By Laura Morales
Published by ECPR
264 pages
ISBN 13: 978-0-9552488-9-4
http://www.ecprnet.eu/publications/morales.asp

About the Book
From political parties to environmental organisations, citizens join a host of associations in order to influence policymaking and political
agendas. Yet why in some western democracies do citizens join political organisations much more than in others? Drawing on a large number of
crossnational surveys and data sets, Morales shows that huge crossnational variations in political membership are not so much related to social
or attitudinal differences between these countries' citizens, but are explained to a great extent by the structure of the political system of
each nation.

Author Biography
Laura Morales is a Research Fellow at the Institute for Social Change of the University of Manchester. She has previously taught Political
Science and Research Methods at Universidad Aunoma de Madrid (2001-2003), Universidad Complutense de Madrid (2003), and the Universidad de
Murcia (2003-2007). She was awarded with the ECPR and the Spanish Political Science Association prizes for the best Ph.D. thesis in 2004. Her
interests lie, especially, in the areas of electoral behaviour, political participation, and comparative politics. She has published
extensively on associational involvement, political participation, and political parties.