Does illegal immigration empower rightist parties?

The main goal of this paper is to analyze the political outcome in countries where the relevant issue in elections is the control of immigration. In particular we explore the consequences on the political outcome of the fact that parties are either ideological or opportunistic with respect to this issue. In order to do that we use a simple two-party political competition model in which the issues over which parties take positions are the level of border enforcement and the way it has to be ?nanced. We show that an ideological rather than a pure opportunistic behavior gives parties an advantage to win the election. In particular, in most of the cases we consider we ?nd that rightist parties have an advantage to win in countries where the relevant issue in election is illegal immigration. This result may help us to understand the recent success of anti-immigrant and rightist parties in several countries.

Political alliances and organisational change in political parties: a framework for analysis

This article sets out a theoretical framework for the study of organisational change within political alliances. To achieve this objective it uses as a starting point a series of premises, the most notable of which include the definition of organisational change as a discrete, complex and focussed phenomenon of changes in power within the party. In accordance with these premises, it analyses the synthetic model of organisational change proposed by Panebianco (1988). After examining its limitations, a number of amendments are proposed to adapt it to the way political alliances operate. The above has resulted in the design of four new models. In order to test its validity and explanatory power in a preliminary manner, the second part looks at the organisational change of the UDC within the CiU alliance between 1978 and 2001. The discussion and conclusions reached demonstrate the problems of determinism of the Panebianco model and suggest, tentatively, the importance of the power balance within the alliance as a key factor.

Are parties domocratizing themselves? the evolution of leardership selection in Spain (1977-2008)

The aim of this paper is to verify, for the Spanish case, whether between 1977 and 2008 has increased the internal democracy of the major political parties (PSOE, AP / PP, PCE / IU, PNV and CDC). To do this, we will focus on their leadership selection processes, one of the key elements associated with intra-party democracy. The paper is going to introduce data on four different dimensions of leadership selection: the certification process, the voting procedure, the inclusiveness of the selectorate and, finally, the degree of competitiveness. The results will show that have been few changes in the leadership selection processes of the Spanish political parties since 1977. However, the results of the Spanish case will also be used to suggest some preliminary links between the four dimensions.