The Rise of the Greens in British Politics

Abstract

In this chapter, I show how both the Green Party of England and Wales and the Scottish Greens underwent increases in their poll ratings, memberships and national prominence in the year and a half prior to the 2015 General Election. This growth, in England and Wales at least, was proportionately more dramatic than that of any other party and culminated in an unprecedented Green vote share at the General Election as well as the Green Party becoming the third largest party in England and Wales by membership. Moreover, the Greens, at least temporarily, secured a position in the second tier of Britain’s refigured party system. The rapidity of these changes, their lack of historic precedent and their counter-intuitiveness make the rise of the Greens in Britain particularly interesting. I go on to outline the structure of this study, as well as the approaches, data and methods that it uses.