International IDEA’s work on political parties is being reorganized and will now take place under the framework of a new programme, Political Parties, Participation and Representation.

Political party strengthening has, traditionally, been a small part of international democracy and governance support efforts. Democracy support actors and donors have been reluctant to work directly with political parties lest they be perceived as overly political or accused of interfering in domestic politics. Yet there is an increasing acknowledgement that the health of democracy is often linked to the state of the political parties.

The new global programme is the outcome of several rounds of internal consultations and the recommendations from a recent evaluation. It builds on the existing expertise that the Institute has developed in the area of strengthening political parties and the link to political systems.

While International IDEA will continue to provide direct support to political parties and include gender equality perspectives in all programming; this programme has identified two new focus areas as especially important. The first is in the area of cooperation in political competition where International IDEA will focus on the prevailing political culture of competition at the expense of consultation and consensus building. The second strand focuses on the 'political cycle of accountability'. This refers to the important relationship between the state, the citizen as the voter who can demand accountability and the citizen as the beneficiary of results delivered by the political system.