liberation

[party membership] 13: The Progressives and the Alliance

The creation of the Alliance in the early 1990s was supposed to herald the resurgence of the mass membership party-type. However, the figures that the party claimed as membership were a mere fraction of what the traditional parties once claimed, and these numbers quickly melted away leaving today’s Alliance and the Progressive parties with only a handful of members and activists. [Read more below]

[party membership] 12: United Future

When the United Party was established in 1995, it appeared to be the ultimate elite-cadre type party, set up from within Parliament by MPs rather than by any strong social force. As a result it had only a very insignificant-sized membership. [Read more below]

[party membership] 10: Green Party

Although the Green Party has always aspired to be a mass participatory party it has done little to bring this about. The Greens have a relatively democratic party structure, but in practice involve few activist members in steering the direction of the party. Currently the party claim to have a few thousand members. [Read more below]

[party membership] 9: New Zealand First

The number of New Zealand First party members is especially difficult to ascertain. The high secrecy of the organisation is such that all internal party information is kept as close to the leadership as possible. Early in the party’s life NZ First claimed to have more than 10,000 members, and Winston Peters often claimed the party was the second biggest in NZ. However, as former NZ First MP and adviser Michael Laws explained, ‘Like many of Winston’s claims this one also exceeded the straitjacket of actuality’. [Read more below]

National’s policy vagueness – learnt from Labour

One of the main observations and complaints made about the Opposition National Party in recent months has been that it is not releasing policy and is incredibly vague about what it will do if it comes into government this year. These are fair questions and challenges to National, but... [Read more below]

[party membership] 8: Act New Zealand

Instead of modelling itself on a mass-membership party, Act has always had as its model the electoral-professionalised design of a cadre-type party. [Read more below]

[party membership] 7: The National Party

The National Party was previously the largest voluntary organisation in the country, and relative to population, was allegedly once the largest mass membership party in the Western world. [Read more below]

[party membership] 6: The Labour Party

The New Zealand Labour Party has gone from apparently having one of the largest per capita memberships of any Labour Party in the Western world, to now possibly one of the smallest whilst in government. The story of the party’s membership is that of incredible decline. [Read more below]