How has the
decline of membership of political parties changed their nature and how they
operate in the UK?
Barry Gilheany
This essay sites the decline in membership of
political parties in the UK in the wider contexts of long-term shifts in the
party system and in the UK politics generally towards a multi-level
polity. It looks at how party managers
have responded to the long-term membership decline with a particular emphasis
on how they have sought alternative income streams. An overview of the history and functions of
parties in the UK is given. The paper also engages with the academic debates
around the development of the British party system and poses a tentative
conclusion around the possible future of parties as cartels.
Organised political parties are a universal feature of
all modern democracies – indeed of almost all modern political systems. Their four principal functions in politics
are: fighting elections, raising money, representing interests and recruiting
political leadership (Moran, 2011).
The British party system is one of the oldest in the
world and, at a certain level, still remains one of the most stable and
predictable party systems. At the same
time, the two individual parties that lie at the core of this system have
become progressively weaker (Labour and Conservatives) in recent years while
the system faces challenges from the alternative structures of competition in
what is an increasingly multi-level polity (Mair, 2009). These challenges include the rise of new,
electorally prominent parties (UKIP, Greens); the emergence of distinctive
regional party systems in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland as a result of
devolution to these countries; the UK’s first experience of coalition
government 2010-2015 and the dramatic emergence of the Scottish National Party
(SNP) as the third largest party in the House of Commons after the general
election of 2015.
Allied to these changes have been loosening party
affiliation and voting behaviour based on social class; decreasing voter turnout
at elections due partially to overall alienation from the political system in general, decline
in membership of parties and the greater salience of single issue or social
movement/pressure group activity.
The modern history of party organisation has been
closely shaped by the developing history of the British system of
government. The parties that grew out of
the 18th century Parliament were known as ‘cadre parties’ in their
organisation – meaning that they were mostly made up of a small cadre (group)
of leaders at the centre. They had
little internal discipline or coherent political philosophy (Moran: p.259).
With the extension of the franchise and electoral
reform (most significantly the introduction of the secret ballot in 1872) in
the 19th and early 20th centuries the two main parties –
the Liberal and Conservative parties -
both shifted from being cadre to mass parties in response to the
problems of organising a large and diverse electorate and attracting their votes. (Moran: pp.260-61).
Both parties aimed
to recruit a mass membership. In order to provide an incentive to people to
join they established bodies which claimed to give members a say in how the
party was run and in particular a say in the policies which the parties put
before the electorate. They formed local
parliamentary constituency organisations and gave then a major say in the
selection of parliamentary candidates.
The parties used mass organisations to raise money, both by direct
subscriptions and by employing local party activists as fund raisers (Moran:
p.261).
The rise of the Labour Party (which displaced the
Liberals as one of the two major parties) with a national party structure with
its own conference and constitution created outside Parliament was to usher in
the age of the mass party that lasted up until the early 1960s. The mass party flourished in a period when
leaders had to reach millions of voters through means of personal contact e.g.
public meetings and canvassing. The
advent of radio, television and, latterly, the Internet, changed radically the
ways that parties communicated with the electorate as they now reached voters
through news and current affairs transmissions.
By the 1990s, the use of centrally organised telephone canvassing and sophisticated (and
expensive) polling and advertising methods had largely deprived the mass party
of its role in contacting individual electors (Moran, p.261-62).
As a partial consequence of this loss of function of
mass parties, the total membership of parties has fallen sharply over the last
half century or so. Notwithstanding the
not totally reliable historical documents on the subject, it seems that in the
1950s, individual membership of Conservative Party Associations in
constituencies probably exceeded 2.8 million, Labour Party membership probably
stood at just over 1 million (excluding its 5 million plus ‘affiliate’
membership from the trade unions). By
the mid-! 970s, Conservative membership has fallen to about 1.5. million. Labour Party membership had by the turn of
the 21st century dropped to about 170,000 (despite a spike at the time of the
election of Tony Blair as leader in 1994); roughly the same amount as the
Conservatives who have a higher age profile.
Despite the compensatory rise for the whole party system in membership
for the SNP and Plaid Cymru, there are probably about three million fewer party
members than there were 50 years ago, with the two leading parties, Labour and
Conservatives, worst affected (Moran: p.248).
The decline in party membership has to be viewed in
the wider context of the loosening of the traditional collective identities
that used to be the backbones of both major parties in the UK. Other indicators have been the lower levels
of party identification, the withering away of party organisational
embeddedness in wider society and the cross-party consensus around centrist
domestic policies pursued by the Blair government and acquiesced in by the
Cameron-led Conservative party (Mair: p.293).
The loosening of collective identities is evidenced by
the decline in the electoral domination of the two largest parties over the
last four decades. In 1970, Labour and
Conservative together polled almost 90 per cent of the vote, In 1992, the two
parties polled 76.3 per cent of the vote; this proportion fell to 74 per cent
in 1997, to 72.4 per cent in 2001 and to just 67.6 per cent in 2005.(Mair:289).
