Short Term Factors Affecting Voting Behaviojr Flashcards
Rational choice theory
Voters act like individual consumers, choosing the most suitable ‘product on offer. Voters consider how they would be affected by having different parties in government, and make their decision based on who will benefit them and their families.
Therefore successful parties are able to adapt their policies to ones that are popular with most of the electorate.
For example, Thatcher changed the Conservative Party’s policies for the 1979 election, as did Blair for New Labour in 1997.
Rational choice theory combines issue voting and valence (trust), which may be seen as a more accurate way of analysing voting behaviour.
Issue voting
Voters make decisions on a range of issues by going through several stages:
Voters must be aware of the issue.
Voters must have an opinion on an issue.
Voters must detect a difference between the parties on the issue.
Finally, voters must actually convert their preference into a vote for the party.
Issue voting is problematic as it relies on a high level of political engagement from voters. It is also not particularly good in explaining voting patterns (for example, in 1987 and 1992, voters preferred Labour’s policies but the Conservatives won the elections).
Valence
Valence is the idea that people support the party best able to deliver on issues they care about.
So, valence suggests that voters aren’t solely concerned with policies, but also on how much they trust a party to deliver those policies. This might be summed up with three questions:
1
Which party leader do I trust?
2
Which party do I trust to manage the economy?
3
Which party has been/will be most competent in government?
In 2017, many voters questioned whether the Labour Party could deliver economic prosperity, even though they liked their policies of abolishing tuition fees, renationalising industries and giving the NHS more funding.
Party leader
The charisma and personality of party leaders is now crucial to a party’s success - they are the ‘brand’ of their party and are often put in good positions for photo opportunities’
For example, in 1997 the young, energetic, family man Blair was seen in stark contrast to Major.
The 2010 televised debates reinforced this view when leaders tried to avoid saying anything controversial, and began to look less ‘human’ Voters started to trust them less, being unable to identify with them. Voters seemed willing to vote for an ‘authentic’ character who would tell the truth in a language they understood, almost irrespective of the policies they supported.
Economic management
It is widely accepted that voters are more likely to support a party if it has managed the economy successfully while in government or it is thought likely to be able to deliver economic prosperity.
Equally, voters are less likely to support a governing party which they feel has been responsible for mismanaging the economy.
For example, the 1978 ‘winter of discontent’ played a key role in Thatcher’s victory in 1979. In 2010, the Conservatives were able to blame Labour under Brown for the 2008 financial crisis.
Governing competency
Governing competency is an assessment of how effective a party has been in government.
• Control of events: Major’s government lost power in 1997 when voters felt they were stumbling from one crisis to another and seemed unable to control events.
• Policy: the Thatcher government (1979-1990) stuck firmly to its promises to change the economic model and was rewarded with electoral success.
• Party unity, strong leadership: the Labour Party under Blair (1994-2007) is an example of how voters rewarded the party who had a clear vision and a united party.
