All For One: The Effect of Primaries on the Concept of Party Membership

The French PS and UMP defy widespread trends of party membership decline. The paper argues that this is linked to two major organisational reforms: the introduction of primaries to select presidential candidates and party leaders; a decrease in the cost of party membership and thus participation. These reforms allowed the parties to combine several aspects of mass parties: legitimacy rooted in popular support with centralised elite power. They also change the notion of party membership by shifting to a more passive, ad hoc and individualistic conception. The paper theorizes the link between organizational reform and conception of party membership, empirically examining it using the French PS and UMP. It concludes that party leadership often prioritises quantity over quality of membership, and party membership becomes generally not distinguishable from mere voting affiliation. It also outlines the dangers in devolving voting rights and the paradox of democratisation as a disempowering party members.