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Marginality and Turnout in General Elections in the 1970s

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2009

David Denver  and
Gordon Hands
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Extract

In an article published some time ago. we analysed in a systematic way the relationship between constituency marginality and turnout in British general elections between 1955 and 1970. Previous considerations of marginality had concentrated on its effect upon change in turnout from one election to the next, but we were concerned with the relationship between the absolute level of turnout in constituencies in one election and their marginality at the previous election (‘previous marginality’). We found that there was a consistent, significant, positive relationship between previous constituency marginality and turnout.

Type
Notes and Comments
Information
British Journal of Political Science , Volume 15 , Issue 3 , July 1985 , pp. 381 - 388
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1985

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References

1 Denver, D. T. and Hands, H. T. G., ‘Marginality and Turnout in British General Elections’, British Journal of Political Science, IV (1974), 17–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 The marginality score for each constituency is defined as 100 minus the winning party's percentage majority over the second-placed candidate.

3 See Särlvik, Bo and Crewe, Ivor, Decade of Dealignment (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), pp. 333–6.Google Scholar

4 See Crewe, Ivor, Fox, Anthony and Alt, James, ‘Non-Voting in British General Elections 1966-October 1974’. in Crouch, Colin, ed., British Political Sociology Yearbook. Vol. 3 (London: Croom Helm, 1977), pp. 38–110.Google Scholar

5 On issue voting see Särlvik, and Crewe, , Decade of Dealignment, Chap. 11Google Scholar. On tactical voting see Steed, Michael, ‘The Results Analysed’, in Butler, David and Kavanagh, Dennis, The British General Election of February 1974 (London: Macmillan, 1974).Google Scholar

6 The occupation and housing variables are derived from the 1971 census. Figures for individual constituencies are given in Butler, and Kavanagh, , The British General Election of February 1974Google Scholar, and Butler, David and Kavanagh, Dennis, The British General Election of October 1974 (London: Macmillan, 1975)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. The percentage urban in each constituency was calculated directly from the 1971 census. Electorate figures were taken from House of Commons papers 478 of Session 1974/1975 and 374 of Session 1979/1980, published by HMSO.

7 The 1959–70 data confirmed the logic of this argument. Negative correlations were found between turnout and the percentage professional and managerial and the percentage non-manual in consistently Conservative seats. On the other hand, the correlations in consistently Labour seats were positive. These relationships continued to hold in the 1970s as the figures in Table F1 show.

8 Crewe, , Fox, and Alt, , ‘Non-voting’.Google Scholar

9 Details of campaign expenditure in individual constituencies are given in the House of Commons papers referred to in footnote 6. The precise measure used for the 1974 and 1979 elections – percentage of legal maximum spent by the top two candidates – differs slightly from our original measure – percentage of expenditure allowed above the flat-rate allowance spent by the two leading candidates – but the two measures yield almost identical results.