Here, There, and Everywhere

Abstract

Abstract This chapter provides a ‘state-of-the-field’ critical overview of the role of political parties in democratic transitions, especially in nation states of the Global South. With specific references to case studies from Ethiopia, Malaysia, Maldives, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and the Gambia, the chapter maps the patterns that emerge in the interactions between party politics and fluxes in regimes within nation states. It conceptualises the role of political parties in democratic strengthening or backslides along two broad thematic parameters—first, in relation to the historical, legal, and institutional contexts within with parties exist; and second, in relation to the dynamic roles parties play as agents. The chapter focuses on parties as individual units instead of party systems and touches upon questions of party constitutionalisation, party bans, party finance, party institutionalisation, and the linkages between political parties and business elites, autocratic or military regimes, populist leaders, and dynastic politics. It also sheds light on the previous lives of parties as grassroots or social organisations and locates post-colonial parties in their historical context. By doing so, the chapter understands parties as heterogenous, constantly shifting, dynamic entities, and provides the thematic rubrics against which the place of parties in democratisation processes in the selected case studies in this volume, as well as in other states in transition globally, can be better understood.