Political Parties and Citizen Engagement in Modern Democracies
Political Parties and Citizen Engagement
From exclusive jurisdiction implying that the power to exercise the judicial function corresponds exclusively to the courts and tribunals established by the rules established by the laws of jurisdiction and procedure. The application of the law or its interpretation by judges and magistrates cannot be corrected by others, much as are his superiors in the judicial hierarchy, except in the exercise of judicial power when dealing with resources commensurate with the laws.
The Political Actors
The Political Parties
The changes that Western societies have experienced in the past 50 years have affected, of course, relations between citizens and their political organizations, but does not mean it has been turned his back on political parties. In fact, remain the links through which to channel the bulk of political participation, and instruments that promote the democratic functioning of our political systems. The emergence or development of new forms of political participation have been an alternative to the existence of party organizations, but complementary tools and mechanisms to support electoral éstas. The Spanish political parties have remained more or less stable since the restoration of democracy in 1977. That support and how they developed the process of transition to democracy (pacts among party elites) consolidated the political parties and organizations were involved in the transition process, without which today have lost protagonismo.
The transition to democracy gave rise to a political party that just reminded those in the Republican experience, neither party organizations and the patterns of partisan political competition to allow the existing recall forty years ago. These are modern parties, emerged in a new more advanced society in which the media have developed remarkably, with its implications for the processes of socialization and political communication. The incursion of television in political communication processes that politics leads to acquire high levels of personalization, replacing the figure of the leader to the content of party political messages.
This trend is more prevalent in a society in which party loyalties have been greatly weakened by the authoritarian parenthesis. The relationship between voters and party leader is a direct, unmediated by the party organization, thus affecting the weakness of the relationships between them. The identification rates of Spanish citizens with political parties are among the lowest in Europe. The games were presented at the beginning of the transition as class parties, with a heated ideological rhetoric, but quickly moderated their positions with a clear setting catch it-all games in which ideological considerations become less important for the sake of electoral success wider beyond the scope of the class, and in which the figure of the militant and the links between the party and give society the role of the leader. Later model have approached the party listed as professional-electoral party, or party cartel, games in which the social aspect becomes less important, ceding to the organizational and institutional aspects. Are fully integrated into the state’s institutional structure, either forming a sub-element of the same society. The Spanish political parties, like Westerners, with their presence have permeated the entire structure of the state apparatus, penetrating and colonizing the whole political system, experimenting, while, serious shortcomings in their implementation social.
The current Constitution of 1978 was the first to mention political parties, whereas expression of political pluralism, assist in the formation and expression of popular will and are an essential instrument for political participation. Their creation and the exercise of their activities are free while respecting the Constitution and the law Their internal structure and functioning must be democratic. The Political Parties Act establishing their legal status, to be considered private associations that meet public purposes and that people can create in the exercise of their fundamental right of association. The party funding is of mixed nature.