essex man and mondeo man are stereotypical figures which were popularised in 1990s england. "essex man" as a political figure is an example of a type of median voter and was used to help explain the electoral successes of margaret thatcher in the previous decade. the closely related "mondeo man" was identified as the sort of voter the labour party needed to attract to win the 1997 election.ollie stone-lee, who's the new mondeo man?, bbc news 2 january 2005 ==background== although the labour party is sometimes considered the "natural choice" for the working class, there has traditionally been a group within that class who have voted conservative,tanner, d., political change and the labour party 1900-1918 (1990) who are distinct from the "essex man" phenomenon. after world war ii, there was considerable social change in south-east england. working-class families were encouraged to leave the war-damaged slums in inner london and move to newly built council-owned properties in the suburbs and "new towns" in the home counties, including basildon and harlow in essex. with the decline of manufacture and skilled manual work in the 1980s, this group increasingly looked to middle-class professions for employment or became self-employed. their children enjoyed housing, education and employment opportunities far removed from the experiences of their parents.butler, t., social change and the middle classes (1995) ==essex man and thatcherism== margaret thatcher's policies from 1979 to 1990 included lower taxation, control of inflation and sale of council housing stock at subsidised prices. these policies (in particular, the right to buy scheme) are thought to have caused many people who had traditionally voted labour in essex to switch their allegiance in the 1979, 1983 and 1987 elections.israeli, r. and ball, s., mass conservatism (2002) the oxford english dictionary (oed) lists the earliest reference to the essex man as one from 7 october 1990 in the (conservative) the sunday telegraph, although a reference to 26 january 1990 issue of campaign: "representative [[[david amess]]] of new essex man, working-class, father electrician, right-wing, keen hanger, noisily rambunctious, no subtlety". "what sort of person signs up as an advertiser?", campaign, january 26, 1990 owing to the similarities between the politics of thatcher's britain and ronald reagan's america, the contemporary term "reagan democrat" is roughly analogous to "essex man".{{cite book|last=biressi|first=anita|title=class and contemporary 
1980s_slang 1990s_slang Culture_in_Essex Pejorative_terms_for_people Political_terms_in_the_United_Kingdom Politics_of_Essex Polling_terms Sex-_or_gender-related_stereotypes Slang_terms_for_men Stereotypes Stock_characters Youth_culture_in_the_United_Kingdom