This module provides a comprehensive and up-to-date overview of the changing nature of party politics in the UK today. It takes a comparative politics approach to map and explain the ways in which our party system has evolved and our parties have adapted to a changing political environment. Themes covered include the following: party ideologies; the nature and extent of party competition in the context of social, electoral and media change; the internal life and organizational development of parties; the varieties of party system found across the UK; the roles played by parties within the wider political system; and the crisis of popular legitimacy confronting them.