International Democracy Assistance and the Institutionalisation of Political Parties in Southern and Central Europe

Viable political parties and effective party systems are fundamental to building democracy. However, when it comes to the role of party/party system institutionalization in democracy consolidation scholars come to diverse conclusions. It is argued that weak party system institutionalization creates obstacles for the system to consolidate and prevents new democracies from capitalizing on successful democratic transition. Others do not perceive institutionalization as being decisive factor for democratic consolidation. Democratization and democratic consolidation in South and Eastern Europe are characterised by similar involvement of international actors to support consolidation of democratic system and to strengthen their political institutions. Therefore, the external involvement in fostering democratic development of newly democratized countries has taken the form of assistance to political parties defined as support for institutionalization of political parties. There was a widespread believe that an international aid would allow for democracy to consolidate and would help the individual parties to become modern entities linked to the emerging civil society, thus contributing to their institutionalization. This paper will seek to answer whether international party assistance had an impact on institutionalization of political parties in Southern and Central Europe. In order to answer this question the paper will discuss the linkages between democratization and party system institutionalization and will determine the importance of one for another. The paper will discuss differences between party system and political party institutionalization to establish features of the latter for further analysis of linkages between party assistance and party institutionalization. Finally, the paper will compare cases of party assistance in Spain and Portugal with the cases of party assistance offered to Polish and Hungarian parties and their linkages to party institutionalization.