Join our Whatsapp channel

       The birth of modern political parties can be traced back to the late 18th century. They largely appeared in Europe and the United States. But most of these parties were ‘cadre parties’ — parties formed by economic elites. They invested more in strengthening their relations with a limited electorate who too belonged to elite groups. The working classes were not allowed to vote, and nor were women and non-white segments of the population.

       As industrialisation intensified, the number of people belonging to the working classes expanded. This created tensions between the new ‘bourgeoisie’ (middle/upper-middle classes) and the working classes. Some sections of the bourgeoisie, though, viewed the increasing size of the working classes as potential votes that could shape more ‘democratic’ means to address working class grievances. Thus was born the concept of the ‘mass party.’

       Mass parties were mostly the creation of the ‘progressive’ bourgeoisie. These parties often organised themselves at the grassroots level and worked towards legislating economic and social reforms. The ‘social democratic’ parties in Europe, the Labour Party in the UK and the post-1930s’ Democratic Party in the US, all have roots in early mass parties.

       Many cadre parties too began to transform themselves along similar lines — even though they promised economic prosperity through unregulated capitalism and a social order based on conservative values. The mass party model was also adopted by large fascist movements, but they weren’t interested in democracy. The mass fascist parties believed that societies should be directed by a ‘special’ set of people. They perceived the people of a particular nation or race as a single organic national entity.

       The evolution of modern political parties, from groups created to protect the interests of the elite into structures that precipitated the rise of populism, has often led to chaotic results and experimentation — especially in Pakistan

       The All India Muslim League (AIML), which was formed in 1906, first emerged as a cadre party, or the party of a small Muslim elite. By the late 1930s, however, it began being transformed into a mass party to attract the votes of a much larger chunk of India’s Muslims.

       From the 1950s onwards, as the electorate expanded, most of the electorate now wanted to sustain their middle class status and the working class wanted to aspire to reach that status. In other words, they began to harbour similar interests.

       In the West, for example, the middle class strengthened and, consequently, more and more members from the working classes began to aspire to achieve middle class status. Gradually, politics of class conflict started to recede. So, in a bid to attract an even wider base of voters, mass parties began to transform into ‘big tent’ parties or ‘catch-all parties.’

       Big tent parties adopt a wide range of positions. They seek a diverse coalition of supporters. For example, ‘progressive’ big tent parties have various wings representing different (and often opposing) expressions of leftist politics — from moderate to more extreme. The same is the case with conservative big tent parties that have within them wings representing moderate-right to far-right positions. Nevertheless, all big tent parties largely aim to retain an overall moderate/centrist disposition.

       In Pakistan, one of the first major big tent parties was the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP). Formed in 1967 as a progressive outfit, it had socialists, social democrats and Marxists, as well as ‘Islamic socialists’, ‘progressive’ ulema and landed elites within it.

       In the erstwhile West Pakistan, the PPP’s main opponents were cadre parties such as the Jamaat-i-Islami, a party headed by an elite group of Islamists, and various Muslim League factions that had lost the AIML’s mass party appeal. Then there were mass parties such as the National Awami Party, headed by progressive Pakhtun and Baloch bourgeoisie.

       Big tent parties dominated politics in many developed and developing democracies till the 1990s. In Pakistan, the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) emerged as a major conservative big tent party. It co-opted industrialists, traders, Islamists and conservative bourgeoise/ petty bourgeoisie. But it increasingly aimed for a centre-right trajectory.

       However, in the late 2000s, both the PML-N and the PPP transformed into cartel parties. According to the American political scientist Richard S. Katz, most mass parties that became big tent parties eventually transformed into cartel parties. By this he meant that cooperation between competing big tent parties increased, but this was mostly done to block the emergence of new parties.

       But cartel parties began to lose ground due to complacency. New ‘anti-elitist’ parties (especially from the right) sprang up. These were mostly populist parties. In some cases, the populist branches of existing big tent outfits dislodged the more moderate wings of the parties. The Republican Party in the US is an example.

       So, are populist parties symbolising the revival of mass parties? No. Mass parties had well-defined hierarchical structures and focused on grassroots organisation. They aimed to engage ordinary citizens in the political process and adhered to a coherent ideology. The same is the case with big tent parties, even though they are more pragmatic and ideologically flexible. Populist parties, on the other hand, are mostly led by ‘charismatic’ leaders who claim to embody ‘the will of the people.’ An anti-pluralistic us-versus-them dichotomy is central to their rhetoric. Populist parties seek broad support, but their organisational structures are loose, and they rely more on mobilising followers through performative rallies. In Pakistan, Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) is an example.

       Also, most populist parties fail to break out of their movement mode and are vulnerable to a burnout. For example, even as president, Donald Trump’s politics continues to be more about his ‘Make America Great Again’ (Maga) movement. His economic and social programmes are largely based on the narrow us-versus-them nature of the movement.

       For over a decade, political scholars have been lamenting the crisis democracy has been plunged into. This is also a crisis of big tent parties. Some scholars ascribe the emergence of the ‘destructive’ and iconoclastic populist parties to the cartel-isation of big tent outfits. But Pakistan offers an interesting resolution to this.

       The PML-N and the PPP became cartel parties. This was seen as an opportunity by the military establishment (ME) to facilitate the rise of a ‘third force’ because, apparently, the bourgeoisie had begun to feel ‘alienated’ by the ‘corrupt’ PPP and PML-N. The third force was the populist PTI and the moulding of a hybrid system, in which the ME’s political role was to come out in the open. This experiment was a disaster because populist parties are badly organised, lack strong structures, and remain in movement mode. According to the political commentator Najam Sethi, instead of a proper party, PTI became a ‘fan club.’

       In 2022, after PTI’s Khan was constitutionally dismissed as PM, the ME picked up the pieces by plugging the more organised and experienced PML-N and the PPP in a more thought-out version of the hybrid system. This is Pakistan’s way of addressing the crisis that politics and big tent parties are facing in democracies. If the ploy succeeds, then this version of the hybrid system will continue to be strengthened through constitutional means.

       Published in Dawn, EOS, July 13th, 2025