Voting Behaviour Flashcards
Stats on more candidates in recent general elections
It should be noted that in 1979 there were typically three or four candidates per constituency (2576 candidates in 635 constituencies), but by 1997 the number rose to 3724 candidates in 659 constituencies and in 2010 to 4150 candidates in 650 constituencies. This shows a development that gave greater choice to voters, reducing the dominance of the two large parties.
1979 Conservative election victory info
• The election initiated 18 years of Conservative rule, under Margaret Thatcher up to 1990 and then under
John Major to 1997. Seen as bringing to an end years of post-war consensus.
• Called after James Callaghan’s minority Labour government lost a vote of no confidence in the House of
Commons - the most recent time this has happened.
•Thatcher’s initial majority was modest, but it increased in 1983 and 1987; John Major clung to power in the 1992 election.
•Labour descended into a prolonged period of left/right infighting over policy until the reinvention of the
Dartv under Ionv Blair enabled it to return to Dover nags
Turnout in 1979 and size of majority
Turnout: 77%
Majority: 43 seats
Info about Labour’s 1997 victory
• The landslide victory of New Labour, which removed John Major’s Conservatives from office and opened the way to 13 years of Labour government.
• Tony Blair was prime minister until 2007 when he was succeeded by Gordon Brown.
• The Liberal Democrats emerged as a significant third force at Westminster.
• The Conservatives were troubled by ongoing divisions, poor leadership and an inability to appear relevant to contemporary society. They were unable to dislodge Labour from power in the next two elections (2001 and 2005).
1997 Turnout and majority size
Turnout: 71.4%
Majority: 179 seats
Info about 2010 election
• The election that saw Blair’s successor, Gordon Brown, removed from office, ending the New Labour era.
• David Cameron’s Conservatives increased their share of the seats, benefiting from 4 years of efforts at modernisation under their new leader.
• The Conservatives did not gain an independent majority, so had to form a coalition - the first since 1945 - with the Liberal Democrats. Against predictions, the coalition survived a full term, partly due to the Fixed Term Parliament Act on which the Liberal Democrats had insisted.
• Cameron won a slender Conservative majority in the 2015 election.
2010 turnout and majority
Turnout: 65.1%
Majority: None following the election; the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition that was formed afterwards had a majority of 77.
1979 party policies and manifestos
Both the Labour and Conservative manifestos were notable for their moderation. Both gave high priority to bringing inflation down. Callaghan came from Labour’s traditional centre-right and he resisted pressure for more extreme proposals from his party’s left wing. Thatcher’s policy statement contained very little indication that she intended to move her party to the right. There was a mention of returning recently nationalised industries to private hands and removing some trade union powers, but no suggestion of a radical crusade to scale down the state sector. This meant that when Callaghan warned the electorate of a lurch to the right if the Conservatives won, it had little credibility.
1979 election campaign
The Conservatives adopted many of the techniques of modern advertising under the guidance of two professional publicity specialists, Gordon Reece and Tim Bell. The Labour campaign lacked awareness of the finer points of presentation, whereas Thatcher proved amenable to her advisers’ invention of photo opportunities, and was pictured doing everything from tasting tea to holding a newborn calf. The real impact of the campaign is hard to measure. Although the Conservatives outpaced Labour in the opinion polls, when voters were asked who would make the better prime minister, ‘Sunny Jim’ Callaghan was 20 points ahead of Thatcher on average. In spite of his mistakes, voters still respected his air of experience. Thatcher was wise to turn down the offer of a televised debate, which would have highlighted this difference between them. It was perfectly acceptable to do so as a debate had not been held at any previous election.
Wider political context in 1979
The real reason for Thatcher’s victory was the weakness of the Labour government, which precipitated the dissolution of parliament. In spite of Callaghan’s personal popularity, and tentative signs of economic improvement, there was never much doubt that the Conservatives would win.
