement, which Kirchheimer duplicated and enriched with sociological notions, is not validated by the empirical evidence. Parties can actually extricate significant electoral gains from adopting more extreme policy positions on either the left or right of the political spectrum.
 Being well aware of this, political parties adopt dissimilar policy positions and have become more willing to revise their policy stance when this is beneficial to their electoral appeal or chances of government participation. This research shows that, in line with the catch-all thesis, parties have become less rigid concerning their traditional issue-emphasis. This increasing flexibility of political parties at the ideological level was first depicted with a manifest decreased emphasis on traditional issues, notwithstanding substantial cross-national variation. In all, parties are more willing to emphasise issues which are unrelated to their historical origin. Still, this investigation also found that political parties, given the chance, reveal clear and distinct policy preferences and return to more traditional policy profiles when this is possible. 

Not completely in line with the findings in this study, Kirchheimer assumed that parties would become increasingly power-hungry and office-seeking motives would guide their behaviour, rather than the execution of a specific political program. Evidence presented in this study shows that political parties indeed have a steady inclination to accept governmental office even when traditionally preferred policy fields cannot be controlled through ministerial responsibility. However, it also emerged that when parties have the power to (re)claim traditionally preferred portfolios they will seize this opportunity with both hands. Office-seeking and policy-seeking motives are apparently very closely intertwined and political elites carefully counterbalance their aspirations and ambitions for public office with their ideological convictions and policy objectives. Consistent with this outcome, it was found that political parties in Western Europe have a very stable level of 'opportunism' in ministerial control. Contrary to the catch-all thesis, control over ministerial portfolios of some party families became more conventional at times, as the allocation of ministerial positions develops increasingly in accord with traditional policy preferences of these political parties. Christian democratic and social democratic parties, as Kirchheimer inferred, have been less interested in (or capable of) controlling portfolios which are traditionally important to them. Nevertheless, the growing aptitude and willingness to adopt flexible policy positions as well as an enduring inclination to accept control over non-traditional ministerial portfolios both indicate a substantial level of office-seeking behaviour on behalf of West European political parties.

If it is true that Christian democratic parties are "catch-all parties avant-la-lettre" (Kersbergen 1994) then catch-allism is not a strategy to be recommended for parties which want to increase their effectiveness in control over the executive. Christian democratic governmental power has declined significantly, both in scope and duration. Social democratic parties, which fulfilled Kirchheimer's criteria of catch-allism more than the other party families, have experienced some erosion of their power base as well. In contrast, conservative, agrarian and, to a lesser extent liberal parties, have gained more control over traditionally preferred portfolios as well as over the number of ministerial posts in general. Furthermore, the conservative, agrarian and liberal parties, which comply relatively little with the catch-all model, have increased their tenure in office over the last five decades.

As a consequence, political competition in Western Europe has altered towards more competitive interaction between parties, be it only amid members of the traditional party families. What can be seen is that the major traditional parties continue to dominate the executive branch of government and by and large divide the spoils of office among themselves by admitting few new contenders through the portal of executive power. Thus, political competition increased but only among a fixed number of parties who are very disinclined to allow new competitors into the governmental arena. Although it proved relatively easy to enter the parliamentary arena by appealing to new groups of voters or disillusioned supporters from the traditional parties, gaining access to governmental power is infinitely more complex. Acquiring admittance to governmental responsibility not only necessitates a certain level of electoral support, but also the approval of the traditional party elites. So far, traditional parties have not fully succumbed to the forces that are slowly undermining their power bastion.

Catch-allism at the electoral level

Central to Kirchheimer's catch-all thesis is his assertion that political parties adopt an electoral appeal beyond their traditional social bases of support which will make their electoral profile less class-distinctive. This study showed that, in general, parties have indeed been very successful in their cross-class appeal and that class voting in Western Europe declined substantially. During the post-war period, electorates of political parties have become increasingly characterised by middle class voters. Social democratic parties in particular transformed from primarily the representatives of the working class into parties which attract a majority of middle class voters. Christian democratic parties became transfigured from parties with a very heterogeneous social representation to parties with a predominately middle class support. Overrepresentation of the middle class in the electorate of conservative parties has remained stable over time, whereas for liberal parties the level of support from non-working class voters increased. By comparing these developments to changes in the social stratification of West European societies it was found that this process of de-alignment is much in line with the structural transformation of the total electorate, which makes the claim of a deliberate strategy of cross-class electoral appeal problematic. In addition, parties which are traditionally associated with working class representation, communist and social democratic parties, still attract the bulk of the residue of the working class vote in most countries. Instead of the conclusion drawn in many other studies, namely that the explanatory power of social class for voting behaviour has declined, it seems more accurately to conclude that the sharp differences in class-distinctiveness between parties was reduced by the structural transformation of West European societies, yet that the remaining social stratification is still visible in terms of party support.

