Number of units of observation and case selection 1. The issue of the number of cases

CHAPTER 3. METHODOLOGICAL ISSUES

3.1. Number of units of observation and case selection 1. The issue of the number of cases

Case selection is a difficult issue, as it is always a matter of balancing comparability, number of cases, quality of the information provided and the possible degree of generalisation. The method chosen for this empirical analysis is the comparative case study. This method requires that the same in-depth study is made for a limited number of cases and that the same variables are used systematically across each unit of analysis (King, Keohane and Verba 1994: 45). Through case study research, we can obtain detailed information about the cases, observe the complexities of the social phenomena under investigation and try to assess the strength of the hypothesised relationships (Denscombe 2000: 31). The comparison of several cases strengthens the validity of the study and it results, as it produces results that do not apply only to one case. The present study compares the organisation of the main state-wide parties in two countries, adding another level of comparison: not only are several parties compared with regard to their organisation, but they are also compared across two countries, increasing the validity of the observations. A number of reasons come to explain this choice.

Data on the issue of the vertical dimension of party organisation is scarce and unsystematic, and it had to be collected for the purpose of the dissertation. This research aims at studying party organisation through the analysis of many internal party processes. This called for the realisation of interviews in the countries themselves and limited the number of countries that could be compared. An international comparison was preferred to a simple case study (study of the organisation of one party) or a single-country analysis, as it can offer conclusions that are valid beyond the context of a single country. The comparison of party organisation in two countries therefore allows our hypotheses to be tested in a manner that is less dependent upon the national context.

The method of case selection is a combination of two types of methods. First, a most similar systems design was chosen in order to control for a number of variables.

The most similar systems design requires that the chosen units of analysis are as close

as possible on a maximum number of aspects in order to control for as many variables as possible and focus on a limited number of possible relationships. As no two political parties or countries share the exact same characteristics, it is more a matter of comparing 'relatively similar' countries (Dogan and Pelassy 1990: 133). This is combined with a strongest case analysis, designed to alleviate some, albeit not all, the doubts about the main hypotheses. The underlying assumption behind this research strategy is that if the hypotheses are not validated by the study of apparently favourable cases, then they are very unlikely to be validated at all (Rallings 1987: 2). If this may seem somewhat too deterministic and increases the likelihood of positive results, it still has the merits of testing hypotheses that have been rarely tested in the past.

As a result of this choice, we cannot expect to achieve a high level of external validity for the answers provided to our research questions, but we endeavour instead to achieve a higher level of internal validity (Pennings, Keman and Kleinnijenhuis 1999: 12). Whereas the conclusions of the comparison of two countries cannot lead to broad generalisations, it can at least provide a detailed account of the internal processes in the parties studied and test the validity of the hypotheses in the selected cases. The comparison can also offer interesting cues on the relationship between the variables selected in the model. From this investigation, some tendencies, in the form of organisational trends or relationships between independent and dependent variables may appear. Moreover, the two cases share characteristics that are common with other countries (regionalised nature of their government, multinational character, regionalism, etc.), for which some of the findings of this study might also apply.

3.1.2. Country comparison

Choosing the countries to compare in Western Europe

To study the relationship between regionalisation, regionalism and multi-level party organisation, the countries analysed had to be regionalised or federal states with instances of regionalist feelings and regionalist parties in at least some of the regions of the countries. Table 3.1 below compares the regionalised arrangements of 15 member states of the European Union (the EU between 1 January 1995 and 30 April 2004) and the presence of regionalist parties. Among the federal states of the European Union, Austria does not have any regionalist party. Belgium is ruled out, as it does not have any state-wide party: all the Belgian parties are now divided along linguistic lines. Germany has limited regionalism, most notably among the Danish minority in the Schleswig-Holstein.