Callaghan’s government was a minority administration that survived by constructing deals with smaller parties. This left it vulnerable to defeat in the Commons. Moreover, Callaghan mistimed the election. There was widespread expectatlon that he would call an election in the autumn of 1978, but he backed away from doing so. During the winter of discontent, which followed in the early months of 1979, the government’s attempt to impose a 5 per cent limit on pay increases collapsed as a series of strikes - by lorry drivers, health workers, refuse collectors and even, in one local authority, gravediggers - created a sense of national paralysis.
Callaghan’s fallure to control militant trade unions handed the Conservatives a winning card.
The media showed images of a miserable, strike-bound Britain. When Callaghan returned from a Caribbean island summit meeting of world leaders, and dismissed questions by a journalist about the situation at home, The Sun accused him of being out of touch. A politically lethal headline summarised his off-the-cuff remarks in three words: Crisis? What crisis?” This provided the Conservatives with an Irresistible theme: that the country needed a new direction and a Government that could grapple with economic and social breakdown.
The election was triggered by a withdrawal of support for the government by nationalist parties, after the result of referendums on Scottish and Welsh devolution went against the government.
This forced Callaghan to go to the country at the worst possible time for his party.
What is a manifesto?
the document in which a political party details what actions and programmes it intends to introduce if it is successful in the next election - a set of promises for future action.
What is a mandate?
the authority to govern, which a government derives from an election victory. This means that it has the right to introduce its policies as stated in its manifesto. It also allows it to take decisions on other issues as they arise during its term of office, which could not have been foreseen when the manifesto was produced.
1997 party policies and manifestos
As Labour leader, Tony Blair drove forward the policy of modernisation that had tentatively begun under his predecessors, Neil Kinnock (1983-92) and John Smith (1992-94). The ‘New Labour’ project abandoned old-fashioned party policies such as nationalisation, tax increases and the strengthening of trade union powers, which might put off non-committed middle-class voters.
Blair also gave off reassuringly tough signals on law and order, an issue that mattered to voters following rising crime rates in the early 1990s, and emphasised his links to the business community Crucially, Labour won the endorsement of the greater part of the press, including The Sun and The Times. The message was that New Labour was a moderate party with the interests of ‘middle England’ at heart. As a sign of the party’s desire to show how responsible it was, its 1997 platform stressed specific policy details where it promised to make a difference, such as reducing the size of primary school classes and cutting hospital waiting lists. There was no stark difference between Labour and the Conservatives.
Another of Labour’s policies that helped the party win was Blair’s emphasis on constitutional reform, which gave the party common ground with the Liberal Democrats. This made it easier for Liberal Democrats to vote tactically for Labour in marginal seats, which their own candidates coul not hope to win. This may have added up to 30 seats to the Labour majority.
1997 election campaign
New Labour placed a huge emphasis on developing a professional vote-winning machine. It employed public-relations experts to handle the media, used focus groups to assess public opinion and systematically targeted marginal seats rather than safe seats. However, the importance of th strategy should not be exaggerated. Labour’s share of the vote increased on average by 12.5 per cent in its target seats, but by 13.4 per cent in constituencies that it neglected. In fact, despite the central control over the campaign exerted by Labour headquarters, the party’s lead in the opinion polls actually declined in the course of the campaign.
1997 wider political context
Labour could not have won on such a large scale without the damage the Conservatives inflicted on themselves after their narrow victory in the 1992 election. Turnout in 1997 was relatively low, at 71.4 per cent, which meant that under 31 per cent of the registered electorate actually voted Labour. This does not suggest a mass popular movement in support of Labour. The Conservatives had their worst election result since 1832, winning only 30.7 per cent of the vote. The 1997 result can only be fully explained by looking at the failures of John Major’s government.
Economic policy played an important role. By 1997 the economy was recovering from the recession of the early part of the decade, but voters did not give the Conservatives credit for this. They remembered the catastrophe of ‘Black Wednesday’ in September 1992 rather than the modest economic improvement that followed. There was no tangible ‘feel good factor’ in 1997, as the fruits of recovery failed to feed through into either tax cuts or increased investment in public services.