By 2010, the ‘Big Two’ had fallen to their lowest combined standing since 1918,
winning just 65 per cent of votes cast.
Factoring in the drop in turnout (from 80 per cent in 1951 to 65 percent
in 2010), Labour and the Conservatives have lost almost half the votes they
garnered in the mid-20th century (Paun, 2011.)
The overarching context in which these psephological
events have occurred is what could well be a fundamental paradigm shift in the
UK party system. In his analysis of party systems. Mair cites Sartori’s
definition of a party system as ‘the system of interactions between political
parties that results from their mutual competition or cooperation’; i.e. the
party system is more than the sum of its parts. He goes on to utilise Sartori’s
typology which identifies three distinct types of party system:’ two-party system’ characterised by a limited format and a small ideological
distance, exemplified most clearly by the UK; ‘systems of moderate pluralism’
featuring a relatively small number of parties and a limited ideological
distance (e.g. Denmark and Germany); and “systems of polarized pluralism’,
distinguished by a large number of parties and a large ideological distance
(e.g. Weimar Germany, post-war Italy and Israel) (Mair: 287-288).
Historically, it was axiomatic amongst political
scientists that the UK has one of the most stable party systems in the world
based on the Labour-Conservative duopoly that has pertained since the Second
World War. However the system based on
the two major parties and the
alternative they offer to one another has now been overtaken in the devolved
polities of Scotland (which has seen Labour-Lib Dem coalition, a minority and
now majority SNP administration) and Wales (where a Labour-Plaid Cymru
coalition and Labour minority admin has
held sway). In Northern Ireland where
parties divide on largely ethnic lines, the GB parties consciously refused to
organize there (Mair, p.299).
In the European
electoral arena, elections to the European Parliament have returned strong
contingents of UKIP representatives, 12 on a 16% share of the vote in 2004
rising to 13 on a 16.5% share in 2009
(Clark, 2012) as well as Greens, two in each election since 1999 (Clark: p.114)
and, on one occasion, two BNP MEPs. The
two party system has had decreasing purchase beyond the confines of the
“Westminster village” and has experienced a succession of shocks to the system
from the consolidation of UKIP on a vote percentage of 14% as the fourth
UK-wide party, the coalition government arrangement between the Conservatives
and Liberal Democrats between 2010 and 2015 and the momentous general election
result of 2015 which saw Labour virtually wiped out in their Scottish redoubt
by the SNP who with their 56 seats are now the third largest party in the House
of Commons and who, in some eyes, are acting as the de facto opposition to the majority Conservative government as
Labour goes through the trauma and possible catharsis of a leadership contest.
So although the surprise election of a single party Conservative government in
2015 may represent a return to type, the deeper political trends of growing
pluralism and weakening voter identification with the traditional parties look
to be long lasting (Paun: p.453). How
then have the two big beasts (as well as the add-on component the Liberal
Democrats) of the British party system responded to one element of systemic
change in British politics; the decline in their numbers?
In essence, party membership has declined because
fewer citizens are prepared to make the commitment to join and remain involved
in party life, rather than because the parties have chosen not to recruit
them. There are less social benefits
accruing to members as proven by the decline of the parties’ network of social
clubs. Of greater significance is that the numerical decline in party
memberships parallels the processes of partisan dealignment that has marked
political behaviour in Britain since 1970 including weakening of class
solidarity, increased social mobility and new zones of political contestation
leading to the growth of single-issue group membership (Webb, 2000).
A macro-political consequence of membership decline
has been the emergence of the catch-all party with the following features
identified by Kirchheimer:[1]
1. A drastic reduction of the party’s ideological
baggage;
2. Further strengthening of top leadership groups within
the party;
3. Downgrading of the role of the individual party
member;
4. De-emphasis of the specific social class of
denominational clientele;
5. Securing access to a variety of interest groups
(partly in order to broaden electoral appeal and partly to raise funds (Webb:
p.224).
Panebianco[2] subsequently built directly on Kirchheimer’s
intellectual foundations to devise the electoral-professional model of the
modern political party which focuses primarily on party organisation rather
than ideology (Webb: pp: 224-25). It is through this prism that one can view
and comprehend the organizational changes in terms of streamlining of functions
of the various party organs, neutering the role of the annual conference
(especially in Labour), professionalising staff and the targeting of resources
towards marginal seats at election times (Clark: pp175-183).
Grassroots party members are still important. They provide income through subscriptions and
donations. Members act as ‘ambassadors’
in their community, providing feedback to party elites on local political
views, while at the same time communicating the party’s message to voters. They can be a source of ideas for the party,
and help to select party elites. They provide a source of voluntary labour for
the party especially at election times.
