Political party typologies: Maurice Duverger (1917-2014) and after

Maurice Duverger plays an important role in the process of institutionalization of political science discipline. After the Second World War, he shows great efforts both theoretically and practically to make political science an independent discipline. He participates in the establishments of the political science institute and department at different universities in France, also in the establishments of associations and a journal related to the discipline in an international context. He does a lot of work in the fields of political science, political sociology and law. He obtains a reputation in the international academic literature thanks to publications, translations of his works and being guest lecturer at various universities. While Duverger is active in the formation and development of political science in general, in particular he wants to initiate scientific studies on political parties and reveal generalizable findings. From the beginning of the twentieth century, parties begin to be studied comparatively, also considering their structural features. Duverger takes the first general and comprehensive step in these studies. He studies parties according to their organizational features, classifies them and creates his own party typology; establishes a relationship between party systems and political systems then theorizes it. After Duverger, party studies and party typologies still continue to this day. In this thesis, that is shaped around Duverger and political party typologies, firstly Duverger's life, studies, thoughts on political science and sociology and academic circulation will be examined. Then the focus will be on his party typology and lastly typology studies that have come to this day with the contribution of many theorists. In this way, it will be discussed whether Duverger's typology is still valid or not, and at the same time, the general state of the typology studies will be observed.