Mass political parties were free associations unlike obligatory medieval guilds

Evidence

Being “total organizations,” Tamás’s parties were predictably described as modern institutions par excellence. Unlike with the medieval guilds, membership of a party was not obligatory—it was a free association, which members could join to defend their interests. As Antonio Gramsci saw it, the party served as the modern equivalent of the Machiavellian prince, managing complex political situations with tact and insight. This could be done by building up both a base and a framework; parties work from the top down, but also from the bottom up. — Arthur Borriello and Anton Jäger, The Populist Moment, 135

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to Gramsci’s theory of hegemony and the party as ‘modern prince’, and to earlier reading on Medieval merchant guilds and free association as discussed in Milgrom and other trade-institution chapters.
• DEFINE: Clarifies how the 20th-century mass party differs as a distinctive institutional form from medieval corporate guilds.