But most party members, particularly in the Labour Party, take on ‘low
cost’ activities such as signing a petition or displaying a poster as opposed
to ‘high cost’ activities such as standing for party or external office or
telephone canvassing. Parties increasingly
rely on a broader group of ‘supporters’; people who are not paid-up members,
but who may be generally supportive of its aims and are willing to help out
when called upon, particularly at elections (Clark: pp.186-88).
The declining level of party organizational networks
as well as of activism does impinge markedly on the ability of parties to carry
out their functions. One of the biggest
problems parties have therefore to deal with is how to raise funds and subscriptions
and donations from an ever-decreasing membership base. In the absence of large-scale state subsidies
for parties they have had to diversify their income streams. More and more both major parties (and the
Liberal Democrats) have had to rely on large private individual and corporate donations.
Donations and fundraising now contribute by far the largest proportion of party
income. This peaked for the Conservatives
in the European election year of 2009 at just over £26.1 million. Donations and fundraising income peaked for
Labour in 2005 at just under £15 million, before fluctuating thereafter with
the party raising just under £6.5 million in donations and fundraising in 2009
(Clark: 190-91).
Some limited subventions such as ‘Short Money’ and a
Policy Development Fund (PDF) set up in 2000 is paid to opposition parties
depending on their share of the vote to enable them to perform their
parliamentary duties. The Conservatives
received just over £5 million in 2007-09 from ‘Short Money’ enabling them to
fund the Office of the Leader of the Opposition. The Liberal Democrats have been relatively
more heavily dependent on Short Money as its income is more reliant on the election
cycle. The loss of Short Money due to
the party’s entry into government as a coalition partner of the Conservatives
in 2010 led to redundancies and financial difficulties at Liberal Democrat HQ
(Clark: pp.190-91)
The reliance of parties on private donations has
created much concern about party funding. Despite the regulation of party
finance under the Political Parties,
Elections and Referendums Act (PPERA) 2000, parties have attempted to exploit
loopholes in this legislation such the 2006 ‘cash for honours’ case which
suggested that Labour had received sizeable loans from individuals subsequently
to be nominated for peerages. While a
police investigation did not press charges, these nominations were rejected by
a House of Lords Committee. Commissions
of inquiry into and a White Paper on party funding followed in the wake of
‘cash for honours’ leading to the Political Parties and Elections Act (PPEA)
2009 which among other things raised the permissibility and reporting
thresholds for loans and donations, from £200 to £500, while requiring loans
and donations over £7,500 to be accompanied by the declaration of the source of
the donation and the donor’s tax status.
Subsequent attempts to regulate party funding have stalled over the
issues of the limits to donations and controlling party expenditure (Clark:
pp.193-97).
In conclusion, it looks self-evident that the decline
of membership of British political parties is symptomatic of an irreversible
decline of the mass party duopoly which dominated British political practice
and discourse for the half century after the rise of the Labour Party just
after World War I. An alternative
reading is that such marks of ‘decline’ as the fall in membership and the
response of party leaders to it represents a shift to a ‘cartel party’ model
whereby parties are increasingly providing functions for the state – like supplying
leaders for government – rather than functions for the wider society. As state servants their need for money and
membership from that wider society is diminishing. They are ‘cartel’ parties as they manipulate
the political market place to protect their position against outsiders. The appearance of a state regulator, namely
the Electoral Commission, and state funding of parties could be said to ‘fit’
this thesis. However this paper has
shown that the long-term shifts towards multi-level governance in the UK and
the results of the 2010 and 2015 general elections show that this cartel, if it
ever existed, has been decisively busted.
Not only is the mass party in decline but, to take the most stark
example, the virtual wipe out of Labour, Conservatives and Liberal Democrats at
the hands of the SNP in this year’s Westminster contest show that parties that
maintain a UK-wide cohesion are also becoming more difficult to sustain (Moran:
pp.275-76).
Bibliography;
Clark, A. (2012) Political
Parties in the UK Contemporary Political Studies Basingstoke, Hants:
Palgrave MacMillan
Mair, P. The
Party System in Flinders, M., Gamble, A., Hay, C. & Kenny, M, eds.
(2009) Oxford Handbook of British
Politics Oxford: Oxford University Press
Moran, M. (2011) Politics
and Governance in the UK Second Edition Basingstoke, Hants: Palgrave
MacMillan
Paun, A. (2011) After
the age of majority? Multi-party governance and the Westminster model.
Commonwealth & Comparative Politics Vol. 49, No.4: pp.440-456
Webb, P. (2000) The
Modern British Party System London: Sage Publications
[1] Kirchheimer, O (1966) ‘The transformation of western European party
systems’ in LaPalombara, J. and Weiner, M.
Political Parties and Political
Development Princeton: NJ: Princeton University Press pp. 177-200
[2] Panebianco, A (1988) Political Parties: Organisation and Power
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
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