Four elections (1979, 1983, 2019, 2024) - key concepts

The concepts

• General election (tap to reveal) - An election where all 650 MPs are elected at once. The main way the UK chooses its government.
• Realignment (tap to reveal) - When a group of voters that used to support one party permanently switches to another. If working-class voters move from Labour to Conservative and stay there, that is realignment.Use it: Use to debate whether 2019/2024 elections represent temporary volatility or a permanent change in the party system. If working-class voters are durably Conservative (as Trump-style voting in the US suggests), this is realignment; if they are floating voters, it is dealignment.
• Red Wall (tap to reveal) - A group of traditionally Labour-voting constituencies in the North of England, the Midlands, and Wales that switched to the Conservatives in 2019.
• Voter ID (tap to reveal) - The 2023 UK requirement to show photo ID before voting. Critics say it stops disadvantaged groups voting.
• Local elections (tap to reveal) - Elections to councils and local mayors. Often used to judge how the government is doing mid-term.
• Alliance (electoral) (tap to reveal) - When two or more parties agree to work together during an election, for example by not competing in the same seats to avoid splitting the vote.
• Blue Wall (tap to reveal) - A group of traditionally Conservative-voting, affluent constituencies in the South of England and commuter belts that became more competitive for the Liberal Democrats.
• By-election (tap to reveal) - A one-seat election held between general elections to fill a vacancy.
• Campaign (election) (tap to reveal) - The organised push by a party or candidate to win votes in an election, involving leaflets, adverts, social media, speeches and door-knocking.
• Compulsory voting (tap to reveal) - A law that forces all eligible citizens to vote in elections, with fines or other penalties for those who do not.
• Dark adverts (tap to reveal) - Political adverts on social media that only the target audience can see - hard to scrutinise or regulate.
• Dealignment (tap to reveal) - When voters stop automatically supporting the party they or their parents always voted for. People become less loyal to parties over time.Use it: Use to explain increased electoral volatility and why voting is harder to predict. Links to the decline of class voting and the rise of valence politics. Supported by evidence: in 1966, 43% of the electorate had strong party identification; by 2015 this had fallen to around 16%.
• Disillusion and apathy (tap to reveal) - A growing sense among citizens that politics cannot change things, leading them to disengage and stop participating.
• Electoral Commission (tap to reveal) - The independent body that oversees elections in the UK, registers parties, monitors campaign spending and ensures elections are fair.
• Electoral swing (tap to reveal) - A measure of how many voters switched from one party to another between two elections. A 5% swing to Labour means Labour roughly gained 5% and their rival lost 5%.Use it: Use to explain how FPTP can produce disproportionate outcomes. A uniform 2% swing across all seats produces very different seat outcomes depending on where it occurs. The 1997 election saw a swing of about 10.2% from Conservative to Labour - one of the largest in post-war history.
• Electoral volatility (tap to reveal) - How much voters move between parties between elections. Increasing as party loyalty weakens.
• Exit poll (tap to reveal) - A survey of voters as they leave polling stations, used to predict the result before counting is done.
• Floating voters (tap to reveal) - Voters who have no strong loyalty to any party and are willing to switch between them depending on the issues at a given election.