6 - The Majority Institutionalized, 1660–1800

Summary

This chapter argues that majoritarian politics was institutionalized in England during the Restoration period and that this institutionalization preceded and was a precondition for the institutionalization of party politics. By 1662 there were already strong signs that majoritarianism had been institutionalized alongside the restoration of the Stuarts. By the early 1670s, at the latest, the institutionalization of majoritarian politics was complete. With this new institution in place, political practice became organized around the securing of majorities. This led in turn to the emergence and eventual institutionalization of party politics in Parliament, because party politics was the form of coordinated political practice best suited to securing those majorities. It is therefore no surprise to see that in England, the elaboration of partisan politics followed somewhat quickly on the first institutionalization of majoritarian practices in a national representative institution. By the end of the Stuart period, majoritarian politics were firmly in the grip of partisan coordination. The partisan structure of politics would of course weaken occasionally over the course of the eighteenth century, but majoritarian decision-making did not. This makes clear in yet another way that it played a more fundamental role in the emergence of modern politics in Britain than the party system itself.