ABSTRACT
This chapter turns to the Swedish political parties. I examine their organizational structures and processes, and explore how they have changed in light of European integration. Drawn from the discussion and hypotheses presented in Chapter 1 are three basic research questions. (1) How has the European Union (EU) impacted on parties’ formal organizational structures? (Has the formal decision-making power of EU specialists increased? Have they increased their access to power resources, such as money and staff, over time?) (2) Has the power of EU specialists in internal party politics increased, as one of the hypotheses presented in Chapter 1 suggested? (Have their access to and consumption of power resources changed? Has their influence in formulating party programmes changed? Have they ‘intruded’ into policy areas traditionally regarded as domestic? Is EU specialization becoming more common?) (3) Has the power of party elites been enhanced, as the other hypothesis in Chapter 1 suggested? (How effective are intra-party mechanisms in holding elites accountable when they are engaged in EU-level forums? How effective are parliamentary mechanisms, such as European affairs committees? Who is involved in selecting candidates for election to the European Parliament and EU specialists?)
The parties surveyed are those with parliamentary representation after the election of 2002. They are, in a rough left-to-right order, the Left Party (in Swedish, vänsterpartiet, often abbreviated as v), the Social Democrats (Sveriges social-demokratiska arbetareparti, s), the Greens (miljöpartiet de gröna, mp), the Centre Party (centerpartiet, c), the Liberals (folkpartiet liberalerna, fp), the Christian Democrats (kristdemokraterna, kd) and the Moderates (moderata samlingspartiet, m).2
