2.2. Financing of Political Parties
Thomas Ferguson's Investment Theory of Party Competition (known also as the
Investment Theory of Politics) focuses
on how business elites, not voters, play the leading part in political
systems. The main assertion of the theory is that policy is created by
competing business elites and investors, not voters. Consequently,
political parties serve business interests, and the State is controlled
by the major investors who define the core of political parties.
Ferguson even compares financing elections with nuclear race.
The same theory
applies toward the political parties on European level who can up to
40% be funded by the Member States' political parties according to Regulation (EC) No 2004/2003
of the European Parliament and the Council of 4 November 2003 on the
regulations governing political parties at European level and the rules
regarding their funding OJ L 297, 15/11/2003 P. 0001 - 0004.
A crucial
question is - who is funding the Member States' parties that form the
basis of the Europarties.
The question has been addressed by the Policy
Department C: "Citizens' Rights and Constitutional Affairs" of the DG
for Internal Policies in a document headed: "How to Create a Transnational Party System?"
- a study conducted by the Observatory on Political Parties and
Representation (OPPR), part of the European Democracy Observatory
(EUDO) at the European University Institute (EUI) in 2010 and presented
to the Committee of Constitutional Affairs of the European Parliament
on 26 January 2011. The study covers four aspects:
1) An analysis of the
political doctrine and programme of major political parties in several
Member States; 2) An examination of current procedures applied to
political parties to choose leaders for European Office; 3) The
development of proposals on how to help a European political party
system evolve from national structures strongly influenced by
historical traditions and cultural factors;
4) Suggestions regarding
the extent to which the European electoral system and different systems
of party financing would have to be revised in order to facilitate the
above objectives.
These different
aspects can, in turn, be profitably grouped into two categories:
- the
first and second items concern empirical aspects of party organisation,
programmes and functioning at European and Member State levels whose
in-depth investigation can be seen as a necessary pre-requisite for the
rest of the analysis.
- The remaining items pertain to the more
prescriptive aim of the project, and, as such, allegedly require a more
speculative reflection.
The main starting‐point
for this analysis has been the recognition that the organisation,
strategy and styles of competition of political parties are both
embedded in, and primarily defined by, national political settings.
The study concludes
that while it might have been a relatively easy task to bring together
the Socialist or the Christian‐Democratic parties in the EC-6, the
political Groups faced a much more challenging situation on the eve of
the far-ranging expansion to the ten young democracies of Central and
Eastern Europe (CEE), which entered the EU between May 2004 and January
2007.
The Euromanifestos
Project (EMP), based at the University of Mannheim in Germany, applies
quantitative content analysis to the election manifestos issued by the
national and the European-level parties for the European Parliament
elections. The theoretical and methodological foundations of the EMP
lie in the Comparative Manifestos Project (CMP), a long‐lasting
international endeavour, which systematically collected and coded the
election manifestos issued by the national political parties for the
national elections in the post‐World War II period.
MAIN CONCLUSIONS:
- The wide variety in the numbers of parties at national level can constitute an obstacle for the development of a single EU party system;
- The presence of two or even more national political parties within the same EP group hinders the development of a EU party system;
- The tendency by many national parties to treat their membership in EP groups only in technical terms weakens the process of trans‐national party‐building;
- The fact that all the major Europarties are subjected to the same legal regime may favor the development of a EU party system;
- The building of a trans‐national party system is conditioned by the differences in electoral and political cultures and by the perception of the EP elections as second order contests.
- The wide variety in the numbers of parties at national level can constitute an obstacle for the development of a single EU party system;
- The presence of two or even more national political parties within the same EP group hinders the development of a EU party system;
- The tendency by many national parties to treat their membership in EP groups only in technical terms weakens the process of trans‐national party‐building;
- The fact that all the major Europarties are subjected to the same legal regime may favor the development of a EU party system;
- The building of a trans‐national party system is conditioned by the differences in electoral and political cultures and by the perception of the EP elections as second order contests.
