Wikipedia:Naming conventions (political parties)

This guideline documents an English Wikipedia naming convention.

Editors should generally follow it, though exceptions may apply. Substantive edits to this page should reflect consensus. When in doubt, discuss first on this guideline's talk page.

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This page in a nutshell: For articles on organizations, such as political parties, the general convention is to name pages with the commonly-used English translation and place the original native name or names on the first line of the article, unless a native name or acronym is far more commonly-used in English-language news media and other sources, in which case those names or acronyms should be used.

This naming convention is a guideline which helps to explain the Article titles policy as it relates to the article title used for article about political parties, it should not be read in such a way that it contradicts the policy.

Guidelines

The title used in reliable English-language sources both inside and outside the political party's country (in scholarly works and in the news media), should be preferred. Parties whose names are always kept in one language in a multilingual country also are commonly referred to by their native title in English, and so those names should be used in article titles.
- For example, Plaid Cymru, Bloc Québécois, Likud, Kadima, and Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami are used because their English translations are rarely used even in the English-language media, either inside or outside the country.
- But Bangladesh Nationalist Party is used because the English title (not the Bengali Bangladesher Jatiyobadi Dal) is commonly used in English-language media.
- When English translations of names are used, and a variety of translations are possible, use the translation that the party or organization itself uses unless that translation differs from the majority of other English-language sources.
  - This is important when translations can vary: For example, the Arabic عمل, used in names of political movements, may be translated as "action" or "labour"; the Arabic الشغّيلة and Persian/Kurdish زحمتکشان may be translated as "toilers" or "workers" or "labourers," and some works may be translated either as "Popular" or "People's" (or spelled differently, as in "Labour" and "Labor").
Where acronyms are far more commonly used than full names in international news media, the acronym should be preferred: Fatah instead of Palestinian National Liberation Movement, Golkar instead of Party of the Functional Groups.
Parties whose name make no sense if translated into English should retain their native form. ¡Alfaro Vive, Carajo! does make some sense in Spanish, but the name 'Alfaro Lives, Dammit!' doesn't make much sense at all in English. Likewise parties whose acronym have a meaning in the original language but not in English. MIGATO ('My cat') is an indirect reference to the nickname of the party leader, a connotation lost if translated.
Parties whose names are composites of different languages. Communist Mazdoor Kissan Party contains both English and Urdu elements, and if translated that composition is lost.
Redirects and disambiguation should be created for alternate names and acronyms.

Disambiguating name use

If more than one party has an identical name (and if one party is not the primary topic), there are several ways to disambiguate the usage:

If two parties from different countries have identical names, then the name of the country could be put in parentheses: Socialist Party (France) and Socialist Party (Argentina).
If two parties in the same country have identical names then they could be differentiated by year of establishment: Communist Party of Sweden (1924) and Communist Party of Sweden (1995). If the name of the country or state is not clear in the party name, disambiguate the country as well: Progressive Party (United States, 1912) and Progressive Party (United States, 1924).
In some cases political parties can be differentiated by the name of their party leader, like Communist Party of India (Marxist–Leninist) (Mahadev Mukherjee) and Communist Party of India (Marxist–Leninist) (Kanu Sanyal). This is useful when the date of establishment is unclear, or when a party splinters and each claims to be the continuation of an original party.
In most cases, subjective terms (such as radical, moderate, or democratic) should not be used as disambiguators.
Generally, if one can differentiate between the original inventor of a party name and later inheritors, then the original party could be named without disambiguating brackets. However, if a later party is considerably more notable than the original one then that party could own the name without clarifying brackets.
- Example: Brazilian Labour Party (current) is used for the current party, while Brazilian Labour Party (historical) is used for the less-notable historical party.