Routes to party choice: Ideology,economic evaluations and voting at the 1997 British General Election

Abstract. Most conventional accounts of voting behaviour fit single models to the entire electorate, implicitly assuming that all voters respond to the same sets of influences, and do so in similar ways. However, a growing body of research suggests that this approach may be misleading, and that distinct groups of voters approach politics, and the electoral decision, from different perspectives. The paper takes a disaggregated look at voting in the 1997 British General Election, dividing voters into different groups according to their formal educational qualifications. Results suggest that different groups of voters respond to different stimuli, depending on their education, and on the party they are voting for.     

Electoral bias at the 2015 general election: reducing Labour’s electoral advantage

Electoral bias results in an asymmetrical seat distribution between parties with similar vote shares. Over recent British general elections Labour held an advantage because it efficiently converted votes into seats. Following the 2015 election result this advantage has reduced considerably, principally because Labour’s vote distribution saw it accumulate more ineffective votes, particularly where electoral support was not converted into seats. By contrast, the vote distribution of the Conservative party is now superior to that of Labour because it acquired fewer wasted votes although Labour retains a modest advantage overall because it benefits from inequalities in electorate size and differences in voter turnout. Features of the 2015 election, however, raise general methodological challenges for decomposing electoral bias. The analysis, therefore, considers the effect of substituting the Liberal Democrats as the third party with the United Kingdom Independence Party. It also examines the outcome in Scotland separately from that in England and Wales. Following this analysis it becomes clear that the method for decomposing electoral bias requires clearer guidelines for its application in specific settings.     

The campaign dynamics of economic voting

This paper considers the relationship between election campaigns and the impact of economic evaluations on vote choice. The motivation is the standard expectation that the campaign generally serves to amplify the significance of economic considerations in the voter's calculus—to focus his/her attention on this “fundamental” element of the electoral decision. Drawing on survey data from ten national elections across four countries (Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States) and applying both parametric and semi-parametric statistical techniques, the paper finds no support for this proposition. The paper reflects on the significance of this conclusion for work on political learning during election campaigns, the literature on economic voting, and the study of electoral behaviour more generally.     

A method for measuring and decomposing electoral bias for the three-party case, illustrated by the British case

The measurement of bias in election results, whereby one or more parties are advantaged in the translation of votes into seats at the expense of others, is attracting increasing attention. So far, almost all of the analytical work – aimed at both identifying the extent of bias in an election result and establishing its causes – has focused on either two-party systems or on the largest two parties in multi-party systems. Building on the firm foundations of one such approach, this paper introduces an original procedure for analysing bias in three-party systems using a readily-appreciated metric for both evaluating the degree of bias and decomposing it into the various causal factors. This is illustrated using the example of the 2005 British general election and a comparison of the results from two-party and three-party analyses of six recent elections there.     

Black and (thin) blue (line): Corruption and other political determinants of police killings in America

Police violence is not uncommon in America, and the risk of civilians' being killed by police is considerably higher here than in similar countries, making it a major public health issue. For Black Americans the risk is significantly higher. In this study, we analyze the political determinants of police killings of Black Americans, with a specific focus on corruption in American states. Our evidence suggests that police can kill Black Americans with impunity because of a lack of accountability—exemplified by corruption—that is largely determined by political influences. Our findings point to ways in which the responsibility for police violence and killings is deeply rooted and influenced by the values of the wider society.     

East Side Story: How Transnational Coalitions Contested EU Conditionality

The literature on Europeanisation in relation to Eastern Europe has posited the material incentives of EU membership as the main driver of domestic reforms aimed at adopting EU rules and norms (conditionality). But this fails to explain puzzling instances where no EU rule exists yet domestic change happens under European influence, or where the rule is a condition yet has little impact. As repositories of (dis)information, transnational networks can embolden a candidate country to breach the rules or influence it to comply with the ‘extra-conditionality’ the networks themselves create out of their own agendas.     

Tacticians,Stewards, and Professionals: The Politics of Publishing Select Committee Legal Advice

At Westminster, there are increasing pressures on select committees to publish in‐house legal advice. We suggest that examining the process of deciding to publish provides useful insights into the provision, reception, and use of legal advice, and the dynamics of select committees generally. We argue that the autonomy of select committees to decide what use they make of evidence and advice they receive is, in practice, constrained by the intra‐institutional dynamics and practices of select committees. Committee actors – parliamentarians, clerks, and parliamentary lawyers – each have overlapping, sometimes competing, roles. Most of the time, these roles and the responsibilities they encompass coincide, but the prospect of publication reveals clear tensions between the different actors. This is the politics of publication: the tactical approach of politicians is in tension with the stewardship of clerks and the professional norms of parliamentary lawyers. We suggest this tension will only increase in the near future.     

An Assessment of How Facial Mimicry Can Change Facial Morphology: Implications for Identification

The assessment of facial mimicry is important in forensic anthropology; in addition, the application of modern 3D image acquisition systems may help for the analysis of facial surfaces. This study aimed at exposing a novel method for comparing 3D profiles in different facial expressions. Ten male adults, aged between 30 and 40 years, underwent acquisitions by stereophotogrammetry (VECTRA‐3D ^® ) with different expressions (neutral, happy, sad, angry, surprised). The acquisition of each individual was then superimposed on the neutral one according to nine landmarks, and the root mean square (RMS) value between the two expressions was calculated. The highest difference in comparison with the neutral standard was shown by the happy expression (RMS 4.11 mm), followed by the surprised (RMS 2.74 mm), sad (RMS 1.3 mm), and angry ones (RMS 1.21 mm). This pilot study shows that the 3D–3D superimposition may provide reliable results concerning facial alteration due to mimicry.