ABSTRACT
There are a number of questions that any comparative analysis of party factions in the context of a period of transition must address. They include the following. First, there is the question of definition. Defining 'faction' is no simple matter in any political context, and the pages of this book reveal that there are particular complexities in the case of transitions from authoritarian rule. Secondly, what influence on the shaping of factional behaviour in a given party system is imparted by context - cultural, conjunctural and institutional? A particularly important part of the context is the nature of the previous regime. Thirdly, there is the central question which the answers to most other questions feed - what has been the dynamic offactional behaviour within the dynamic oftransition in each given case? Finally, what have been the consequences for the emerging political system of the particular configuration of party factionalism in each case? Each of these questions arose in the foregoing, if with differing emphases, and this conclusion brings together the answers that were given.
