El funcionamiento de una democracia depende en gran medida del comportamiento y la capacidad de los partidos políticos para representar los intereses de los ciudadanos y elaborar alternativas políticas. Para ello, los partidos deben desarrollar sus programas, construir estructuras organizativas eficaces, ofrecer a sus miembros una participación activa en las decisiones internas del partido, poner su financiación sobre una base sólida y transparente, mantener un estrecho contacto con los grupos sociales, informar abiertamente sobre sus objetivos e intenciones, planificar eficazmente las campañas electorales y, no en último lugar, contar con líderes que se distingan por su competencia y por el respeto de los principios éticos que exige el ejercicio de la política en representación de los ciudadanos. La presente obra ofrece una introducción completa y de fácil lectura al mundo de los partidos políticos. Basándose en su rica experiencia internacional, el autor consigue comparar la evolución en diferentes países y regiones del mundo y formular recomendaciones prácticas concretas para la organización y eventuales reformas de los partidos.

El funcionamiento de una democracia depende en gran medida del comportamiento y la capacidad de los partidos políticos para representar los intereses de los ciudadanos y elaborar alternativas políticas. Para ello, los partidos deben desarrollar sus programas, construir estructuras organizativas eficaces, ofrecer a sus miembros una participación activa en las decisiones internas del partido, poner su financiación sobre una base sólida y transparente, mantener un estrecho contacto con los grupos sociales, informar abiertamente sobre sus objetivos e intenciones, planificar eficazmente las campañas electorales y, no en último lugar, contar con líderes que se distingan por su competencia y por el respeto de los principios éticos que exige el ejercicio de la política en representación de los ciudadanos. La presente obra ofrece una introducción completa y de fácil lectura al mundo de los partidos políticos. Basándose en su rica experiencia internacional, el autor consigue comparar la evolución en diferentes países y regiones del mundo y formular recomendaciones prácticas concretas para la organización y eventuales reformas de los partidos.

Democracy is in decline and the share of world's population living in freedom under democratic government has decreased considerably as authoritarian practices proliferate. Surprisingly, most of the analyses that study these developments give little attention to the role of political parties in the decline of democracy although there is a broad consensus about the relevance of political parties for the functioning of democracy. How parties can contribute to democracy is best understood by looking at a very diverse range of cases in different parts of the world. Instead of taking a regional approach which dominates the literature on political parties, this volume takes a global perspective. It brings together experts from four continents, which opens up fresh comparative perspectives on the role of political parties in the democratic process. Political Parties and the Crisis of Democracy asks how parties contribute to the consolidation of democracy, why they fail today, why new parties emerge and displace old parties, and also what parties need to do in order to survive cutthroat competition, above all with a new (and sometimes not so new) variants of populist parties. It takes a unique global focus, covering old and new democracies in different regions of the world. It covers Western and Central Europe, Asia-Pacific, Latin America and Africa, Turkey and Israel, including presidential, semi-presidential, and parliamentary democracies and also some countries where democracy is seriously threatened or eroding. This volume offers unique comparative perspectives combined with a detailed analysis of individual countries and their party systems. It shows that parties are central actors for the consolidation of democracy, but that organisational reforms are necessary to cope with social change such as individualisation, the decline in party membership and the impact of new media and modern communication, thus counteracting the fragmentation of party systems and the decay of democracy. This is an open access title available under the terms of a [CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International] licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.

Judicial control of public power ensures a guarantee of the rule of law. This book addresses the scope and limits of judicial control at the national level, i.e. the control of public authorities, and at the supranational level, i.e. the control of States. It explores the risk of judicial review leading to judicial activism that can threaten the principle of the separation of powers or the legitimate exercise of state powers. It analyzes how national and supranational legal systems have embodied certain mechanisms, such as the principles of reasonableness, proportionality, deference and margin of appreciation, as well as the horizontal effects of human rights that help to determine how far a judge can go. Taking a theoretical and comparative view, the book first examines the conceptual bases of the various control systems and then studies the models, structural elements, and functions of the control instruments in selected countries and regions. It uses country and regional reports as the basis for the comparison of the convergences and divergences of the implementation of control in certain countries of Europe, Latin America, and Africa. The book’s theoretical reflections and comparative investigations provide answers to important questions, such as whether or not there are nascent universal principles concerning the control of public power, how strong the impact of particular legal traditions is, and to what extent international law concepts have had harmonizing and strengthening effects on internal public-power control.