Ideological Beasts, Functional Organisations or a Mirror of ‘Me’? Citizens’ Conceptualisation of Party Functions in Australia and the UK.

While the functions of political parties have been extensively defined in the political science literature, it is still an open question whether citizens attribute the same roles to parties. On the one hand, established theories of parties highlight their systemic functions (candidate selection, mobilisation etc.) as well as the connection between parties and societal groups, including functions such as interest aggregation. On the other hand, studies at the citizen level show the importance of aspect like individuals’ feelings of being represented and the role of individual identities. This article investigates where citizens locate parties within these perspectives and which functions they attribute to them. It is based on data from two surveys from 2019 and 2020, both run in the UK and Australia, which include novel survey instruments that measure what citizens think about political parties. The findings show how citizens share the fundamental understanding of parties’ role in democracy but have strongly contrasting priorities among them. This paper will, therefore, inform both democracy and party literature on citizens’ perceptions of parties, and in extension party democracy, and give insights into why many citizens seem disenchanted with parties in general.