The table also shows that of the non-federal European countries (countries that score less than 4 for 'constitutional federalism'), Spain and the UK without England receive the highest scores with Italy following them. Italy is regionalised state and it has regionalist parties, in particular the Lega Nord, the Südtiroler Volkspartei and the Union Valdôtaine. Five of its 20 regions enjoy special autonomy status that allows them to pass legislation over local matters, based on the recognition of regional minority rights and geography. The other 15 regions originally had administrative powers, but saw their areas of competence expanded in 2001. In 2005, a process of devolution (devoluzzione) of further competences was initiated and but was rejected in a referendum held in June 2006. Because of the more limited extent of Italian regionalisation, the countries chosen to illustrate a regionalised setting are Spain and the United Kingdom.

Table 3.1. Regional governance in the European Union (EU 15), 2005

Note: 'UK2' stands for the devolved parts of the UK: Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, that is, the UK without England.

Source: Hooghe and Marks (2001a, Table II) and extrapolation from the same. For the coding scheme, see Hooghe and Marks (2001b).

Comparing party organisation in Spain and in the UK

Both countries share a number of characteristics that go beyond the regionalised character of their decision-making procedures. Whereas the details of the history and party systems of both countries will be described in chapters 4 and 6, it is worth pointing out the main common points between the UK and Spain at this stage to argue in favour of comparing parties in these two countries.

Both are West European parliamentary democracies with a monarch as head of state, are members of the European Union and have undergone (and are still undergoing) processes of power transfer to their constituent regions. The party systems of Spain and the UK include both state-wide and regionally-based parties.

These parties are in most cases regionalist parties that advocate stronger powers for their regions and occasionally separatist parties that argue in favour of the independence of a region (such as the Scottish National Party and Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya). Even though both countries have different electoral systems (plurality in the UK and PR with the D'Hondt formula of seat allocation in Spain), they have fairly similar degrees of disproportionality, favour larger parties and discriminate against the smaller parties (Lijphart 1994: 162; Lijphart 1999: 162-4).

Lijphart's criteria to evaluate the character of a democratic system (1999) show that the UK and Spain have many characteristics in common. Both countries favour single-party cabinets (even single-party minority cabinets in Spain) rather than coalition cabinets, they have a high level of interest group pluralism and the executive dominates the legislative branch of government. They have different electoral systems that nevertheless produce rather similar effects (high disproportionality, advantage to large parties) and their state-wide party systems are dominated by two large parties, with smaller parties gaining small shares of the seats. Both have decentralised government to their regions (albeit unevenly in the UK), have an asymmetrical legislature with a stronger lower chamber and have independent central banks. Spain and the UK diverge only on two criteria out of ten: Spain has a written constitution

and medium-strength judicial review of the constitutionality of the laws passed by its parliament, while the UK does not have a written constitution and has no judicial review of its laws.

As a result, we can control for a number of factors, such as the regime type (republic vs. monarchy, parliamentary vs. presidential: the fact that there are only parliamentary elections means that there is only one type of state-wide elections to consider), the main characteristics of the political system, the multi-level structure of decision-making and changing capabilities of the state (with constraints imposed at a higher level by the European Union and at a lower level by regional governments), the direct election of regional assemblies, and the presence of regionally-based political parties, sometimes of a regionalist or nationalist nature (Winter and Türsan 1998).

Both countries are quite similar with respect to their decentralised character.

There are no two countries that share the exact same form of regionalised structure, both in terms of scope of the powers assigned to the regions and with respect to the nature of the type of distribution of competence (dual versus integrative).

Consequently, we have to allow for a certain level of variation in that respect. Spain scores high for constitutional federalism (3 on a scale of 4), special territorial autonomy (2) and regional elections (2). It only receives a score of 1 for 'role of regions in central government'. The first crucial difference between Spain and the UK is that whereas Spain has decentralised power to all of its regions, the UK is only decentralised in Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland and London. The largest and most populated part of the country, England, remains ruled by the central parliament. Table 3.1 above illustrates that overall, regional governance in the UK is less developed than in Spain.

An extrapolation using Hooghe and Marks coding system (2001a Table II and 2001b Appendix 2) shows that if the non-decentralised part of the UK, England, is excluded, then the British regionalised arrangement is much closer to the Spanish one.

