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27 Comp. Pol. Stud. 3 (1994-1995)

handle is hein.journals/compls27 and id is 1 raw text is: Socialists and social democrats have probably nowhere been better entrenched than in Austria and Sweden. Yet in both countries, they have suffered electoral defeats in the 1980s and early 1990s, just as socialists in many other West European nations. Changes in class structure and the economic climate during socialist government incumbency do not satisfactorily explain socialist decline. Instead, this article focuses on the organizational structure of Austrian and Swedish social democracy to explain the parties' strategic immobility when faced with the new electoral challenges of free market liberalism and left-libertarian politics. Differences in the parties' organizational structure help to account for the respective timing of electoral crisis and the organizational reforms and new policy initiatives chosen in response to such crises. AUSTRIAN AND SWEDISH SOCIAL DEMOCRATS IN CRISIS Party Strategy and Organization in Corporatist Regimes HERBERT KITSCHELT Duke University T he Swedish social democrats (SAP) and the Austrian socialists (SPO) were the only Northwest European moderate left parties that managed to remain above the 40% support level in each national election of the 1980s and also held on to or were able to reassert their control of government after a brief interlude of nonsocialist rule. Yet the political dominance of these parties has either been gradually undermined (Austria) or effectively termi- nated as a consequence of the Swedish parliamentary elections of September 1991. Although the unique resources and policies of these socialist parties were able to delay the crisis that some social democrats experienced in such other West European countries as Germany or Britain, they have not managed to escape from the problems that have plagued the conventional left since the 1970s. In the past two decades, all social democratic and socialist parties have faced two new challenges to a greater or lesser degree. On the one hand, the COMPARATIVE POLITICAL STUDIES, Vol. 27 No. 1, April 1994 3-39 D 1994 Sage Publications, Inc. 3 from the SAGE Social Science Collections. All Rights Reserved.

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