School of Social and Political Sciences - Theses

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A party in disarray: Victorian Labor after the split 1955-1965

Allan, Lyle James ( 1980)

Political parties, as Edmund Burke saw them, were bodies of united men agreed on some particular principle promoting national interest. The demands of a mass-electorate in Western democratic societies have rendered obsolete Burke’s conception of “party,” except in the sense that mass political parties seek power in government and in so doing may seek to promote the national interest as they define it. The modern mass-clientele party, as it operates in Western societies, is commonly at variance with Burke’s conception. Mass-clientele parties are not united bodies in Burkean terms, but rather are coalitions of interests, rarely agreed on particular principles except in the most general way. This dissertation seeks to make a contribution to the theory of mass-clientele parties operating in a predominantly two-party system. Generalizations will be suggested that may have application to mass-clientele parties per se, based on the experience of the Australian Labour Party (hereafter ALP) in Victoria.