Parties contribute to democratic government through the functions they perform for the political system. The functions can broadly be divided under six categories: Firsty, political parties unite sectional interests, bridge the geographical differences, and induce cohesion. In other words, various interests are aggregated through the instrumentality of parties. This ensures both order and system maintenance.

Secondly, political parties contribute to democratic government by nominating candidate for election to public office. In the absence of parties, voters would be confronted with a bewildering array of self-nominated candidates, each seeking a narrow victory over others on the basis of personal friendships, celebrity status or name. Parties minimize this danger by setting up their candidates in different constituencies. They carry out campaigns to win elections. They also defray the cost of contesting elections where the candidate is a poor person.

Again, political parties help democratic government by structuring voting choice- reducing the number of candidates on the ballot to those who have realistic chance of winning. Parties that have won sizeable portions of the vote in past elections are likely to win comparable portions of the vote in future ones also. This discourages non-party or non-serious candidates for running for the office.

This in turn focuses the election on the contest between parties and on candidates with established records, which reduces the amount of new information that voters need in order to make a rational decision. In addition, parties also help voters choose candidates by proposing alternative programmes of government action in the form of party manifestos. The specific policies advocated in an election to election, the types of policies advocated by candidates of one party nonetheless usually tend to differ from those proposed by candidates of other parties.

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In the case of the US, for example, even though the neutrality of the names of major political parties, namely, Democratic and Republican suggests that they are undifferentiated in their policies, in reality; however, these parties regularly adopt very different policies in their platforms. Besides, parties help co-ordinate the actions of public officials. A government based on the separation of powers like that of the Unites States, divides responsibilities for making public policy.

The President and leaders of the House and Senate are not required to cooperate with one another. Political parties are the major means for bridging the separation of powers, producing co-ordinated policies that can govern the country effectively. Individuals of the same party in the presidency, the House, and the Senate are likely to share political principles and thus to cooperate in making policy.

In a parliamentary political system, where the formation and continuance of the real executive, i.e., the Council of Ministers, depends on the support of the majority in legislature, political parties perform the task of disciplining the members of the majority to keep them united for providing the life line support to the government. This role of political parties has, in fact, made them informal governments in democracies as the powers of the legislature has now been usurped, to a great extent, by political parties.