Why using deliberative democracy to conduct intra-party reform? The reform of the Christian-democratic Belgian French-speaking party

The literature on party reform has highlighted how many western European political parties have opened up their decision-making or rely on the extensive use of (digital) participatory tools in key areas such as the selection of their candidates or leader. While reforms progressively orient parties towards participatory models of democracy, parties much less frequently use inclusive participatory processes and democratic innovations for internal reform. Using the reform process of the Christian-democratic Belgian French-speaking party (cdH) in 2020-2022 as a case study, this paper focuses on (1) the motivations put forward by party elites for implementing a participatory and deliberative reform process and (2) their assessments of its consequences for the party's internal dynamics and the content of the reforms adopted. We first describe the process and its participatory and deliberative components, assessing supporters’ turnout by supplementing official party figures with press reports and interviews. We then analyse interview material with party officials using discourse analysis to shed light on party actors’ motivations and beliefs attached to the use of democratic innovations in the context of party reforms. Preliminary results point to a strong steering of the process by the party leader and close collaborators who firmly controlled its subject, timing, and framing. Participation and deliberation facilitated side-lining the parliamentary group but generated significant internal resistance. Furthermore, there is little grounds for asserting that a substantial part of the adopted reforms originated from the participatory and deliberative process.