De-alignment of West European electorates was also assessed by the level of party identification and electoral volatility. Paradoxically, the electoral orientation of political parties has not strengthened their long-term link with the electorate and modern political parties increasingly aim for short-term electoral support at the next general or local election, rather than constant political participation. Long term affiliation with one particular party can still be found only among a rapidly declining number of European voters. Kirchheimer had anticipated this disconnection of political parties from their supporters at a very early stage and he was very concerned about its consequences for the quality of the democratic process. This loss of identification with one single political party has particularly affected the traditional representatives of the working class, namely social democratic and communist parties. This is not surprising in light of the finding that their traditional social basis of support withered away with the upward social mobility of the working class across West European countries. In addition, this process also affected Christian democratic parties which previously had attracted a substantial segment of the working class at elections in some countries.

Contrary to the catch-all thesis, however, this loss in stable affiliation between parties and voters did not result in a continuing rising trend in electoral volatility. In fact, what was found instead was a declining trend in electoral turnover in most countries between 1945 and 1990. Increasing levels of electoral flux, which Kirchheimer predicted would result from the adoption of catch-all features, could only be witnessed between the early 1970s until the mid-1980s. Still, almost all traditional major party families, with the exception of the conservatives, have seen some erosion of their electoral base and their electoral performances have become less secure.

This study found little evidence to support the catch-all assumption that parties aim to communicate primarily with the electorate through organised interest groups. At the elite level parties have not been progressively penetrated by individuals from non-traditional social groups supporting the party. In contrast to Kirchheimer's predictions there is little evidence of a linear trend towards external recruitment of ministers from organised interests. Ministerial recruitment has not become characterised by the assimilation of an increasing number of experts and professionals into the party elite. Instead, a progressively more ‘political’ pattern of ministerial recruitment is dominant because national party leaders of most West European parties recruited more of their colleagues from among the parliamentary representatives. Rather than vesting experts and professionals with direct executive power and ministerial responsibility, political elites have opted to maintain direct executive control themselves. This is not to say that politics in Western Europe has not professionalised; indeed as was also shown above, politicians hire an increasing number of experts and professionals. Still, these experts only advise them on the decisions that are taken; politicians themselves have maintained firm control over the executive. The increasing resources party elites allocate to themselves, while preserving power over who has access to this select group of powerholders, are all indicators of concentration and centralisation of power at the elite level. On the other hand, organised interests have found it less practical to enlarge their influence by seeking ministerial representation and think it far more advantageous to make financial contributions to political parties or establish influential lobby organisations in West European capitals where the national governments reside.

Catch-allism: An Arrested Development

The major conclusion from all this is that not one of the eighty-three parties in this study completely fulfil all the criteria of the catch-all party model. This outcome is partly an artefact of the multi-dimensional test of the catch-all thesis, of course, which renders it almost impossible to satisfy all the requirements of catch-allism on all the indicators. Nevertheless, some parties and party systems come relatively close to the catch-all model. In line with Kirchheimer's hypotheses on the geographical pattern of catch-allism, it was found that, in particular, parties in the larger West European continental democracies (France, Germany and Italy) have advanced towards the catch-all model at the organisational level, while parties from the Scandinavian countries (Sweden, Norway and Denmark) as well as Irish and British parties have not progressed at the same speed in this direction. A similar pattern was found at the ideological dimension; relatively higher levels of catch-allism were found in Germany, Italy and France and relatively low levels of ideological transformation towards catch-allism can be seen in Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Ireland and the United Kingdom. A less transparent picture was found at the electoral dimension, but here too higher levels of catch-allism were discernible in Italy and France, while Danish, Swedish and Finnish parties were less marked by catch-all characteristics at the electoral level.

