Accounting for Organisation and Financing. A Comparison of Four Hungarian Parties ZSOLT ENYEDI Abstract This article analyses the financial and organisational profile of the major Hungarian political parties. The question investigated is whether the structure of income and expenditure and the organisational make-up of parties are related to each other, and whether these patterns are compatible with the general rules of party finance, the ideology and power position of the parties, as well as general political development. The analysis of the empirical data finds a correspondence between the regulation of party finance and the generally high level of party centralisation. The structure of expenditure was found to be most closely related to party size, but size did not explain the ratio of donations. As expected, conservative parties tended to have a small membership and were more dependent on their leaders. However, the role of members, donations and membership fees, and the status of MPs within the party hierarchy were not well predicted by membership in party families. The exact distribution of power within the organisations, and the ratio between the various sources of income and targets of expenditure seem to depend more on the individual trajectories of parties as organisations than on any of the general classificatory schemes. THE ORGANISATION AND FINANCING OF POLITICAL PARTIES are activities that belong to the backstage of politics. They are rarely transparent and there is rarely any pro- found public discussion of them. After all, one may argue that the principal job of parties is to offer alternatives in values, public policies and personnel. As long as parties are accountable on these three dimensions it is of secondary importance how they run their internal affairs. However, political scientists tend to show more curiosity. On the one hand, just like politicians, they believe that organising and financing may influence party success. On the other hand, fundamental principles, such as representation, equality and clean governance are seen to be affected by the way parties and candidates structure and fund their operation and campaigns. Interest in these matters often leads, however, to frustration, given the difficulties of studying backstage activities. This article analyses the financial and organisational profile of the major Hungarian parties. The question to be answered is whether the organisational and financial features of parties display meaningful patterns, and whether these patterns are compatible with the general rules of party finance, the ideology and power position of the parties and the general political development. A large number of hypotheses are examined, contrasting EUROPE-ASIA STUDIES Vol. 58, No. 7, November 2006, 1101 – 1117 ISSN 0966-8136 print; ISSN 1465-3427 online/06/071101-17 ª 2006 University of Glasgow DOI: 10.1080/09668130600926363