If we consider only Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, the coding of the UK (UK 2) is then very different: the regions empowered since 1999 have extensive authoritative competences over a range of policy areas but these competences are not guaranteed in a constitution (code 2 for 'Constitutional federalism'); the UK allows special territorial autonomy for some regions, with the Scottish and Northern Irish institutions⁹ having powers of primary legislation while the Welsh Assembly only has powers of secondary legislation (score 2 for 'Special territorial autonomy', as Scotland and Northern Ireland constitute over 10% of the population); the regions have a limited and non-binding influence at the central level through executive cooperation (score of 1 for 'Role of regions in central government'); and finally, the three regional assemblies considered are directly elected (score of 2 for 'Regional elections').

Both countries have an asymmetric design. There is, however, an important difference in terms of the scope of that asymmetry between the two countries. The Spanish system was originally quite asymmetric because of the distinction between 'historic nationalities', a term used to refer to the Basque Country, Catalonia, Galicia and Navarre, and the other regions. This distinction provided two distinct routes towards autonomy and allowed the first group of regions (together with Andalusia, which 'forced' its way into this group) to obtain more powers than the other regions.

Progressively, however, the non-historic regions have caught up on most of the

9 The suspension of the Northern Ireland Assembly between October 2002 and May 2007 is ignored, as it remains that this institution, should it have functioned then, would have had such powers.

competences of the historic regions. Only a few differences in competences remain, most notably with respect to the police force in the historic regions and fiscal autonomy in the provinces of the Basque Country and Navarra.¹⁰

There is a much stronger asymmetry between Scotland and Wales. Whereas the Scottish Parliament has powers of primary legislation, the Welsh Assembly can only pass secondary legislation within the framework of Westminster bills. This asymmetry can in part be explained by the different levels of regionalism and the strength of the regionalist feelings in the regions: in Spain, it is the regions with the historical claims of regional rights to self-government that have been awarded the largest degree of autonomy. Likewise, Scotland has more claims to regional autonomy based on history and stronger support for regional self-government than Wales (see Chapters 4 and 5).

The regions where regionalism is strongest and that have some historical precedents of self-government or special rights have been awarded more powers than the other regions in both countries.

The two countries also differ in other respects, starting with two crucial differences, the transition from a centralised to a decentralised state and the constitutional guarantee of decentralisation. While the UK has an old parliamentary tradition, Spain, on the other hand, has only recently become a democracy. In Spain, the transition from Franco's authoritarian regime to parliamentary democracy happened only in 1978 but also quasi-simultaneously as the process of decentralisation. The long discussions of the transition period also included the shape of the state and the extent of its competences. The final agreement produced a singular process of asymmetric decentralisation, with each newly created Autonomous Community negotiating its attributions with the central state within the framework established by the constitution (Articles 2 and 143-158). As a result, the different Autonomous Communities obtained their Statutes of Autonomy one at a time, and the first regional elections took place in 1980 (Basque Country, Catalonia), 1981 (Galicia) and 1983 (Aragon, Asturias, Balearic Islands, the Canary Islands, Cantabria, Castile La Mancha, Castile and Leon, Extremadura, La Rioja, the Madrid Community, Murcia Region, Navarre, Valencian Community).

On the other hand, the United Kingdom has a very long tradition of parliamentary democracy, which will not be developed here any further as it is generally well known. While being until recently one of the most centralised countries in Europe, as a union the UK allowed some internal diversity. For instance Scotland was able to keep its Church and legal system after the 1707 union with England, and Wales managed to retain its cultural distinctiveness and linguistic rights (Bogdanor 2001: 7-10). Devolution in Scotland and Wales is very recent. It is the result of two bills passed in 1998, the Scotland Act and Government of Wales Act. The first Scottish and Welsh elections were held simultaneously the following year. Unlike Spanish decentralisation, devolution in Britain is not constitutionally protected and could be repealed by a simple Act of Parliament.

