Abstract

This article argues suggests that the de facto "presidentialization" of parliamentary democracies represents a growing challenge to the party government model. Taking the classic case of the UK as an example, we can see that party government is being steadily undermined as the long-term conditions on which it has been sustained have altered to the benefit of increasingly powerful and autonomous individual leaders. The evidence reveals ways in which candidate-centred electoral processes, changes in intra-party patterns of power, and the growing structural power of Prime Ministers within the executive have combined to enhance the independence of leaders from their parties.