Finding a niche? Challenger parties and issue emphasis in the 2015 televised leaders’ debates
| Author | John Bartle,Nicholas Allen,Judith Bara |
| Published date | 01 November 2017 |
| Date | 01 November 2017 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/1369148117715014 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
https://doi.org/10.1177/1369148117715014
The British Journal of Politics and
International Relations
2017, Vol. 19(4) 807 –823
© The Author(s) 2017
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DOI: 10.1177/1369148117715014
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Finding a niche? Challenger
parties and issue emphasis
in the 2015 televised
leaders’ debates
Nicholas Allen1, Judith Bara1 and John Bartle2
Abstract
Do leaders of ‘challenger’ parties adopt a ‘niche’ strategy in national televised debates? This article
answers this question by analysing the content of the two multiparty televised leaders’ debates that
took place ahead of the 2015 British general election. Using computer-aided text analysis (CATA),
it provides reliable and valid measures of what the leaders said in both debates and develops our
theoretical understanding of how challenger-party leaders make their pitches. It finds that the
UK Independence Party (UKIP), Green Party, Scottish National Party (SNP) and Plaid Cymru
leaders all demonstrated a degree of ‘nicheness’ in their contributions in comparison with the
Conservative, Liberal Democrat and Labour leaders. It also finds that the challenger-party leaders
placed a greater emphasis on their core concerns. Nevertheless, the debates covered much policy
ground. Their structure obliged all party leaders to talk about a broad range of issues.
Keywords
2015 general election, British party system, challenger parties, issue emphasis, niche parties,
party leaders, televised debates
Introduction
The 2015 general election featured Britain’s first national multiparty televised leaders’
debate. Hosted by the broadcaster ITV, it brought together the Conservative prime minis-
ter David Cameron, the Liberal Democrat deputy prime minister Nick Clegg, Labour’s
Ed Miliband, the UK Independence Party’s (UKIP) Nigel Farage, the Green Party’s
Natalie Bennett, the Scottish National Party’s (SNP) Nicola Sturgeon and Plaid Cymru’s
Leanne Wood. Two weeks later the BBC broadcast a five-way debate featuring Miliband,
Farage, Bennett, Sturgeon and Wood. The 2015 debates were thus markedly different
from those in 2010, when Cameron, Clegg and the then Labour prime minister Gordon
1Department of Politics and International Relations, Royal Holloway, University of London, Egham, UK
2Department of Government, University of Essex, Colchester, UK
Corresponding author:
Nicholas Allen, Department of Politics and International Relations, Royal Holloway, University of London,
Egham TW20 0EX, UK.
Email: nicholas.allen@royalholloway.ac.uk
715014BPI0010.1177/1369148117715014The British Journal of Politics and International RelationsAllen et al.
research-article2017
Article
808 The British Journal of Politics and International Relations 19(4)
Brown all took part in three contests (Bailey, 2012; Pattie and Johnston, 2011). While the
earlier debates had been framed as ‘prime ministerial’ contests (Benoit and Benoit-Bryan,
2013; Coleman, 2011), the 2015 debates could not be.1 Partly for this reason, they did not
dominate the campaign as they had in 2010 (Bailey, 2012). Nevertheless, the 2015 debates
were major campaign events. They were watched by millions of viewers and attracted
significant media attention (Cowley and Kavanagh, 2016: 286–287). What the leaders
said in them mattered.
In the wake of the 2010 debates, we analysed the leaders’ words and sought to develop
our theoretical understanding of party behaviour in televised debates (Allen et al., 2013).
This article is partly a sequel to and partly an extension of that study. We again draw on
theories of party competition to interpret the leaders’ words in 2015, and we again use
computer-aided text analysis (CATA) to provide reliable and valid measures of the issues
they emphasised. In this article, however, we focus primarily on the words of the four
challenger-party leaders: Farage, Bennett, Sturgeon and Wood. In particular, we examine
the extent to which their contributions differed to those of the mainstream-party leaders
and how ‘niche’ they were in terms of the policy areas they emphasised (Meguid, 2005,
2008; Meyer and Miller, 2015).
Our conceptual distinction between ‘challenger’ and ‘niche’ parties is important.
Following De Vries and Hobolt (2012: 251), we define the former as parties that have
not previously held cabinet-level posts at the national level.2 Mainstream parties, in
contrast, are those that have held national political office. By niche, we refer to a particu-
lar characteristic of some parties, namely a tendency to emphasise policy areas neglected
by their rivals (Meyer and Miller, 2015). To minimise confusion, we avoid using the
term ‘mainstream’ when talking about parties’ issue emphases. While challenger parties
are likely to pursue niche strategies to differentiate themselves from mainstream parties
(De Vries and Hobolt, 2012; Meyer and Wagner, 2013), they need not do so. Indeed,
their choice of strategy may be complicated by regional dynamics: challenger parties in
the context of national elections may be mainstream parties in the context of regional
elections (McAngus, 2016).
Our focus on the challenger parties in the 2015 debates is in no way meant to down-
play the importance of the ‘prime ministerial’ contest between Cameron and Miliband. It
simply reflects theoretical and practical considerations. There has been little research into
how challenger parties behave in national televised debates. There is a particular need to
develop relevant knowledge and theory in the context of the fragmenting British party
system (Brandenburg and Johns, 2014; Quinn, 2013; Webb, 2000). Given the general
decline in the established major parties’ shares of the vote, it seems likely that challenger
parties will be included in future debates. If their leaders address a relatively narrow range
of issues, then broadcasters may need to adapt their rules to meet their public-service
objectives of informing and educating the electorate (Kuhn, 2007: 42–57).
Focusing on the challenger parties also provides a necessary dose of analytical clarity for
analysing both 2015 debates. The UKIP, Green, SNP and Plaid Cymru leaders were present
in both contests. The incumbent prime minister and deputy prime minister, Cameron and
Clegg, only participated in one. The leader of the opposition, Miliband, participated in both
the ITV and BBC debates. His role shifted perceptibly, from being Cameron’s principal
rival in the first debate to being the sole representative of the Westminster establishment in
the second (Cowley and Kavanagh, 2016: 187). These changes complicate any analysis of
the 2015 debates and raise more questions—such as the effect of the incumbents’ presence
on other leaders’ behaviour—than can be answered here. These changes also mean that the
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