Building New Labour: The Politics of Party Organisation

"New" Labour was defined in part by wide-ranging reforms to the party's internal democracy. These included changes to how candidates and leaders are selected, changes to policy making processes, and a program of quotas that transformed women's representation in the party. Meg Russell asks what motivated these reforms, to what extent they were driven by leaders or members, and what they can teach us about party organizational change and the nature of power relations in the Labour Party today.