Hansard Society Series in Politics and Government – serie

Britain Votes: The 2024 General Election brings together a team of distinguished academic experts to examine every facet of a record-breaking election. This was a contest that produced the highest swing in the post-war era, delivering a Labour landslide, and reducing the Conservatives to their lowest ever level of parliamentary representation. This volume helps explain how and why this remarkable electoral turnaround was achieved. The contributions analyse the election results in detail and evaluate the campaigns and electoral performance of all the main parties. There is in-depth assessment of the electoral contests in Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. Every aspect of the campaign is scrutinized, from party funding to media coverage and the parties' strategies for digital engagement. The volume also highlights a number of critical challenges to the electoral process in the UK and also asks what the outcome in 2024 might suggest for the next election.

Women, Politics, and Change is concerned with the relationship between women and politics from a variety of perspectives covering a wide range of geographical as well as political contexts. Essays span the theory/practice divide and everything between, from chapters which look at the broad theoretical discussions concerning symbolic and substantive representation of and by women within formal politics, through to empirically informed studies based on interviews with women parliamentarians and women activists. Contributors are keen to analyze the contribution that women have made and continue to make to the development of the democratic project, through their different perspectives and (sometimes different) concerns. Crucially, though, many of the contributions explore the tensions which still exist for women when they attempt to work effectively in contexts which have been traditionally hostile to women, and to examine the strategies which women devise to push a differently nuanced political agenda forward.Unusually, the political contexts that form the foci of this collection include both the 'usual suspects' of developed Western democracies but also news of and from other places, such as Kosova, China, Iran and Africa, where we still know relatively little about their political systems and even less about the gendered dimension of their political worlds. Closer to (the European) home, we can no longer speak of Westminster as the only seat of British Government. The past three years have seen the setting up of Assemblies in Wales, Northern Ireland and London and a Parliament in Scotland, and the role of women in both the background and the foreground of those new political structures has been significant.The book carries on where Women in Politics, an earlier title in this series, left off. Then, the contributions were exclusively British, whereas the great strength of this volume lies precisely in the diversity of its geographical foci, spanning several continents as well as exploring many different parliamentary, social, economic and cultural environments. This more inclusive focus reflects a shift in the Zeitgeist which is pushing outwards instead of inwards, at least as far as many women scholars are concerned, but also reflects a desire to map the differences that women can make and are making in the lives of the world's citizens, and to explore if sisters are doing it for others as well as themselves.

The 2015 General Election was one of the most extraordinary contests of recent times, with an outcome which surprised some analysts. Britain Votes 2015 provides a comprehensive analysis of the campaign and outcome. A team of experts assess the results, offering detailed analysis of the overall and English, Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish contests. The strategy, finance and performance of the Conservatives, Labour, Liberal Democrats, SNP and UKIP, along with several other parties, are dissected in detail. Key issues such as economy and immigration are explored. Combining retrospective analysis with assessment of future directions, Britain Votes 2015 is indispensable for all scholars of British elections and politics.The latest in a distinguished series of election volumes produced by the Hansard Society and Oxford University Press, Britain Votes 2015 features the work of a range of top academics, including Tim Bale and Paul Webb on the Conservatives, Rosie Campbell and Sarah Childs on women and the election, John Curtice on the impact of the electoral system, Steven Fielding on Labour, Matthew Flinders on political disaffection, Matthew Goodwin on UKIP, Andrew Gamble on the economy, and James Mitchell on the Scottish National Party.Britain Votes 2015 is essential reading for anyone interested in the campaign, outcome and consequences of the 2015 General Election.

Britain Votes 2017 offers a comprehensive analysis of one of the most extraordinary elections ever, with an outcome few predicted. It contains dedicated chapters on the results; the fortunes of each the major parties; the campaign and outcomes in each country of the UK; the Brexit context; campaign finance; party campaigning and digital strategies; engagement, disengagement and populism; women voters; young voters; the roles of the media; and much more.The latest in a distinguished series of election volumes produced by the Hansard Society and Oxford University Press, Britain Votes 2017 features the work of a range of top academics, including Tim Bale and Paul Webb on the Conservatives, John Curtice analysing the outcome, Eunice Goes on Labour, Matthew Flinders on engagement, disengagement and populism, Emily Harmer and Rosalynd Southern on women voters, James Dennison on UKIP, Sarah Harrison on young voters, and Sara Hagemann on the Brexit context. Britain Votes 2017 is essential reading for anyone interested in the campaign, outcome and consequences of the 2017 General Election.

The five-volume Scott Report on Arms to Iraq was remarkable because its subject matter entailed a lengthy investigation into all three branches of the British Government: the executive, the legislative, and Parliament. In Under the Scott-Light, distinguished experts from the fields of law, politics, and public administration carefully examine the Report, contributing incisive analyses of the people, processes, and policy considerations involved; exposing the generally secretive world of Whitehall, including its darkest corners, in which the security and intelligence services and the arms trade are seemingly obliged to operate. Under the Scott-Light provides the reader with a rare opportunity to read about the actualité of the governmental machine in operation.

The nation state is now faced with unprecedented pressures. Global shifts (a medley of powerful forces in contemporary political economy, military affairs and international security, technology and communications, cultural changes, ecological challenges and so on) require policy solutions at levels of governance beyond traditional states. At the same time, and in part as a response to these wider forces and the uncertainty they bring in their wake, established national polities are challenged too by the rise of politicized sub-national (ethnic, religious, linguistic and cultural) movements. This phenomenon presents a challenge to the extant political systems and the elites who manage their affairs. Moreover, it offers a particular challenge to democratic states. Inasmuch as these polities celebrate the virtues of self-determination and encourage pluralism as a matter of course, flourishing and assertive movements demanding in some degree the re-negotiation of the national bargain, present a serious challenge to the continuity of historic national projects. At the same time, democracy is particularly well equipped, both as a discourse and method of practising politics, for accommodating cultural diversity. This book contains an overview of this challenge to the art of democratic government, and case studies from every region of the world. The contributions are by acknowledged international experts on how democratic states have confronted the task of managing cultural diversity and accommodating perceived differences of identity short of political break-up.