Monthly opinion polls show that Labour was consistently ahead of the Conservatives from the autumn of 1992 onwards. The Conservatives had lost their reputation as efficient managers of the economy and failed to retrieve it.
The image of Tory incompetence was confirmed by a series of financial and sexual scandals (which the media called ‘sleaze) and continuing divisions over Britain’s relationship with the European Union. The impression of weak leadership was fatal for the Conservatives.
2010 party policies and manifestos
There was little difference between the three main parties on the main issue of the election - the need to reduce the budget deficit - which had increased to £163 billion since the financial crisis of
2007-08. All three parties pledged to make savings without sacrificing essential public services. The differences were on the timing and extent of public-spending cuts. The Conservatives were alone in calling for immediate cuts; their rivals argued that this would jeopardise the fragile recovery of the economy from recession, and the cuts should be phased in gradually. From 2008 Cameron and his team focused their attacks on Labour’s alleged mismanagement of the economy, accusing the party of reckless overspending and a failure to regulate the banking system effectively. This gained considerable traction with the electorate; in one opinion poll 59 per cent of voters agreed that most of the extra money spent by the Labour government had been wasted.
2010 election campaign
The 2010 election provides further evidence of the limited importance of campaigns in determining the final result. The Conservatives had begun intense targeting of marginal seats early in the
2005-10 parliament, striving to get their candidates established at local level, market-testing policies with voters and emphasising their support for public services on which people depended.
Yet in spite of these efforts, the Conservatives were still 20 seats short of an overall majority.
On the Labour side much was made of Gordon Brown’s unscripted meeting with a voter in Rochdale, Lancashire. After she embarrassed him with a hostile question about immigration, a radio microphone picked him up describing her as a ‘bigoted woman’ while he was being driven away. The incident was seized on by the media but its actual significance was limited. Brown was already behind in the polls and in fact Labour held Rochdale, where the incident took place.
The most remarkable innovation of the 2010 campaign was the decision to hold televised debates featuring the three main party leaders. Brown was generally felt to have come across as rather wooden, and his tendency to reply ‘I agree with Nick’ was derided at the time. Nick Clegg experienced a boost in the opinion polls after an unexpectedly good performance in the first of the three debates, but this fell back before polling day. Although the Liberal Democrats were able to enter government in coalition with the Conservatives, they lost a total of five seats.
2010 wider political context
A similarity with James Callaghan’s 1979 defeat was Gordon Brown’s choice of election date. When he succeeded Tony Blair as prime minister in June 2007, Brown briefly encouraged speculation that he would call an autumn election in order to secure a personal mandate. When he decided not to do so, he was widely ridiculed for alleged cowardice (Bottler Brown’) and his reputation never fully recovered. He then had to grapple with the financial crisis and ensuing recession, which gave the Conservatives ammunition to use against him. Although many independent commentators commended him for the emergency action he took, in bailing out the banks and partly nationalising those on the brink of failure, he received little political credit for this.
Brown was harshly treated in the media, being depicted as an insecure, cantankerous workaholic who could not articulate a convincing vision for the country. An Ipsos MORI poll shortly before the election showed that 33 per cent of people regarded Cameron as the most capable potential prime minister, compared to 29 per cent for Brown. But when asked about particular leadership characteristics, Brown was consistently ahead on such criteria as ‘who best understands the problems facing Britain’ or ‘who would be best in a crisis? Clearly the electorate was not fully convinced that Cameron was ready to take over. Opinion polls showed the Conservatives ahead of Labour on some issues, but in spite of Cameron’s efforts at modernisation of the party, these still tended to come from traditional Conservative territory, such as immigration and law and order.
On the main question facing the country, management of the economy, 29 per cent of voters felt that the Conservatives had the best policy, compared to 26 per cent for Labour. A further 36 per cent did not choose any of the parties. This helps to explain why the Conservatives were unable to secure an independent majority.
History of class voting
Up to about 1970, voters in Britain were strongly influenced by their social class background.
