From Catch-all Politics to Cartelisation The Political.pdf

West European Politics, Vol. 28, No. 1, 33 – 60, January 2005 From Catch-all Politics to Cartelisation: The Political Economy of the Cartel Party MARK BLYTH and RICHARD S. KATZ The John Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, USA ABSTRACT Adaptations to coordination problems endogenous to political parties have established the cartel party as the emerging equilibrium type in modern Western democracies. However, these factors alone are insufficient to maintain such an equilibrium given the threat of defection. That threat is mitigated by three factors: historical changes in party form, systemic changes in the global economy and changed ideas about governments. Together, these changes produce both a cartel of parties and the cartel party organisational form, without requiring overt conspiracy. These speculations are mapped onto actual experiences of the UK, the US and Sweden. The theory of the cartel party is advanced by emphasis on the ‘cost of production’ of policies and the constriction of the policy-space over which parties compete. We also explain why a cartel of parties might be stable, notwithstanding the temptation to defection often attributed to cartels as multi-player prisoners’ dilemmas. The purpose of this article is to explain recent changes within the party organisations and party systems of advanced capitalist states from one common theoretical logic. The argument we present here is that over time a series of adaptations to coordination problems endogenous to political parties established the cartel party as the emerging equilibrium type of party in modern Western democracies. However, these endogenous factors are insufficient, in and of themselves, to maintain such an equilibrium, since the threat of defection, especially in multi-party systems, is ever present. We argue that such a threa