ELECTORAL INSTITUTIONS, POLITICAL-ORGANIZATION, AND PARTY DEVELOPMENT- FRENCH AND GERMAN SOCIALISTS AND MASS POLITICS

The electoral systems of Weimar Germany and the French Third Republic help to explain the divergent organizational and ideological developme nt of the French and German socialist parties after 1918. The constrai nts and incentives of electoral mechanisms are crucial in explaining t he internal decision making of parties and their capacity to respond i nnovatively to structural changes. Electoral mechanisms can also contr ibute to or limit the democratic deficit of parties. A neo-institution al theory is employed to analyze how electoral mechanisms shape the ad ministrative and governance structures of parties.