The Political Implications of Sectoral Cleavages and the Growth of State Employment: Part 2, Cleavage Structures and Political Alignment
| Published date | 01 December 1980 |
| DOI | 10.1111/j.1467-9248.1980.tb01257.x |
| Date | 01 December 1980 |
| Author | Patrick Dunleavy |
| Subject Matter | Article |
THE POLITICAL IMPLICATIONS
OF
SECTORAL CLEAVAGES AND THE
GROWTH
OF
STATE EMPLOYMENT:
PART 2, CLEAVAGE STRUCTURES AND
POLITICAL ALIGNMENT*
PATRICK DUNLEAVY
London
School
of'
Economics and Political Science
Abstract.
Part
1
of this paper (last issue) outlined four alternative approaches to the analysis
of non-class production cleavages, namely: empiricist electoral analysis, Weberian accounts.
radical Weberian/conventionaI Marxist approaches, and sectoral theory. In Part
2,
the
sectoral approach is applied in two areas of empirical concern. The first is the analysis
of
the
cleavage structures underlying party differentiation in modern Britain, looking in particular at
unioninon-union and publiciprivate employment divisions within the labour force. The
second area
of
application is the analysis of influences on political alignment, using two data
sets for
1974.
The conclusion argues for the greater accuracy and utility of sectoral theory
compared with the other three approaches in both these areas, although the available
empirical evidence linking sectoral location via unionization to political alignment remains
essentially preliminary at this stage.
I.
INTRODUCTION
IN
Part
1
of this paper (published in the last issue)
I
outlined three
conventional views
of
the relationship between a number of aspects
of
production situations and occupational class. Empiricist, Weberian and
conventional Marxist views all tend to assimilate variations in levels of
unionization and inter-industry differences in workforce bargaining power into
the notion
of
occupational class itself.
In
contrast an approach based
on
capital sectors sees these variations as partially autonomous dimensions
of
labour interests which operate to specify the influence of social class upon
political alignments.
In this part of the paper the sectoral approach is applied to the analysis
of
two aspects of the production of political alignments. Firstly,
I
examine the
analytic grip provided by the sectoral approach on the origins and develop-
ment of political cleavages
in
post-war Britain. Ideally such an account would
be historically grounded, but the constraints of paper publication and the
volume of material to be surveyed militate against undertaking such
an
enterprise here. Accordingly, the very brief account given in section
II
*
1
would like to thank Phyllis Thorburn, Keith Hope, Clive Payne and others at Nuffield
College. Oxford in
19768,
plus computing staff at Nuffield. the Open University and the LSE for
help with the data analysis reported here.
'The Political Implications of Sectoral Cleavages and the Growth of State Employment: Part
I,
Alternative Approaches
to
Production Cleavages',
Political
Studies,
28
(
1980). 364-83.
Political
Studies.
Vol.
XXVIII,
No.
4
(527-W)
528 POLITICAL IMPLICATIONS
OF
SECTORAL CLEAVAGES
concentrates on the contrasting explanations of political cleavages related to
production situations given by conventional approaches and a sectoral model.
This analysis yields a number of hypotheses about the influence of sectoral
locations on political alignment which are subjected to preliminary empirical
test in section
III
using survey data from
1974.
Log linear analysis is used in an
attempt to analyse the complex contributions of social class, union member-
ship and sectoral location to the formation of alignments. The paper concludes
with some directions for future research.
11.
SECTORAL CLEAVAGES AND PARTY DIFFERENTIATION
Conventional accounts of the influence of production situations on political
alignment are premissed upon a micro-social psychological model of the
processes underlying voting choices. This model stresses the centrality
of
psychological mechanisms of individual value-formation, upon which the key
influences are the networks of personal relations within which the individual
is
involved.z Additionally the model suggests that
it
is possible to tap
in-
dividuals’ values directly by survey techniques, thereby generating valuable
additional information about the strength and nature
of
individuals’ attach-
ment to a particular party
or
alignment.3 Radical Weberian and Marxist
approaches question this model only in some respects. They are prepared to
decry the empiricist insistence on interpreting responses to survey questions as
simple
or
direct measurements of ‘values’ without relating the response
patterns obtained to the conditions of production of
response^.^
And they are
prepared to emphasize the centrality of observed influences on alignment (such
as that of occupational class) which can be measured only very obliquely or
imperfectly by survey attempts to tap individual attitudes. But on fundamen-
tals, the origins
of
alignment in individual experience and personal interac-
tions, their challenge
is
muted and indistinct. While they incorporate references
to
‘dominant value systems’ as pervasive, macro-social influences on value-
formation, they provide no articulated model of the development of political
cleavages which could satisfactorily account for the observed within-class
variations in ‘values’
or
alignment.5
The major consequence of the acceptance of micro-social psychological
models of the bases of political alignment has been to sustain an empiricist
picture of the relationship between ‘issues’ and social locations. Where
*
A good review
of
the literature is provided by R. Dowse and
J.
Hughes.
Political
Socio1og.v
(London, Wiley, 1972), Ch. 6;
G.
Lindzey (ed.),
Handbook
q/
Social Psychology
(Cambridge,
Mass., Addison Wesley, 1954). demonstrates how little this model has changed over the last two
decades.
’
D. Butler and D. Stokes,
Political Change in Britain
(Harmondsworth, Penguin, 1969), Ch. 9;
I. Crewe,
9.
Sarlvik and
J.
Alt. ‘Partisan Dealignment in Britain’,
British Journal
of
Politico1
Science,
7 (1977), 129-90; a quick count of questions in these major surveys suggests that
attitudinal questions accounted for around 60 per cent of all questions asked while social
background questions accounted for less than
5
per cent
of
the total.
C. Marsh, ‘Opinion Pools-Social Science or Political Manoeuvre?’, in
J.
Irvine,
I.
Miles and
J.
Evans (eds.),
Dernpsrifjiing
Social Statistics
(London, Pluto Press, 1979).
See F. Parkin, ‘Working Class Conservatives: a Theory of Political Deviance’,
British Journal
o/
Sociology,
18
(l967), 278-90, and
Class Inequality and Political Order
(London. MacGibbon
and Kee, 1971). Ch.
3;
J.
Westergaard and
H.
Resler,
Class
in
a
Capitalist Society
(Harmondsworth. Penguin. 1976), Part V.
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