This timely book updates, and takes stock of, Lipset and Rokkan's classic work
Party Systems and Voter Alignments: Cross-National Perspectives
, an influential work since its publication in 1967. It examines the significance of the original volume for the history of political sociology, and assesses its theoretical and empirical relevance for the study of contemporary elections, voters and parties. Most importantly this volume gives scope to new areas such as consociational democracies, small island states, and newly democratising Eastern and Central European and Third World countries.