Regulating Political Parties provides a novel and valuable contribution to the existing literature on political parties by discussing the various dimensions of party law and regulation, in Europe and other regions of the world. To what extent are political parties legitimate objects of state regulation? What are the dilemmas of regulating political finance? To what extent are parties accorded a formal constitutional status? What are the consequences of legal bans on political parties? How do legal arrangements affect parties representing ethnic minorities? These and related questions are discussed and examined from both theoretical and empirical perspectives. By bringing together international experts from the disciplines of law and political science, this volume thus addresses from an interdisciplinary and comparative point of view what has long been a notable lacuna in the study of political parties.

Ingrid van Biezen is Professor of Comparative Politics and Head of Department at Leiden University.

Hans-Martien ten Napel is Associate Professor of Constitutional and Administrative Law at Leiden University in the Netherlands, and a senior researcher at the Netherlands School of Human Rights Research.

Table of contents
Introduction 7
Ingrid van Biezen & Hans-Martien ten Napel
Chapter 1: Democracy and the Legal Regulation of Political Parties 17
Richard S. Katz
Chapter 2: Dilemmas of Regulating Political Finance, with Special Reference to the Dutch Case 45
Ruud Koole
Chapter 3: Lessons from the Past: Party Regulation in the Netherlands 71
Remco Nehmelman
Chapter 4: Th e Constitutionalization of Political Parties in Post-war Europe 93
Ingrid van Biezen
Chapter 5: Party Laws in Comparative Perspective 119
Fernando Casal Bértoa, Daniela R. Piccio & Ekaterina R. Rashkova
Chapter 6: Explaining Legislative Confl ict over the Adoption of Political Financing Law in the European Union 149
Wojciech Gagatek
Chapter 7: The SGP Case: Did it Really (Re)Launch the Debate on Party Regulation in the Netherlands 181
Hans-Martien ten Napel & Jaco van den Brink
Chapter 8: Will it All End in Tears? What Really Happens when Democracies Use Law to Ban Political Parties 195
Tim Bale
Chapter 9: Ethnic Party Regulation in Eastern Europe 225
Ekaterina R. Rashkova and Maria Spirova
Chapter 10: On the Engineerability of Political Parties: Evidence from Mexico 253
Imke Harbers & Matthew C. Ingram
About the authors 279
Index 285