Electoral Systems and Voting Behaviour

There is a theory called 'Embourgeoisement' which means that with rising salaries and better living conditions people are now starting to consider themselves as middle class and would vote for a new ideal party rather the party in their "social class". However this has not always been the case, during 1945 and 1970 the voting behaviour suggested strong class alignment; despite a large number of working class Conservative voters. So most manual workers voted for the labour party and most non-manual workers voted for the conservatives. However, since then a large amount of political scientists have suggested that a class dealignment is taking place. They say that the link between occupational voting is no longer in affect. In 1993, Crewe said, "In the 1945-70 period, nearly two thirds of all voters voted for their class party. From February 1974 the link slowly weakened and since 1983 the proportion has been under half (44-7%) with a majority voting for either the 'class enemy', for the non-class centre or nationalists parties. This trend should not be exaggerated, however class still remains the single most important social factor for the vote."

Political issues are also an important factor in influencing voting. Crewe (1977) suggests that some issues largely affected Labour Party support on questions of basic principle for the party such as, nationalization, the extension of the welfare state and its close links with the TU movement. Crewe claims:

In 1964 a clear majority of Labour identifiers approved of further nationalization (57%) and repudiated the idea that trade unions were too powerful (59%); an overwhelming majority wanted more spending on the social services (88%). By 1979 support for each of these three tenets was down to barely a third, and support for all three together limited to under a quarter.

Crewe argues that the defections from Labour were the result of tensions between official party policy and the views of a large number of Labour voters. There is an emphasize on an issue approach to voting. Voters are seen as moving towards a more critical stance, deciding how issues affect them personally and hence are acting more rationally than formally. This is basically a consumer model; people actively search for the party which seems most likely to create policies which they favor and whose style of government they can respect.

It could be argued that Labour failed to find new policies with major appeal, which discouraged the working class to vote for them and helps suggest that social factors aren't as important in voting behavior as political issues. This is also the case with the Conservatives: as a number of new issues had grown in importance since the mid 1970s, and they were associated with the Conservatives (these being taxes and law 'n' order). Conservative converts in 1979 ranked taxes above unemployment as an influence on their vote. This helped to contribute to the Conservatives success and suggests that political issues are more important than social factors such as class in influencing voting behavior.

In conclusion, despite the degree of class de-alignment; class is still important in influencing voting behavior. Despite this, political issues could and can be considered more important as they affect people personally which makes the voter think more rationally. People are now actively searching for the party that seems most likely to create policies that they favor rather than just simply voting for a party because they are considered to be the "correct party" for their class.

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