KEY SUMMARY:
- The proposed
transnational constituency could foster closer party co‐operation at EU
level, by promoting genuine transnational campaigning and EU level
party programmes;
Preferential voting, if implemented at EU level, could have a positive impact on the development of the PPELs;
- A strong EU level system of party financing could promote organisational convergence and hence transnational party‐building;
- Despite the positive incentives provided by EC Regulation No. 2004/2003, PPELs remain subordinate to their national components and the EP Groups.
Preferential voting, if implemented at EU level, could have a positive impact on the development of the PPELs;
- A strong EU level system of party financing could promote organisational convergence and hence transnational party‐building;
- Despite the positive incentives provided by EC Regulation No. 2004/2003, PPELs remain subordinate to their national components and the EP Groups.
KEY SUMMARY 2:
- The development of transnational parties is a necessary but not sufficient condition for the development of a transnational party system;
- The problem of the building of a EU party system is institutional, since the process is hindered by the lack of competition between the parties for control of executive office;
- A genuine transnational party competition might emerge if future institutional reforms modify the Treaty;
- A positive consequence of the lack of executive control functions is that parties in the EP seem to be better able to give voice to the views of European citizens;
- Given the current institutional setting, the role of PPELs could be enhanced through activities such as involvement in the ECI; coordinating parliamentary responses in the new procedures regarding subsidiarity violations; proposing and standing by their own candidates for the Commission presidency.
- The problem of the building of a EU party system is institutional, since the process is hindered by the lack of competition between the parties for control of executive office;
- A genuine transnational party competition might emerge if future institutional reforms modify the Treaty;
- A positive consequence of the lack of executive control functions is that parties in the EP seem to be better able to give voice to the views of European citizens;
- Given the current institutional setting, the role of PPELs could be enhanced through activities such as involvement in the ECI; coordinating parliamentary responses in the new procedures regarding subsidiarity violations; proposing and standing by their own candidates for the Commission presidency.
SOME FURTHER SOURCES:
Biezen, I. van (2009),
Constitutionalizing Party Democracy: The Constitutive Codification of
Political Parties in Post‐War Europe, Working Paper Series on the Legal
Regulation of Political Parties, No. 3.
http://www.partylaw.bham.ac.uk/pdfs/wp0309
Döring, H. and P.
Manow (2010), Parliament and government composition database (ParlGov):
An infrastructure for empirical information on parties,elections and governments in modern democracies. – Development version. Available at http://dev.parlgov.org
Gagatek, W. (2010),
‘Campaigning in the European Parliament Elections’ in Gagatek, W. (ed),
The 2009 Elections to the European Parliament. Country Reports, Florence: European University Institute, Available at:
http://cadmus.eui.eu/dspace/bitstream/1814/13757/1/EUDO_2009‐EPElections_ CountryReports.pdf
http://cadmus.eui.eu/dspace/bitstream/1814/13757/1/EUDO_2009‐EPElections_ CountryReports.pdf
About Transparency
International (TI), which is the (global) leading civil society
organization in the fight against corruption, whiches part is the
Transparency International Liaison Office to the EU is part of the
global Transparency, see:
On 18 Dec.2007 The Presidents of the European Parliament and of
the European Council signed a regulation supporting the development of
European political foundations and widening the scope of activities of European
political parties:
Strengthening European Democracy, political dialogue
and voter participation in elections to the European Parliament:
Dr. Louis Galea Speech delivered on 26 January 2011 -The view of the Court of Auditors on the funding and financial management of olitical parties at the European level
Council Regulation
(EC, Euratom) No 2988/95 of 18 December 1995 on the protection of the
European Communities financial interests
Dimitris N. Chryssochou Associate Professor of European Integration Panteion University, Athens.
Dimitris N. Chryssochou Associate Professor of European Integration Panteion University, Athens.
Article 7(3) of the United Nations Convention Against Corruption (UNCAC) - which the EU has ratified - as well as in Recommendation (2003)4 of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe on common rules against corruption in the funding of political parties and electoral campaigns, the latter monitored by the Group of States against Corruption – GRECO