Abstract
Using position, angle and thickness to expose the shifting geographies of the 2019 UK general election
Highlights
Despite its prediction in public opinion surveys and constituency-level forecasts (e.g. YouGov, 2019), the Conservative victory in the 2019 UK general election with a majority of 80 seats and an overall vote share of 44% (BBC News, 2019) was a surprise to many
The angle of lines is varied continuously according to the Butler two-party swing (Butler and Van Beek, 1990) in vote share from the 2017 general election, with lines angled right showing a swing to the Conservatives and lines angled left showing a swing to Labour
Where the winning party for a constituency represents a flip in allegiance from 2017, lines are made bold. This encoding exposes the ‘realignment’ of Conservative constituencies: bold blue lines angled to the right in the Midlands, Yorkshire and Humber, North West, North East and north Wales; the reverse, a bold red line angled to the left, occurs only once for Corresponding author: Roger Beecham, 10.139 Manton, School of Geography, University of Leeds, Leeds, LS2 9JT, UK
Summary
Despite its prediction in public opinion surveys and constituency-level forecasts (e.g. YouGov, 2019), the Conservative victory in the 2019 UK general election with a majority of 80 seats and an overall vote share of 44% (BBC News, 2019) was a surprise to many. Several constituencies forming Labour’s “red wall” in the north of England elected Conservative candidates for the first time, a pattern that was repeated in constituencies in Wales and the Midlands and, for some, suggesting a ‘realignment’ in UK politics (Sabbagh, 2019).
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