Democratising candidate selection in Romania and Slovakia

Gherghina, S. and Spáč, P. (2015) Democratising candidate selection in Romania and Slovakia. In: Sandri, G. and Seddone, A. (eds.) Party Primaries in Comparative Perspective. Ashgate: Surrey, pp. 145-160. ISBN 9781472450388

Abstract

In Central and Eastern Europe only a handful of parties formally specify primary elections – open to their members – as a means of selecting their candidates. Two important political parties from Romania and Slovakia had a similar approach towards primaries: they both formally adopted primaries, but failed to use them on a systematic basis. The Romanian Social Democratic Party (PSD) used primaries for the selection of its legislative candidates in 2004, made them optional immediately afterwards and never used them again. The Slovak Democratic and Christian Union-Democratic Party (SDKÚ-DS) adopted primaries in 2000 but used them only in 2002 and 2010.. This chapter analyses the use of primaries in Romania and Slovakia with a focus on the PSD in 2004 and the SDKÚ-DS in 2010. Our goal is to identify similarities in the formal rules, organisation and potential effects of primaries. The empirical evidence reveals no impact of the inclusive candidate selection methods on electoral performance or membership organisation for either party.

• Item Type: Book Sections
• Status: Published
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Gherghina, Dr Sergiu
• Authors: Gherghina, S., and Spáč, P.
• College/School: College of Social Sciences > School of Social and Political Sciences > Politics
• Publisher: Ashgate
• ISBN: 9781472450388