Dealignment, in
political science
Political science is the scientific study of politics. It is a social science dealing with systems of governance and power, and the analysis of political activities, political thought, political behavior, and associated constitutions and la ...
, is a trend or process whereby a large portion of the electorate abandons its previous partisan affiliation, without developing a new one to replace it. It is contrasted with
political realignment
A political realignment, often called a critical election, critical realignment, or realigning election, in the academic fields of political science and political history, is a set of sharp changes in party ideology, issues, party leaders, regional ...
.
Many scholars argue that the trends in
elections in the United States
Elections in the United States are held for government officials at the federal, state, and local levels. At the federal level, the nation's head of state, the president, is elected indirectly by the people of each state, through an Ele ...
over the last several decades are best characterized as dealignment, evident in the portion of Americans identifying with a
political party
A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular country's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific political ideology ...
declining sharply between 1964 and 1976 from approximately 75 percent to 63 percent. It is also believed the
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...
has become dealigned from
social class
A social class is a grouping of people into a set of Dominance hierarchy, hierarchical social categories, the most common being the Upper class, upper, Middle class, middle and Working class, lower classes. Membership in a social class can for ...
over the past three decades.
Dealignment does not refer to an individual losing their party affiliation, but a widespread trend as many people formally abandon the party to which they had been previously tied. Essentially one ceases voting for the political candidates that are formally sponsored by that party.
Dealignment can be seen in the rise of independent candidates. In dealignment, unlike realignment, voters are not switching from one major party to another. They are abandoning all the dominant parties but not their democratic voice. Rather, they place their votes in independent candidates.
Partisan dealignment
Partisan dealignment is a process in which individuals become less partisan in terms of their support for a particular political party.
The last decades, since the 1970s, have seen an increase in the process of partisan dealignment in many countries as voters become less connected to their political party.
[Hermann Schmitt. "Partisanship in nine western democracies." ''Political Parties and Partisanship: Social Identity and Individual Attitudes.'' Routledge. (11 June 2014). pp. 75. .] This process can result in fewer votes for the major parties, such as in the UK, or an increase in voters that vote for the opposite party due to their loss of partisanship. This dealignment shows that short term factors might play a larger role than usual in whether a candidate receives a vote from someone of their party. Several factors can be attributed to partisan dealignment, such as a greater political awareness and socialisation, intensive mass media coverage and decline of deference; disillusionment both with parties and politicians, and most importantly, the poor performance of government. Voters have also become more inclined to vote based on specific issues such as Brexit, immigration or the economy rather than voting based on a partisan attachment.
Prior to the 1970s there had been clear examples of partisan dealignment in the UK. For example, in the three elections which the Conservatives won in the 1950s, they received nearly 50% of the vote in those elections. However, in recent years loyalties towards the UK's main parties - the Labour Party and the Conservative Party - has reduced. This was seen in the 2019 general election when Labour lost votes to the Conservatives over the issue of Brexit.
Class dealignment
Class dealignment is a process in which members of a social class no longer vote for the party that their class is aligned with. In the UK, traditionally, working class voters support Labour and middle class voters support the Conservatives; an example of class dealignment would be if the
working class
The working class (or labouring class) comprises those engaged in manual-labour occupations or industrial work, who are remunerated via waged or salaried contracts. Working-class occupations (see also " Designation of workers by collar colo ...
began to view themselves as
lower middle class
In developed nations around the world, the lower middle class is a subdivision of the greater middle class. Universally, the term refers to the group of middle class households or individuals who have not attained the status of the upper middle ...
.
Class dealignment took place in Britain post-1960s, when people were more likely to pursue
tertiary education
Tertiary education, also referred to as third-level, third-stage or post-secondary education, is the educational level following the completion of secondary education. The World Bank, for example, defines tertiary education as including univers ...
, have
professional jobs and consequently more
affluence
Wealth is the abundance of valuable financial assets or physical possessions which can be converted into a form that can be used for transactions. This includes the core meaning as held in the originating Old English word , which is from an ...
. As a result, working-class voters who would traditionally have voted
Labour
Labour or labor may refer to:
* Childbirth, the delivery of a baby
* Labour (human activity), or work
** Manual labour, physical work
** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer
** Organized labour and the labour ...
may instead vote
Conservative
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization in ...
or
Liberal Democrat
Several political parties from around the world have been called the Liberal Democratic Party or Liberal Democrats. These parties usually follow a liberal democratic ideology.
Active parties
Former parties
See also
*Liberal democracy
*Lib ...
. This happens as people lose their traditional class loyalties to a particular party. An example of this would be the
Barking and Dagenham
The London Borough of Barking and Dagenham () is a London borough in East London. It lies around 9 miles (14.4 km) east of Central London. It is an Outer London borough and the south is within the London Riverside section of the Thames Ga ...
results in the
2006 local elections, in which a traditional Labour area voted for the
extreme-right British National Party
The British National Party (BNP) is a far-right, fascist political party in the United Kingdom. It is headquartered in Wigton, Cumbria, and its leader is Adam Walker. A minor party, it has no elected representatives at any level of UK gover ...
.
A recent example of class dealignment was during the 2019 UK general election in which the "Red Wall", a term first used by James Kanagasooriam in relation to the traditional Labour seats in the North of England, no longer voted along class lines. The result was that traditional Labour seats, such as Great Grimsby, voted to elect a Conservative MP for the first time in decades. In addition, in 2019 the Conservative received the highest number of votes across every social class, including 41% of DE voters who traditionally voted Labour. This illustrates that people in the UK no longer vote in accordance to their class.
An example of there being class realignment is in the US where, in the 2020 Presidential Election, Donald Trump, a Republican, lost support amongst wealthy fiscally conservative and socially moderate voters in the suburbs, but made huge gains with Latino voters nationwide especially in
Miami-Dade County, Florida
Miami-Dade County is a county located in the southeastern part of the U.S. state of Florida. The county had a population of 2,701,767 as of the 2020 census, making it the most populous county in Florida and the seventh-most populous county in ...
, the
Rio Grande Valley
The Lower Rio Grande Valley ( es, Valle del Río Grande), commonly known as the Rio Grande Valley or locally as the Valley or RGV, is a region spanning the border of Texas and Mexico located in a floodplain of the Rio Grande near its mouth. Th ...
in
South Texas, in
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...
and in the
Imperial Valley
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in California, in the Latino-heavy areas of
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
, and the Latino-heavy areas of
Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
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and
Cook County
Cook County is the most populous county in the U.S. state of Illinois and the second-most-populous county in the United States, after Los Angeles County, California. More than 40% of all residents of Illinois live within Cook County. As of 20 ...
.
See also
*
Party identification
*
Voter apathy
In political science, voter apathy is a lack of interest among voters in the elections of representative democracies. Voter apathy or lack of interest is often cited as a cause of low turnout among eligible voters in jurisdictions where vo ...
*
Voting
Voting is a method by which a group, such as a meeting or an electorate, can engage for the purpose of making a collective decision or expressing an opinion usually following discussions, debates or election campaigns. Democracies elect holde ...
*
Political realignment
A political realignment, often called a critical election, critical realignment, or realigning election, in the academic fields of political science and political history, is a set of sharp changes in party ideology, issues, party leaders, regional ...
References
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Political science terminology