Political Parties and the State

This collection of the author's essays on political parties addresses the following questions: under what conditions will strong party organizations emerge?; what influences the character of parties?; and in what circumstances will the parties that formerly dominated politics in a nation or city come under attack? The book's opening chapters analyze the circumstances conducive to the emergence of strong political parties and the changing balance between parties and bureaucracies in Europe and North America. The work then discusses the organization and exclusion of the American working classes by machine and reform regimes. It concludes by examining party organizations as instruments of political control in New York City.