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A political party is an organization that seeks to attain political power within a government, usually by participating in electoral campaigns. Parties often espouse a certain ideology, but may also represent a coalition among disparate interests. In countries that have a parliament political parties that have seats in parliament form a parliamentary party which consists of all their members of parliament. In parliamentary systems of government most political parties will also have an elected leader who, if his party is elected by absolute majority, or with a relative majority within the coalition where tradition is thus, becomes head of government. In presidential systems, the President may be elected as a representative of his party; however, in many nations he is forced to relinquish his connections with his party upon the assumption of office as head of state. In certain electoral situations a coalition government may be formed from members of more than one party. This is more common after elections using proportional representation rather than a "first past the post" system. Partisanship is the tendency of supporters of political parties to subscribe to or at least support their party's views and policies in contrast to those of other parties. Differentiation is essential to most political parties: they must be different at least in some ways to other parties to compete in politics and win elections. Extreme partisanship is sometimes referred to as partisan warfare. Ideal types of political parties Political scientists have developed concepts of different ideal types of political parties in order to better compare them with each other. Richard Gunther and Larry Diamond have distinguished between five families (or genera, as they call it) of political parties: elite-based parties, mass-based parties, ethnicity based parties, electoralist parties and movement parties. In turn, each of these types includes different sub-types of political parties. The electoralist party, for example, can be subdivided into three subtypes, the personalistic, the catch-all and the programmatic party. According to this model, the Republican Party in the United States is considered an electoralist - programmatic party while the Democratic Party is seen as an electoralist - catch-all party. Nonpartisan, Single-party, two-party, and multi-party governments
Parties and directions Political parties are often considered on a political spectrum. One typical spectrum has the Left associated with radical or progressive policies and the Right with conservative or reactionary (i.e., returning to the old ways) policies. Other analyses include other dimensions such as the political parties' acceptance of parliamentary democracy as opposed to authoritarian or totalitarian attitudes, and economic policies, the Left favoring social-democracy, socialism or communism, while the Right tends to favor laissez-faire economics or Fascism. Centrist parties often adopt a collection of policies that defy easy placing on the political spectrum. Many parties will have (formal or informal) factions within them that have differing views on policy direction. Party funding Political parties are funded by contributions from their membership and by individuals and organisations which share their political ideas or who stand to benefit from their activities. Ardent supporters may will their estate to the party of their persuasion. Political parties and factions, especially those in government, are lobbied vigorously by organisations, businesses and special interest groups such as trades unions. Money and gifts to a party, or its members, may be offered as incentives. In the United Kingdom, it has been alleged that peerages have been awarded to contributors to party funds, the benefactors becoming members of the Upper House of Parliament and thus being in a position to participate in the legislative process. Famously, Lloyd George was found to have been selling peerages and to prevent such corruption in future, Parliament passed the Honours (Prevention of Abuses) Act 1925 into law. Thus the outright sale of peerages and similar honours became a criminal act, however some benefactors are alleged to have attempted to circumvent this by cloaking their contributions as loans, giving rise to the 'Cash for Peerages' scandal. Such activities have given rise to demands that the scale of donations should be capped. As the costs of electioneering escalate, so the demands made on party funds increases. In UK, some politicians are advocating that parties should be funded by the State; a proposition that promises to give rise to interesting debate. Some nations, such as Australia, give political parties public funding for advertising purposes during election periods. Colors and emblems for parties Main article: see political colour Generally speaking, over the world, political parties associate themselves with colors, primarily for identification, especially for voter recognition during elections. Red usually signifies leftist, communist or socialist parties. Conservative parties generally use blue or black. Recently in the United States, this trend has been reversed, with red being associated with the conservative Republican Party and blue with the liberal Democratic Party. Pink sometimes signifies moderate socialist. Yellow is often used for liberalism. Green is the color for green parties and Islamist parties. Orange is sometimes a color of nationalism, such as in The Netherlands, or is a color of reform such as in Ukraine. In the past, Purple was considered the color of royalty (like white), but today it is sometimes used for feminist parties. Brown or black is generally associated with fascist or neofascist parties, going back to the Nazi Party's brownshirt security guards and Mussolini's blackshirts. Color associations are useful for mnemonics when voter illiteracy is significant. Another case where they are used is when it is not desirable to make rigorous links to parties, particularly when coalitions and s are formed between political parties and other organizations, for example: Red Tory, "Purple" (Red-Blue) alliances, Red-Green Alliances, Blue-Green Alliances, Pan-green coalitions, and Pan-blue coalitions. The emblem of socialist parties is often a red rose held in a fist. Communist parties often use a hammer, a sickle, or both. Symbols can be very important when the electorate is overall illiterate. In the Kenyan constitutional referendum, 2005, supporters of the constitution used the banana as their symbol, while the "no" used an orange. International organizations of political parties During the 19th and 20th century, many national political parties organized themselves into international organizations along similar policy lines. Notable examples are the International Workingmen's Association (also called the First International), the Socialist International (also called the Second International), the Communist International (also called the Third International), and the Fourth International, as organizations of working class parties, or the Liberal International (yellow), and the International Democrat Union (blue). Worldwide green parties have recently established the Global Greens. The Socialist International, the Liberal International, and the International Democrat Union are all based in London. Bibliography See also | |||||||||
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