With regard to the genetic origin of parties this study found considerable substantiation of Kirchheimer’s assertion that social democratic and Christian democratic parties would transform more into the catch-all direction than parties from another lineage. On the organisational dimension, social democratic and Christian democratic parties indeed acquired a higher level of catch-allism compared to their liberal, agrarian and conservative competitors. Kirchheimer also correctly claimed that the social democratic and Christian democratic parties moved relatively closer to the catch-all model with regard to ideological catch-all characteristics: social democratic and Christian democratic parties are more catch-all in their ideology than members of the other party families, yet liberal and conservative parties also transformed towards the catch-all design at the ideological level. It was seen that at the electoral level the social democratic parties could be found in the upper brackets of the distribution of relative catch-allism again, while conservative and liberal parties also adopted electoral catch-all practices. Christian democratic parties scored relatively low on the electoral catch-all dimension. Furthermore, there is some confirmation of Kirchheimer’s hypothesis that most communist parties are largely excluded from the catch-all development, particularly as far as the ideological and electoral dimension are concerned.
 In sum, despite the fact that there is no evidence of a universal and linear development towards catch-allism, this study clearly substantiated several of the trends and patterns Kirchheimer pointed out, justifying the conclusion that a partial development towards catch-allism has come to characterise West European party systems.

This study provide ample proof that parties adapt effectively to the national context in which they operate, enabling them to perpetuate their prominent position in the democratic process of West European countries. It seems that it is not so much the innate qualities of political parties that determine their survival and success, but rather their capacity to adapt themselves to a changing environment. Formal responses by parties to external challenges are visible in their organisational choices, mode of elite recruitment and strategic behaviour in terms of office, policy and vote. The present study sought to determine the type and extent of party transformation in Western Europe and the extracted factors enabled an evaluation of the relative importance of the different motives underpinning the behaviour of party leaders in Western Europe.

Taking into account the obvious limitations, this study found no linear trend towards catch-allism in Western Europe over time, although there was a clear trend towards catch-allism on several of its indicators until the early 1960s. The problem with Kirchheimer's catch-all thesis is his assumption of a continuing trend. For this assumption of a linear development towards catch-allism I found no evidence. On the contrary, during the late 1960s up until the 1980s there was a decline in the overall level of catch-allism. West European party systems have witnessed an arrested development of catch-allism in the post war period. However, it is almost impossible to generalise this finding to all parties and countries included in this study. Across Western Europe I also found large variation in the extent, timing and direction of party transformation. Therefore, Kirchheimer's hypothesis of convergence of parties to one single model of transformation could not be corroborated either. European parties do not converge to one single type of political party, with similar organisational, electoral and ideological strategies. There are still substantial differences between parties in one country and across Western Europe regarding their organisational format, their office and policy-seeking behaviour as well as their electoral appeal. Moreover, all over Western Europe political parties transform their organisation, reorient their policy positions and revise their electoral strategies in different directions. Party transformation, therefore, is not a single story. None of the individual indicators showed a similar trend in all countries and across all party families. Basically, this study found no uniformity in development. There are vast differences across countries and party families regarding the timing, the level and the direction of party change. All in all, it is almost impossible to generalise about all individual parties. This detailed study over a time span of forty-five years did not find one unilateral  and uni-dimensional development. At the different dimensions and indicators contradictory developments could be recorded, allowing for the main conclusion that over the post war period a partial transformation towards catch-allism has occurred in West European party systems, a development which was discontinued in the late 1970s, early 1980s.

Notwithstanding these divergent trends, the analysis above proved that the items used to measure catch-allism constitute an internally valid measurement tool to quantify the transformation of political parties in Western Europe in the post war period. Also, this study developed an analytical instrument which can test not only Kirchheimer's catch-all thesis, but which by means of a multi-dimensional approach and a wide range of indicators, can also be used to address wider questions of party transformation and party system change. Finally, this study has tried to show that Otto Kirchheimer's catch-all thesis remains relevant to the debate on the transformation of West European party systems, not necessarily because of its currency and validity, but because of its rich argumentation. In this sense Kirchheimer's catch-all thesis has proved to be a valuable working hypothesis that can be employed to delineate the transformation of political parties over the second half of the twentieth century.

Evidently, the type of party which Kirchheimer himself joined in the interbellum no longer exists, yet neither did post war parties develop into full-blown catch-all parties. And although it is uncertain which type of parties will characterise the West European party systems of the 21st century, it is clear that the last decade of the 20th century already reveals a sense of unravelling in some of the party systems. The Italian case has shown that even rapid and total system breakdown is not impossible, while in France, Germany and Austria extreme right-wing parties seem capable to alter the hitherto structured patterns of interaction between parties. No doubt that the end of Cold War and subsequent disappearance of a bi-polar world system will have other effects on the ideological complexion, the electoral appeal and the internal organisation of parties. This study can perhaps serve to describe and understand the character and consequences of such profound changes that have taken place in recent times and serve as a tool to analyse future developments.