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Zsolt Enyedi, "Organizing a Subcultural Party in Eastern
Europe," Party Politics, 2 (July, 1996), 377-396.
First Paragraph:
The dominance of electoral-professional parties seems to
characterize both the western and the eastern part of the
European continent. The process of individualization and
atomization, a major factor behind the disappearance of mass
parties, was further strengthened in the East by the
deliberate policies of the communist regimes. The Hungarian
government's demobilization strategy proved to be especially
successful in undermining the collective political
identities in society (Körösényi,
1991).
Figures and Tables:
None.
Last Paragraph:
The demobilization strategy of the Kádárist
regime, the lack of mass participation in the transition
period and the much-studied effects of the post-industrial
era (that are as valid in Central and Eastern Europe as
anywhere else in the developed world) lead together to
individualistic value structures that make the revival of
mass parties very unlikely (Kopecky, 1995). But this fact
does not necessarily mean that only
'electoral-professional'-type parties, organizations far
removed from civil society, might survive. There are still
parties in the region with a long-lasting cultural tradition
which seem to be orientated towards providing non-political
services for their constituency. They are deriving the
resources for these services, however, no longer from their
members, but from the state. Whether this kind of party
formation, that relies as heavily on the state as the
'cartel party' described by Katz and Mair (1995), and at the
same time turns with its services towards the civil society
as do the mass parties, is a transitory phenomenon or a
long-lasting pattern.
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