Measuring the Level and Direction of Split-Ticket Voting at the 1979 and 1997 British General and Local Elections: A Survey-Based Analysis

Abstract

Only in 1979 and 1997 have British general elections coincided with the annual local government electoral contests. This research note uses both survey and aggregate data to provide new estimates of the extent of split-ticket voting in England at those two elections, and to compare similarities and differences between them. It appears that no fewer than one in six of those electors who voted for one of the three major parties in both contests made a different choice at national as opposed to local level. The fact that the proportion of those splitting their vote in this way was so similar in 1979 and 1997 may surprise those expecting the phenomenon to have grown as part of a general process of partisan dealignment. Rather it appears that changing patterns of contestation between 1979 and 1997, especially at local level, may be better able to account for those variations observed.

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Cox

Laver

(1979) ‘Local and national voting in British elections: Lessons from the synchropolls of 1979,’ Parliamentary Affairs, 32, 383–93.

Crewe

Thomson

(1999) ‘Party Loyalties: Dealignment or Relalignment?’ in Evans

Norris

(eds), Critical Elections. London: Sage.

Curtice

(1996) ‘Who Votes for the Centre now?’ in McIver

(ed.), The Liberal Democrats. London: Prentice Hall.

Gitelson

Richard

(1983) ‘Ticket-splitting: Aggregate measures vs. actual ballots’, Western Political Quarterly, 36, 410–9.

Rallings

Thrasher

(1998) ‘Split-ticket Voting at the 1997 British General and Local Elections: An Aggregate Analysis’ in Denver

(eds), British Elections and Parties Review 8. London: Frank Cass.

Waller

(1980) ‘The 1979 local and general elections in England and Wales.’ Political Studies, 28, 443–50.