Editing Maurice Duverger (section)

===Political parties===
Having as a point of reference their structure, Duverger in his book ''Les Partis Politiques'' (1951) distinguished parties between elite-based parties and mass-based parties. Elite-based parties rather prefer the quality of their members over their quantity, their affiliates being people of great [[Social influence|influence]] on local or national scale. They have flexible and disorganized structures, in general are weakly disciplined and lack developed [[wikt:pragmatic|pragmatic]] content, allowing each of their members to benefit from an enormous freedom of action. Their funding is generally provided by a [[sponsor (commercial)|sponsor]], and as their strength comes from their elected [[Legislator|representatives]], they are typical parties of parliamentarian creation, which depend on the reputation and support of their benefactors.

Mass-based parties possess a secure organization and a strong structure arranged as a [[pyramid]], with superposed hierarchically arranged levels. Their members identify themselves more with the party's [[ideology]] than with its leader, so they have an abstract adhesion. Their decisions are based on the participation of each one of its members, and its founding is granted by their members' payments, a situation that leads them to gain as many adherents as possible. These parties tend to develop on a par with [[suffrage]] and [[democracy]]. For instance, elite-based parties execute an often sporadic political labor, focused on [[elections]]. However, the disadvantage this implies in relation to their contestant parties (which denote permanent labor and a disciplined and organic structure), impels them to modify their organization to become mass-based parties.