ABSTRACT

Studies of political parties have evidenced a clear impetus for organisational change and professionalisation when a party crosses the representation threshold, though the process by which this change occurs remains under-researched. We use a case study of the UK’s three Green parties to provide a focused examination of the professionalisation-through-representation process. Our study finds clear evidence that all three parties have professionalised to an extent as a result of securing representation. By evaluating the empirical findings in relation to key debates within the party organisational change literature, we show that professionalisation-through-representation does not necessarily require deliberate decisions by actors across a party, it can be largely uni-directional (though in this case the Greens have maintained a relatively consistent presence in legislatures) and is shaped by institutional rules on the public provision of funding and staff as well as parties’ own origins.

摘要

对政党的研究已经证明，当一个政党跨越代表门槛时，会明显推动组织变革和专业化，尽管这种变革发生的过程仍未得到充分研究。我们通过对英国三个绿党的案例研究，对通过代理进行职业化的过程进行重点考察。我们的研究发现明确的证据表明，由于获得代表权，所有三方都在一定程度上实现了专业化。通过评估与党组织变革文献中关键辩论相关的实证结果，我们表明通过代表进行职业化不一定需要党内行为者的慎重决定，