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The Neighbourhood Effect: A Test of the Butler-Stokes Model

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2009

A. R. Bodman
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Extract

The purpose of this brief note has been to test the behavioural postulates of the neighbourhood effect. The results do not support the construction that minority voters are converted to the majority view by local information flows. These findings suggest the model of the neighbourhood effect needs to be amended and that alternative explanations of the polarization trends need to be examined more closely.

Type
Notes and Comments
Information
British Journal of Political Science , Volume 13 , Issue 2 , April 1983 , pp. 243 - 249
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1983

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References

1 For example by Berrington, H. B., ‘The General Election of 1964’, Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, CXXVIII (1965), 17–28CrossRefGoogle Scholar; McLean, I., ‘The Problem of Proportionate Swing’, Political Studies, XXI (1973), 57–63CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Butler, D. E. and Stokes, D. E., Political Change in Britain, 2nd edn (London: Macmillan, 1974), pp. 140–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 This is effectively demonstrated by Johnston, R. J. and Hay, A. M., ‘On the Parameters of Uniform Swing in Single-Member Constituency Electoral Systems’, Environment and Planning A, XIV (1982), 61–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

3 Butler, and Stokes, , Political Change in Britain, pp. 140–51.Google Scholar

4 The behaviour of voters with mixed sources of information is assumed to have a fairly uniform impact and is therefore ignored in the remaining discussion.

5 See, for example, the theoretical discussion in Johnston, R. J., ‘Contagion in Neighbour hoods: A Note on Problems of Modelling and Analysis’, Environment and Planning A, VIII (1976), 581–5.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

6 Butler, and Stokes, , Political Change in Britain, pp. 147–8.Google Scholar

7 The inability of swing measures to distinguish varying processes of political change is a theme elaborated on by Bodman, A. R., ‘Measuring Political Change’, Environment and Planning A, XIV (1982), 33–48.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

8 Johnston, R. J., ‘Regional Variations in the 1979 Election Results for England’, Area, XI (1979), 294–7Google Scholar; Johnston, R. J., ‘Regional Variations in British Voting Trends – 1966–1979: Tests of an Ecological Model’, Regional Studies, XV (1981), 23–32CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Johnston, R. J., ‘Testing the Butler-Stokes Model of a Polarization Effect Around the National Swing in Partisan Preferences: England, 1979’, British Journal of Political Science, XI (1981), 113–17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

9 Some additional problems are noted by Bodman, A. R., ‘Representation and Electioneering’, Area, XII (1980), 325–6.Google Scholar

10 See the discussion in Taylor, P. J. and Johnston, R. J., Geography of Elections (New York: Holmes and Meier, 1979), pp. 221–69.Google Scholar

11 See the evidence presented by Berrington, , ‘The General Election of 1964’, pp. 40–2Google Scholar and by Bodman, , ‘Measuring Political Change’, pp. 42–6.Google Scholar

12 Johnston, R. J., ‘Short-term Electoral Change in England’, Political Geography Quarterly, 1 (1982), 41–55CrossRefGoogle Scholar, but note that the transition rates from one major party to the other do not appear to be affected by marginality and that no distinction is made between ‘national’ and ‘local’ transition rates in this study.

13 The assumptions are discussed in greater detail by Cox, K. R., ‘The Spatial Structuring of Information Flow and Partisan Attitudes’ in Dogan, M. and Rokkan, S., eds, Quantitative Ecological Analysis in the Social Sciences (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1969), Chap. 7, pp. 157–85.Google Scholar

14 Interesting historical evidence can be found in Felling, H., Social Geography of British Elections, 1885–1910 (London: Macmillan, 1967).CrossRefGoogle Scholar More contemporary evidence of the spatial variations in party support within constituencies is furnished by Gudgin, G. and Taylor, P. J., Seats, Votes, and the Spatial Organisation of Elections (London: Pion, 1979), pp. 49–52Google Scholar; Maddick, H., ‘A Midland Borough Constituency’ in Butler, D. E., The British General Election of 1951 (London: Macmillan, 1952), p. 173Google Scholar; Blondel, J., ‘Newcastle-under-Lyme’ in Butler, D. E. and Rose, R., eds, The British General Election of 1959 (London: Macmillan, 1960), pp. 155–7Google Scholar; and Holt, R. T. and Turner, J. E., Political Parties in Action: The Battle of Barons Court (New York: Free Press, 1968), pp. 234–5.Google Scholar

15 Johnston, , ‘Regional Variations in British Voting Trends’, pp. 31–2.Google Scholar

16 However, a class-based shift could not explain the polarization found, for example, in the 1979 election.