Contemporary trends in party organization: revisiting intra-party democracy

Party organization has regained a new momentum in the party literature over the past decade. Within this context, we review the most important advances in the literature and critically examine issues such as: the link between party organization literature and organizational theory literature, between party organization and intra-party democracy or between party organization on paper and in reality. We ascertain the need for more conceptual clarifications in the field and raise some questions for debate. We further outline the contribution of this special issue around the controversial relevance and contemporary use of intra-party democracy across representative democracies.