Choosing the regions for the analysis of regional party processes

In the UK, the range of regions to choose from is limited, as devolution only applied to Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and London. London, in spite of its very large population, is not a 'region' in the strictest sense of the term. Rather, it is more like a

10 The reform of the Catalan statute of Autonomy of 2006 is not included in this study.

large urban district. The London Assembly has fewer powers than the other three regional institutions. Another distinguishing feature of the London Assembly is its directly elected mayor. The Northern Ireland Assembly has been out of office for most of the period since its creation. As a result, the Greater London Assembly and the Northern Ireland Assembly are excluded from the comparison as outliers.

Scotland and Wales are both geographical regions with a distinct culture and language, past experience of special administration and new devolved institutions.

Table 3.2. Data on the Spanish autonomous communities

Support for regionalist

† Euskera for the Basque minority.

# These percentages include the votes for UPN (Unión del Pueblo Navarra), which is closely allied with PP. Both parties have an agreement according to which only the UPN competes in regional elections and the PP competes in state-wide general elections. It is a matter of dispute whether the UPN should be considered a separate 'regionalist' party. If the party is not included, the percentages drop to 28.6% (1999) and 26.6 (average).

° Regionalist parties in Castile and Leon are actually parties that defend either part of the region: Tierra Comunera- Partido Nacionalista Castellano and Unidad del Pueblo Leonés.

* Source: compilation of data from the Archivo Histórico Electoral, Presidencia de la Generalitat Valenciana (Argos) http://www.pre.gva.es/argos/archivo/index.html

**Source: CIS Boletín 31, January-April 2003: Instituciones y Autonomías (http://www.cis.es/page.aspx?condicion=boletín%2031)

As we saw above, the Spanish autonomous communities differ in their history, the way they obtained their statute of autonomy and the strength of regionalism. Table 3.2 below recapitulates some of these differences. Because of the 'most likely-most similar' method of case selection chosen in this study, it was decided to focus the analysis of party organisation in the three autonomous communities known as 'historic nationalities', that is, Catalonia, the Basque Country and Galicia. All three obtained their statute of autonomy via the fast route (article 151 of the constitution) on the basis of some previous historical experience of autonomous government and the

existence of distinctive language and cultural practices. As a result, they have a longer experience of a high level of regional self-government. These regions are also characterised by the presence of regionalist parties and a strong level of regional feelings combined with relatively low level of identification with the Spanish identity.

British and Spanish state-wide parties

The political parties analysed here are all the parties with a significant weight in the party system that present candidates for general and regional elections in most of the constituencies of their country. In both countries, none of what we call the 'state-wide parties' actually fields candidates in each and every single constituency for general and regional elections.

Table 3.3. Territorial coverage of the British parties represented in Westminster (2005) Candidates

Notes: The data covers the period up to the 2005 general election and the 2003 Northern Irish, Scottish and Welsh elections. National and regional government indicate whether the party has government experience. In brackets is whether the party is currently in government.

Source: Richard Kimber's website http://www.psr.keele.ac.uk/area/uk/ge05/candidates.htm Table 3.3 above shows that only three parties present candidates all over Great Britain, that is, in England, Scotland and Wales for general elections. In contrast, Northern Ireland has a party system that is altogether different from the party system of Great Britain. The parties there are divided first along community lines and then in function of their position on the Good Friday Agreement and the IRA. Some Ulster parties have some links with British parties but these are nonetheless different parties.

For instance, the small Alliance Party (it received 3.7% of the votes in the Northern Ireland Assembly elections of 2003) is a sister party of the Liberal Democrats. Only the Conservative party, faithful to its name (the Conservative and Unionist Party), keeps there an embryonic structure. It presented three candidates in 2005 and they all achieved between 1.4 and 2.6% of the votes. Only three parties with representation in the House of Commons presented candidates all across Great Britain. The main state-wide parties traditionally do not contest the seat of the Speaker of the House. In 2005, Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the Conservative party did not contest Speaker

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