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Merger or Bust: Whatever Happened to Members of the SDP?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2009

David Denver  and
Hugh Bochel
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Extract

The Social Democratic Party (SDP) was perhaps the nearest thing to a ‘flash’ party seen in British politics in modern times. It was formed in March 1981, largely on the initiative of four leading figures in the Labour party (Roy Jenkins, David Owen, Shirley Williams and William Rogers), following the apparent success of the left in dominating the party, and initially it had a sensational impact on British politics. It had thirty MPs by March 1982 (mostly as a result of defections by Labour MPs); in alliance with the Liberals it immediately went to first place in the opinion polls and stayed in that position until May 1982. The Alliance won four by-elections between 1981 and 1983, and in the 1983 general election, with 25.4 per cent of the vote, came within two points of ousting Labour from its second place. For the next four years the Alliance held its position and in the 1987 election its vote fell only slightly to 22.6 per cent.

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Notes and Comments
Information
British Journal of Political Science , Volume 24 , Issue 3 , July 1994 , pp. 403 - 417
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1994

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References

1 For an account of the merger between the SDP and the Liberals and the subsequent collapse of the continuing SDP, see Denver, D., ‘The Centre’ in King, A., ed., Britain At the Polls 1992 (Chatham, NJ: Chatham House, 1992).Google Scholar

2 Duverger, M., Political Parties (London: Methuen, 1964), p. 313.Google Scholar

3 See, for example, Heath, A., Jowell, R. and Curtice, J., How Britain Votes (Oxford: Pergamon Press, 1985)Google Scholar, and Heath, A. et al. , Understanding Political Change (Oxford: Pergamon Press, 1991).Google Scholar

4 See, for example, Steel, D., Against Goliath (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1989)Google Scholar; Jenkins, R., A Life at the Centre (London: Macmillan, 1991)Google Scholar; Owen, D., A Time To Declare (London: Michael Joseph, 1991).Google Scholar

5 See Denver, D., ‘The SDP-Liberal Alliance: The End of Two-party Politics?’ in Berrington, H., ed., Change in British Politics (London: Frank Cass, 1984).Google Scholar

6 The names and addresses were supplied by the Liberal Democratic party who hold the membership records of the former SDP. We are grateful for the assistance and co-operation of the party.

7 Respondents (N = 2,073) can be compared with non-respondents (N = 1,821) in terms of sex and region of residence. The figures are as follows: males (respondents 62.9% and non-respondents 56.8%); females (36.9% and 43.2%). By region – London & South East (49.3 and 48.3); South West (12.4 and 11.8); East Anglia (4.4 and 6.6); Midlands (11.2 and 9.5); Yorks/North West/North (17.1 and 16.0); Wales (2.6 and 3.8); Scotland (2.9 and 3.7); N. Ireland (0.2 and 0.2). As can be seen, men are somewhat over-represented among respondents, while the regional distribution of non-respondents is close to that of the sample as a whole. The concentration of SDP members in London and the South East is worth noting.

8 Seyd, P. and Whiteley, P., Labour's Grass Roots (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1992).Google Scholar

9 The discussion in this section rests on the assumption that the policy opinions of our respondents in 1991–92 were consistent with their opinions in 1987, when the SDP was still in existence. While it is true that changed circumstances may result in changed views, the issues considered here are relatively enduring and by definition the respondents are highly interested in politics, so that it is not unreasonable to assume a considerable level of consistency.

10 Seyd, and Whiteley, , Labour's Grass Roots, chap. 4.Google Scholar

11 The quotations are cited in Denver, , ‘The Centre’.Google Scholar

12 Ordinary Least Squares estimates are given for ease of comprehension but, since the dependent variables are dichotomous, logit analyses were also undertaken. In terms of significant variables and of order of significance, the results are exactly the same as those shown in Table 3 for Conservative and Liberal Democrat voting intention. In the Labour case, however, previous vote becomes the most significant predictor and opinion on nuclear weapons just fails to reach significance.