Party Patronage in Lithuanian Public Sector

Abstract

The main issue of this paper is party patronage in Lithuania. Firstly, the phenomenon of party patronage is shortly described focusing on main research questions. Afterwards methodology of semi-structured expert interviews is presented. Lastly this article shows the main findings of party patronage study in Lithuania: party patronage index is constructed, data regarding motivation or party patronage, candidates’ selection criteria, impact of ruling party change on practices of party patronage, party patronage as a part of political culture is presented and analysis of Lithuanian political parties most prone to usage of party patronage is given.