Time to End Crystal Ball Politics
| Date | 01 September 2017 |
| DOI | 10.1177/2041905817726909 |
| Published date | 01 September 2017 |
SEPTEMBER 2017 • POLITICAL INSIGHT 3
Time to End
Crystal Ball
Politics
Mea culpas have been
the order of the day in
British politics of late.
In the wake of June’s
unexpected General Election result myriad
commentators – and more than a few
political scientists – threw their hands in
the air, declaring ‘I got it wrong’.
Almost no-one, your editor included,
predicted that Theresa May’s snap election
– which was hardly seen as a gamble at all
in April – would reduce the Conservatives
to minority government, and see Jeremy
Corbyn lead Labour to its largest vote
share in a generation.
Far from clarifying the future direction
of Britain’s exit from the European Union,
the General Election has made predictions
even more difficult. That might not be
a bad thing. If Brexit, Trump and now
the 2017 General Election has taught
us anything, it is that conventional
political wisdom is no longer, well, very
conventional.
Take that oft-repeated truism ‘young
people don’t vote’. In this issue’s lead
feature, John Curtice examines the General
Election result and finds that age has
emerged as a major cleavage in British
politics, with Conservative voters older
and Labour supporters overwhelmingly
younger. This ‘age gap’ could become
an increasingly significant feature of our
politics in the years ahead.
June also confirmed the regional and
national divisions within British politics. In
our series delving into the General Election
result across the UK, Andrew Mycock looks
at how the vote broke down in England,
and finds that issues around English
identity and regional devolution remain
unresolved.
Wales was widely predicted as the site
of a potential political earthquake, with
Theresa May making frequent visits ahead
of anticipated Tory gains. Instead, as Roger
Scully reports, Labour won half of the vote.
In Scotland, Nicola McEwen examines a
difficult night for the Scottish National
Party, while Jon Tonge looks at Northern
Ireland, where the Democratic Unionists
emerged as ‘queen-makers’ in Downing
Street while Sinn Fein broke new ground,
too.
Tim Bale and Paul Webb analyse what
went wrong for the Conservatives during
a campaign that began with record poll
leads and ended with May clinging onto
power. Andrew Crines looks at arguably
the election’s biggest winner – Jeremy
Corbyn – and finds that while the Labour
leader is now in a commanding position
within his party, he remains an ineffective
parliamentary leader.
2017 was supposed to be the Brexit
election, but in many respects the
vote to leave the European Union was
conspicuous by its absence during
the campaign. And yet Brexit is set to
dominate our politics for the coming years,
if not the coming generations.
In our regular In Focus slot, Benjamin
D. Hennig plots the geography of both
the General Election result and the Brexit
referendum. Paul Whiteley examines why
the UK voted to leave the European Union,
and finds a complex picture with a wide
variety of long- and short-term factors
playing a role in the referendum result.
With the last 18 months revealing
the limits of political predictions – and
of orthodox views about the future of
democracy – Matthew Flinders argues
that we need to pay more attention to the
role of emotion in our politics. Elsewhere,
James P. Pfiffner looks at the challenges
facing President Trump’s chaotic White
House and Brendan Moore examines the
politics of climate change in the wake
of the US withdrawal from the Paris
Agreement. Meanwhile, Meryl Kenny
reports on the successes – and challenges
– for gender equality in our politics.
Predicting the political future might
be a mug’s game but we can be certain
that the coming months and years will
bring further change.
Political Insight
will
be here to follow all the developments.
If you would like to join the debates or
contribute to
Political Insight
please drop
me an email (address below) or log on to
www.politicalinsightmagazine.com.
Peter Geoghegan
Editor
(editor@politicalinsightmagazine.com)
Political Insight Sept2017.indd 3 21/07/2017 11:57
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