Movement-parties forever? Assessing the organisational dynamics of Left-wing Populist Parties through the cases of Podemos and La France insoumise

Following Hebert Kitschelt’s definition of movement-party (2006) and drawing onresearch providing a newanalytical framework (Pirro & Castelli Gattinara, 2018), this paper assesses the organisational dynamics of two contemporary Left-wing Populist Movement-Parties, Podemos and La France insoumise. We especially examine and explain the evolution of their party structure andexternal mobilisationcapacity. To do so, we rely on a systematic followingof internal events in both parties and a long-term ethnographic survey onPodemos in Andalusia (2017 –2022) and France insoumise in Brittany (2019 –2022), combining participant observation and in-depth interviews with activists and local party leaders. We first show that the two parties have moved in significantly divergent directions regarding the structuring of the organisation, with Podemos quickly adopting aconventional party structure and France insoumise preservingthe characteristics of a “charismatic”movement-party(Kitschelt, 2006).On the other hand, we show that when it comes to protest activities and extra-institutional mobilisation, Podemos and La France insoumise have undergone mostly similar developments. They have continuouslysupported and taken part in street protest, and our ethnographic surveyshows that overlapping activism is a key feature of the party on the ground. However, their capacity to drive their own extra-parliamentary mobilisationshas weakened over time, as have the most ambitious projects dealing with politicising and organising working-class neigbourhoods, a trend that grassroots activists intend to counterbalance by launching street-level solidarity initiatives. Buildingon previous research, the paper therefore aims to provide new insights into theanalysis of Southern European movement-parties characteristics and evolutions.