Title: The changing British party system, 1945-1979 /
Authors: Finer, S. E.
Date: 1980
Publisher: American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research,
Physical description: xviii, 244 pages : diag. ; 23 cm.
Language: English
LC classification: J
Contents: I. The inventory : 1. Parties at the parliamentary and governmental level : Still a two-party system ; Parties in government and opposition ; Parliamentary party style ; The left-right dimension ; The social representativeness of the labor and conservative parliamentary parties -- 2. Parties at the electoral level : Changes in the electoral system, 1945-1978 ; Distorting elements in the electoral system ; Disproportionality and the electoral system ; Orientation clusters of the major parties ; Social determinants of voting ; Noncompetitive party change, 1945-1979 ; Party identification and voting -- 3. The level of the party organizations : Party structures ; Persistencies in the structure of the two main parties ; A note to Euro-candidates ; Changes in party structures ; “Lateral” tensions in the parties: tendencies and factions ; Vertical tensions: grass-roots militants vs. the parliamentary parties ; Manifesto and mandate: the degradation of the democratic dogma ; Campaigning ; Fiddling the economy: economic bribery of the electorate ; The unpopularity of the two main parties -- 4. The parties and other institutions : The parties and ancillary organizations ; The parties and the mass media ; The parties and the central bureaucracy -- II. The appraisal : 5. The effectiveness of the party system : The two-party system, British style ; The party system as the prime mover ; The parties as co-agents -- 6. Toward reforming the party system : The conventional hypothesis: defense of the status quo ; The impediment hypothesis: toward "doorknocker democracy" ; The dictatorship hypothesis: checks and balances ; The adversary politics hypothesis: toward electoral reform ; The elitist hypothesis: beyond the party system.
Subject headings (LCSH): Political parties--Great Britain.