In August 1991, the Political Organization and Parties Section of the American Political Science Association sponsored a workshop entitled 'Machine Politics, Sound Bites, and Nostalgia: Substantive Issues and Methodological Problems in the Study of Party Organization,' which included a panel of scholars presenting brief papers on research questions and a panel of practitioners responding from their personal experience. The results of these panels are included in this publication. The scholarly perspectives include papers presented by Leon D. Epstein, Paul S. Herrnson, Charles D. Hadley, Michael Margolis, and Kay Lawson. Applied perspectives from practitioners include comments from Michael Margolis, John Pitney, Lynn Cutler, Mark Strand, Les Frances, and Tom Cole. Co-published with the Ray C. Bliss Institute of Applied Politics.
| List of Tables | ||
| Preface | ||
| About the Contributors | ||
| Pt. 1 | Scholarly Perspectives | |
| 1 | Overview of Research on Party Organizations | 1 |
| 2 | Political Parties and Congressional Elections: Out of the Eighties and into the Nineties | 7 |
| 3 | The Organizational Strength of Political Parties at the County Level: Preliminary Observations from the Southern Grassroots Party Activists Project | 20 |
| 4 | The Importance of Local Party Organization for Democratic Governance | 29 |
| 5 | Questions Raised by Recent Attempts at Local Party Reform | 38 |
| Pt. 2 | Applied Perspectives | |
| 6 | Comments by Practitioners | 49 |
Overview
In August 1991, the Political Organization and Parties Section of the American Political Science Association sponsored a workshop entitled 'Machine Politics, Sound Bites, and Nostalgia: Substantive Issues and Methodological Problems in the Study of Party Organization,' which included a panel of scholars presenting brief papers on research questions and a panel of practitioners responding from their personal experience. The results of these panels are included in this publication. The scholarly perspectives ...