Generally speaking, working class people - who earned a living from manual labour - voted for the Labour Party. It was closely linked to the trade union movement and looked after the interests of those who worked in the traditional heavy industries of coal, steel, textiles and shipbuilding. The middle classes (non-manual or white collar’ workers, property owners and business people) voted Conservative. This is known as class voting - voting in line with the political party that supposedly best protects and serves the interests of a particular class. In the final third of the 20th century, class began to lose its importance as a determinant of voting behaviour - a process known as
class dealignment.
Of course there was never a completely clear-cut social divide between the two parties. Labour also commanded the support of a section of the middle class, especially those who worked in the state sector, such as teachers and social workers, and it had a following among university Intellectuals. The Conservatives appealed to deferential and patriotic working class voters who valued established institutions such as the monarchy. Without an appeal beyond the ranks of the middle classes, they would not have held office for the greater part of the period.
What is class de alignment?
the process where individuals no longer identify themselves as belonging to a certain class and do not vote for the party they may be expected to, given their background.
How has class become less important?
The link between class and voting is no longer as pronounced as it was in the years after the Second World War. As society has become more affluent and working-class people have aspired to a middle-class way of life, the differences between people in terms of class have not been as visible. This was already apparent by the time of the 1979 election, but it gathered pace in the 1980s, promoted by the sale of council houses to their tenants under the Thatcher government.
The decline of the old heavy industries reduced trade union power, while the service sector, which was less unionised, expanded. The privatisation of many industries and services reduced the size of the public sector, which was traditionally a source of support for the Labour Party. The creation of New Labour in the 1990s was a recognition of this trend.
Why did class dealignment benefit Labour in 1997?
Tony Blair’s victory in 1997 owed a great deal to his ability to broaden the appeal of the party, appealing to middle-class voters, as well as Labour’s traditional working-class base. This was symbolised by the dropping of its historic commitment to the public ownership of key industries such as the railways and energy companies - in 1995.
What is partisan dealignment?
the process where individuals no longer identify themselves on a long-term basis as being associated with a certain political party.
How is class still important?
However, it is still the case that voters in the highest classes are more likely to vote Conservative than Labour. The reverse is true in the lowest occupational groups. There is also a link between class and patterns of turnout at general elections. Members of the electorate who have more at stake financially - through the ownership of property, savings and investments - are more inclined to vote than the poor, who may believe that the political system delivers little for them. In 2010, 76 per cent of the two highest social classes voted, compared with 57 per cent of the two lowest classes. Another indicator was the gap between those who owned their own homes (74 per cent) and those living in social housing or in the private rented sector (55 per cent).
How have partisan loyalties declined?
Another feature of the last third of the 20th century, and the early years of the 21st, has been partisan dealignment. This is a decline in the attachment felt by many voters to one of the two major parties. In the past this loyalty had been instilled by family tradition and the influence of tie workplace and local community. These bonds were weakened as people became less likely to wo in the same industry for their whole lives; improving education reinforced this process.
More people have become floating, or swing, voters who do not identify with a particular party and are open to persuasion at each election. In part this is the result of a growing sense of disillusion and apathy: a loss of confidence in the capacity of politics and politicians to solve problems and make a difference. The size of the core vote for the Conservatives and Labour - the section of the electorate who can be relied upon to support one of these two large parties - has diminished. In 1979, 81 per cent of the electorate cast their votes for Labour and the Conservatives. By 1997 this had fallen to 74 per cent, and to 65 per cent by 2010.
Evidence that the size of the core vote for cons and Labour diminished?
The size of the core vote for the Conservatives and Labour - the section of the electorate who can be relied upon to support one of these two large parties - has diminished. In 1979, 81 per cent of the electorate cast their votes for Labour and the Conservatives. By 1997 this had fallen to 74 per cent, and to 65 per cent by 2010.
Meaning of disillusion
disappointment from discovering something is not as good as one believed it to be; for example, having no confidence in politics and politicians as being able to solve issues and make a difference.
Meaning of apathy
lack of interest, enthusiasm, or concern; for example, not caring about political activity, which manifests itself in low turnout at elections and poor
awareness of contemporary events.
