Transcending Thatcherism? Ideology and the Conservative Party Leadership Mandate of David Cameron

Abstract

This paper examines the voting motivations of Conservative parliamentarians in the final parliamentary ballot of the Conservative Party leadership election of 2005. By constructing a data set of the voting behaviour of Conservative parliamentarians in the final parliamentary party ballot, and by determining the ideological disposition of the 2005 PCP this paper examines the ideological disposition of the candidates' vis‐à‐vis their electorate. The paper identifies the increasing Thatcherite nature of the PCP across three dominant ideological divides of contemporary British Conservatism‐economic, European, and social, sexual and moral policy. Through such an analysis the paper demonstrates how the modernising David Cameron, who came first in the final parliamentary ballot and then won the membership ballot, transcended the traditional ideological voting motivations of candidates' vis‐à‐vis their electorate. Most significantly, the paper demonstrates that the European ideological policy divide was not a factor in the succession contest, unlike the succession contests of 1990, 1997 and 2001.