University of Twente Student Theses
The role of partisanship in British referendums : a comparative study of the 1975 EEC and the 2016 Brexit referendums
Willecke, C. (2016) The role of partisanship in British referendums : a comparative study of the 1975 EEC and the 2016 Brexit referendums.
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| Abstract: | This bachelor thesis is the attempt to answer the research question whether partisanship in the United Kingdom influenced the outcome the Brexit referendum like it did in the 1975 EEC referendum. To test the first hypothesis whether voters are more likely to follow their parties' recommendations if the political party they identify with clearly supports one of the alternatives, the parties' stances on the matter will be elaborated by reviewing their election manifestos as well as speeches of their leading politicians and results from polls are taken into account. Furthermore, the second hypothesis: if the elite of a political party is unified on the referendum's topic, its identifiers will more often intend to vote in line with their party and if the elite is divided, its identifiers are more likely to be divided too will be tested. Therefore, the level of division of the elite in 1975 and in 2016 and its influence on the voting behaviour will be elaborated using the same methods. Since both hypotheses could be verified in the course of the analysis it can be concluded that partisanship was an influencing factor in this year's Brexit referendum like it was in the EEC referendum in 1975. |
| Item Type: | Essay (Bachelor) |
| Faculty: | BMS: Behavioural, Management and Social Sciences |
| Subject: | 89 political science |
| Programme: | Management Society and Technology BSc (56654) |
| Link to this item: | https://purl.utwente.nl/essays/70373 |
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