Table Of ContentCCOONNTTEEMMPPOORRAARRYY
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OORRGGAANNIISSAATTIIOONNSS
Edited by Narelle Miragliotta, Anika Gauja and Rodney Smith
CONTEMPORARY AUSTRALIAN
POLITICAL PARTY ORGANISATIONS
CONTEMPORARY
AUSTRALIAN
POLITICAL PARTY
ORGANISATIONS
Edited by Narelle Miragliotta,
Anika Gauja and Rodney Smith
© Copyright 2015. Copyright for individual chapters remains with the authors.
© Copyright 2015. Copyright for the collection in its entirety is held by Narelle
Miragliotta, Anika Gauja and Rodney Smith.
All rights reserved. Apart from any uses permitted by Australia’s Copyright Act 1968,
no part of this book may be reproduced by any process without prior written permission
from the copyright owners. Inquiries should be directed to the publisher.
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Series: Politics
Board: Arts
Design: Les Thomas
National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry:
Title: Contemporary Australian political party organisations /
edited by Narelle Miragliotta, Anika Gauja & Rodney Smith.
ISBN: 9781922235824 (paperback)
Subjects: Political party organization--Australia.
Political parties--Australia--History.
Other Creators/Contributors:
Miragliotta, Narelle, editor.
Gauja, Anika, editor.
Smith, Rodney, 1961, editor.
Dewey Number: 324.29401
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Contents
Contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .vii
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi
Anika Gauja, Narelle Miragliotta and Rodney Smith
1. Democracy, Oligarchy or Polyarchy? Intra Party Politics and the
Australian Labor Party . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Nick Economou
2. The Liberal Party: Electoral Success Despite Organisational Drift . . . 15
Wayne Errington
3. The National Party: The Resilient Party . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Brian Costar
4. The Australian Greens . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .37
Stewart Jackson
5. Organisational Approaches of the Right-of-Centre Minor Parties
in Australia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .50
Zareh Ghazarian
6. Parties and the Mass Membership . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .62
Narelle Miragliotta
7. Parties and Candidate Selection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .76
Anika Gauja
8. Parties and Representation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .89
Rob Manwaring
9. Still in the Shadows? Interest Groups and Political Parties
in the Australian Political System. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
Darren Halpin
10. Parties and Campaigning. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
Stephen Mills
11. The Virtual Party on the Ground. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
Peter John Chen
12. Hunting the Swinging Voter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140
Haydon Manning
13. Party Reviews and Organisational Reform. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154
Nicholas Barry
14. Disciplined Parties and Australian Parliamentary Politics . . . . . . . 169
Rodney Smith
15. Parties in Executive Government. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
Dean Jaensch AO
16. Parties and Federalism: Riker, Aggregation and Devolution. . . . . . 197
Campbell Sharman
17. The Law Governing Australian Political Parties: Regulating
the Golems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . 212
Graeme Orr
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225
Index. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249
Contributors | vii
Contributors
Nicholas Barry is a Lecturer in the Department of Politics, Legal Studies
and Philosophy at La Trobe University. His research interests are primarily
in contemporary political philosophy and political institutions. His current
work focuses on debates over equality and distributive justice, and on the
relationship between human rights, democracy and political institutions.
Peter John Chen is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Government
and International Relations at the University of Sydney. He has written
extensively on aspects of the relationship between media and politics:
particularly new media’s impacts on electoral politics, media regulation and
social movements. Peter is the author of Australian Politics in a Digital Age.
Brian Costar is a Professor of Political Science at Swinburne University
and the Director of the Democratic Audit of Australia. His principal areas
of research are Australian political parties, state and federal parliamentary
politics, and electoral systems and behaviour. He has written extensively on
the National Party. Brian is also a regular contributor to the media.
Nick Economou is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Politics and
International Relations at Monash University. His research interests take in
Australian national and state governance, federal, state and local elections
and electoral systems, and the role and behaviour of Australia’s political
parties. Nick is also a prominent media contributor.
Wayne Errington is a Senior Lecturer in the School of History and Politics
at Adelaide University. His current research interests include Australian
parties and elections, as well as leadership and communication. He is the
co-author of the highly acclaimed book John Winston Howard: The Definitive
Biography.
Anika Gauja is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Government and
International Relations at the University of Sydney. Her research centres on
the comparative analysis of political institutions in modern representative
democracies, with a particular emphasis on parties and party organisation.
Anika is the author of a number of books and journal articles and she was
awarded an ARC Discovery Early Career Award in 2013.
viii | Contemporary Australian Political Party Organisations
Zareh Ghazarian is a Lecturer in the Department of Politics and International
Relations at Monash University. His research interests include parties and
elections, particularly minor and right-wing parties. Zareh is a prominent
contributor to the media and has a forthcoming book on the party system in
the Australian Senate since the end of the Second World War.
Darren Halpin is a Professor in Policy Studies, and the Head of School
of Sociology, at the Research School of Social Sciences, the Australian
National University. He is the co-editor of the journal Interest Groups and
Advocacy and the Foundation Series Editor for the book series Interest
Groups, Advocacy and Democracy (Palgrave, UK). His research examines
interest groups in the policy process, with specific emphasis on the
political representation provided by groups, the level of (and necessity for)
internal democracy within groups, and in assessing group organisational
development.
Stewart Jackson is a Lecturer in the Department of Government and Inter-
national Relations at the University of Sydney. He has research interests in
the areas of Green parties, green politics, social movements and electoral
systems. Prior to joining academia, Stewart served as Convenor of the
Australian Greens.
Dean Jaensch, AO is Emeritus Professor at Flinders University. He has written
extensively on political parties, electoral politics and voting behaviour,
Australian politics, State politics, Northern Territory politics, comparative
politics within the Anglosphere and empirical methodology. He is the author
of over sixteen books and a prolific contributor to academic publications.
Haydon Manning is an Associate Professor in Politics and Public Policy in
the School of Social and Policy Studies at Flinders University. He has written
extensively in the areas of political attitudes, voting behaviour, elections,
political parties, and political cartooning. Haydon is a frequent commentator
on South Australian and national politics.
Rob Manwaring is a Lecturer in Politics and Public Policy in the School
of Social and Policy Studies at Flinders University. His research spans
social democratic and labour democratic politics, public policy and political
participation. Rob is the author of The Search for Democratic Renewal.
Contributors | ix
Stephen Mills is a Lecturer in Public Management at the Graduate School of
Government at the University of Sydney. His research interests take in the
areas of elections, political parties and campaign professionalisation. Prior to
joining academia, Stephen worked as a political journalist, Prime Ministerial
speechwriter and corporate affairs specialist.
Narelle Miragliotta is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Politics and
International Relations at Monash University. She has research interests in
the area of political institutions, with an emphasis on Australian parties,
elections and legislatures.
Graeme Orr is a Professor of Law in the Law School at the University of
Queensland. He has written and commented extensively on the law of
politics, especially elections and parties. Graeme is the international editor of
the Election Law Journal, author of The Law of Politics and Ritual and Rhythm
in Electoral Systems and is working on a book on electoral law and deliberative
democracy.
Campbell Sharman is an Adjunct Professor in Political Science at the
University of British Columbia and a Senior Honorary Research Fellow at
the University of Western Australia. He is involved in a continuing project
analysing long-term trends in parties, representation and parliaments in
Australia based on the Australian Politics and Elections Database (http://
elections.uwa.edu.au).
Rodney Smith is Professor of Australian Politics in the Department of
Government and International Relations at the University of Sydney. He
has written extensively on political parties and elections, public sector ethics
and corruption, and religion and politics.
