mpact of European integration. The responses may themselves influence the direction of European integration. Although more precise meaningsvary (see below), a common denominator in most uses of the term is the identification of a national-supranational nexus regarding authoritative policy decisions. Consequently, most efforts involve the identification of appropriate levels of analysis, key institutional actors, and policy competence ownership; employing network analogies, etc., All as part of the attempt to label a process of change and adaptation which is understood to be a consequence of the development of the European Union. Within this growing literature, there is practically no mention made of the role of political parties as actors in the integration process, either caught up in this phenomenon, or else as key actors possibly influencing the very nature and direction of change and adaptation by institutions, etc. the other hand, political party analysis has only recently begun to acknowledge the European Union as an environment that holds potentially significant consequences for political parties. To date, this literature can be divided into two camps. The first explores attempts to recreate party activity outside the national political system, that is, a focus on party groups in the European Parliament (EP) and the development of transnational party federations. This literature dates from the end of the 1970 s, when direct elections to the EP began (eg Henig, 1979; Pridham and Pridham, 1981; see Hix and Lord, 1997). The development of the European Union system has often been the implicit dependent variable in this analytical tradition. The second camp focuses on the European policy orientation of individual political parties (eg, Gaffney, 1996). Whether organised by party family or national political system, this orientation has been characterised by a pronounced descriptive dimension. Domestic determinants of party positions have prevented the generation of truly comparative analyses. In neither of these two approaches are national political parties viewed as actors in the European integration and/or policy process nor as actors affected by this process, apart from instances when the EU has itself become politicized in elections.governments are organised on partisan bases, with parties operating at several levels of activity in government and opposition, and national executives, even within the context of inter-governmental bargaining remain party politicians. Consequently, some systematic framework for the inclusion of party politics into the study of EU policy-making should be able to be constructed. Similarly, political parties have been affected by European integration, not the least of which their operating environments, national political systems, have themselves been transformed by the development and impact of EU policy-making (the Europeanization of domestic politics and policy-making). There is therefore a connection between the two phenomenon, that is, the change and adaptation of national institutions and styles of policy-making and issue agendas by virtue of EU inputs, and the ability of political parties to pursue their traditional functions of representation, legislation and government formation. A rigorous definition of the concept of Europeanization does present an opportunity to systematically analyse political parties as organisations responding to the effects of European integration upon their primary operating arena, the national political system. The aim of this paper is therefore to advance political party analysis by incorporating the impact of the EU on national political systems, and by extension on the behaviour, internal and external, of political parties. paper is divided as follows. I will first briefly review the Europeanization terminology before adopting a working definition. I will then attempt to link Europeanization with political party activity. Next, I will proceed to a consideration of the Europeanization of political parties by evaluating the potential impact upon the function of parties, and then onto innovative responses, or empirical evidence of change, by parties. I will conclude by summarising my findings in a framework for the comparative analysis of the Europeanization of political parties.
Europeanization
is a term that has become increasingly employed to label or describe a process of transformation, but whether of domestic dynamics as a result of European integration, or of EU institutions themselves, consensus remains unachieved, as witnessed by the sample of definitions below: - de jure transfer of sovereignty to the EU level (Lawton, 1999: 92); ...
