Political pluralism in Albania came relatively late, in 1990, after a prolonged lack of democratic experience. Consequently, democratic political parties are relatively new institutions created essentially with the knowledge of past non-democratic models. Democratic practices were almost inexistent, so the evolution of political parties towards a functioning democratic model started practically from zero and incorporated on the way, rules and behaviors imported from abroad or extracted from the internal context. The process of institutionalization of the parties was long and problematic. Currently parties are still looking for a reference model for their political organization of the future. Their internal functioning was initially inspired more by the desire and aspiration to be a democratically functioning party, than by establishing and applying statutory mechanisms and the respective implementation procedures, as a trusted guide and impartial protector of the party democratic norms. In the political debate within the parties or in the public on political parties and their role in society, the concept of internal democracy is treated mainly through its perceived role and importance, than through its sanctioning in the official statute. A certain number of regulations and guidelines fill that gap by completing and / or detailing the daily activities. However the focusing on the written rules often hides the aspect of their implementation. It is these two aspects affecting the internal party democracy that have been selected by the researchers, in order to assess and analyze the indicators of this phenomenon in Albanian political parties. The analysis of internal democracy in Albanian political parties consists of two parts. The first part starts with the description of the concepts of internal democracy; continues with a historical perspective of the birth and development of democratic pluralism and political parties in Albania
