CDI's 2007 Political Party Assistance Roundtable
CDI’s 2007 Political Party Assistance Roundtable was held at Parliament House Canberra on 21 March on the subject of “Political Party Assistance in New Democracies”, featuring a keynote presentation by Mr Ivan Doherty, Director, Political Party Programs, National Democratic Institute (NDI).
Mr Doherty is the NDI's principal in-house expert on political party development. His presentation to the 2007 Roundtable began by reflecting on the importance of political parties and political party development to the broader challenge of democracy building. While it is now widely accepted that stable democracy requires the development of strong well-organised political parties, there had in the past been resistance to the idea of party assistance because of its overtly 'political' nature and also because aid agencies have tended to be more comfortable dealing with civil society than with parties. Mr Doherty noted that there had been a considerable shift in international opinion in this field over the past decade, with more and more governments and international organisations choosing to include political party strengthening in their development assistance program.
Mr Doherty then moved on to focus on the NDI's role in assisting political parties, with a detailed discussion of the various approaches to political party assistance in new democracies. He concluded his talk with an endorsement of Australia's increased role in the political party development field through the involvement of the Australian parties in international development activities and CDI's own political party strengthening program.
The roundtable was an invitation-only event and was attended by the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Alexander Downer, the Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Robert McLelland MP, Senator Marise Payne, Dr Andrew Southcott MP, and representatives of the major Australian political parties, the Australian Electoral Commission, and AusAID. The roundtable was chaired by Mr Tony Eggleton AO CVO, chair of the CDI Consultative Council.
Click on the links below for the full report of this event; access to Mr Doherty's article Democracy Out of Balance: Civil Society Can't Replace Political Parties; and coverage of CDI's 2006 Political Party Assistance Roundtable:
