The Determinants of the Impact of Political Parties on Democracy in Kenya (1991-2013)

Abstract

Political parties are the most widely covered phenomena in political science. This is because they have the ability of representing the public and forming governments both in democratic and undemocratic societies. In an effort to determine the impact of political parties to the democratization process, through analyzed data, the study confirmed two major hypotheses. First, the contribution of political parties to the democratization process has been undermined by weak levels of party organization. Second, party factionalism has undermined the contribution of parties to the democratization process in Kenya. However, the limited contribution of political parties to the democratization process has also been due to the failure by the state to adequately address weak party organization and factionalism, as well as the historical underpinnings to parties such as ethnicity, regionalism, clientilism, and financial constraints. These negative attributes among parties are informed by the colonial legacy on the political administration in general and political parties in particular. The above negative implications among political parties call for a re-look on the broad policy procedures by the government such as party governing institutions. Specifically, they should advance policies which enhance the establishment of revised member chattered documents to include member input in parties as well as a continuous revision of party ideologies. Party regulatory laws should be restructured to address public finance as well as membership contribution to address party financial strains. The study recommends that a MMPR kind of electoral constitution be institutionalized by the government to avoid the formation of simple minority governments which are formed by predominant parties.