Paul D Webb
Biographic Data
| ID | 4098031 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Paul D Webb |
| GIVEN NAMES | Paul D |
| FAMILY NAME | Webb |
| SIGNATURE | WEBB P D |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Sussex |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-3458-000X |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 72 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 773 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 71 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1973 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 13 |
Ten years of Brexit
The 2016 Brexit referendum marked the most divisive episode in postwar British politics, reshaping electoral alignments, the economy, immigration policy, and the UK’s relationship with Europe. Brexit intensified political polarisation by creating enduring “Leave” and “Remain” identities that increasingly transcended traditional party loyalties, contributing to fragmentation of the party system and heightened social distrust. Economically, evidenc…
The story of Party Politics (so far)
This symposium marks the 30th anniversary of Party Politics , a leading journal in the study of political parties and organizations. Over three decades, the field has evolved in response to profound political and societal changes, including the rise of new parties, digitalization, judicialization, and personalization. The symposium invites critical self-reflection on the theories and methods that have shaped party scholarship. It revisits foundat…
Different Process, Same Outcome? The Problems of Within‐Party Sortition
A recent article in Political Quarterly argues for a ‘sortition of candidature’. We show that because political parties are not themselves socially representative, such a scheme would not result in a socially representative Parliament. Drawing on data from the Party Members Project, we show that while some demographic groups would be better represented than at present under within‐party sortition, in other ways, things would become less represent…
Come, Armageddon, come: The Conservatives
Party leadership selection and party leaders’ powers: Empowered grassroots or leader-centric parties
This paper explores whether parties’ leadership selection procedures carry broader implications for intraparty power. Prior scholarship has documented an ongoing shift in the ways that parties select their leaders, with a growing tendency to include grassroots supporters in such decisions, sometimes described as ‘plebiscitary intraparty democracy’. Some have portrayed moves towards more inclusive leadership selection as part of a more general shi…
The PSAI Peter Mair Memorial Lecture 2024 Ruling The Void , a decade on: Reflections on Peter Mair's legacy
Local party members’ views are associated, but not completely congruent, with local constituency opinion
Do local political party members reflect the views of voters in their constituencies? Since candidate selection by local party members is the most common form of candidate selection in the United Kingdom, it is important to understand local party members’ views, and how those views relate to views in the local area. We investigate the degree to which individual members’ views match local opinion by combining the results of a large-scale survey of…
Shopping for a better deal? Party switching among grassroots members in Britain
People who join political parties are motivated primarily, although not exclusively, by ideological impulses. So, given the often considerable ideological differences between parties, one might presume that very few those who later leave one party would be keen to join another. However, using a comprehensive 2019 survey of British party members, we not only identify several factors associated with switching parties (being especially socially libe…
‘Lifts your spirits, lifts your mind’: A co‐produced mixed‐methods exploration of the benefits of green and blue spaces for mental wellbeing
INTRODUCTION: Mental health problems are a considerable public health issue and spending time in nature has been promoted as a way to access a range of psychological benefits leading to the development of nature-based interventions for people with severe and enduring mental health problems. Less, however, is understood about the potential benefits and efficacy of day-to-day routine access to outdoor green and blue spaces for mental health service…
Intra-party decision-making in contemporary Europe: Improving Representation or Ruling With Empty Shells
Political observers agree that parties in European parliamentary democracies are more likely than previously to give party members opportunities to vote in decisions about party policies or personnel. Observers are less agreed about the implications of these apparent procedural trends. Some, including Peter Mair, saw them as evidence of the hollowing-out of party democracies; others have seen them as enhancing citizens’ opportunities for meaningf…
Getting our voice heard: Empowering people with a learning disability to influence adult safeguarding policy
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to present an examination of the development of adult safeguarding policy from the perspectives of both policymakers and those who have sought to influence policy, to empower individuals with a learning disability to have a say in how policies, that influence their life and impact their right to independence, are developed. Design/methodology/approach This paper is based on a project which was led by a UK-wide…
UK Parties Abroad and The Paradox of the Anti-Brexit Backlash
An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. Please use the Get access link above for information on how to access this content
Competition and interaction: Party ties to interest groups in a multidimensional policy space
Political parties and interest groups play a vital role in incorporating societal interests into democratic decision‐making. Therefore, explaining the nature and variation in the relationship between them will advance our understanding of democratic governance. Existing research has primarily drawn attention to how exchange of resources shapes these relationships largely neglecting the role of contextual conditions. Our contribution is to examine…
An exercise intervention for people with serious mental illness: Findings from a qualitative data analysis using participatory theme elicitation
BACKGROUND: People with severe mental illness (SMI) often have poorer physical health than the general population. A coproduced physical activity intervention to improve physical activity for people with SMI in Northern Ireland was evaluated by co-researchers (researchers with lived experience of SMI) and academic researchers using a new approach to participatory data analysis called participatory theme elicitation (PTE). OBJECTIVE: Co-researcher…
Service users' experiences and views of support for decision‐making
This article presents the findings from a qualitative, participatory research project which explored how people with intellectual disabilities and/or mental health problems have, or have not been, supported to make their own decisions. The aim of the research is to help inform how supported decision-making, as required by Article 12 of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, can be effectively operationalised. The project pr…
Mistake overturned, so I call it a lesson learned: 1 The Conservatives
This is a pre-copyedited, author-produced version of an article accepted for publication in Parliamentary Affairs following peer review. The version of record Sam Power, Tim Bale, Paul Webb, ‘Mistake overturned, so I call it a lesson learned’:1 The Conservatives, Parliamentary Affairs, Volume 73, Issue Supplement_1, September 2020, Pages 65–83, https://doi.org/10.1093/pa/gsaa022 is available online at: https://doi.org/10.1093/pa/gsaa022
UK Parties Abroad and Expatriate Voters: The Brexit Backlash
Recent developments in British politics have foregrounded two issues of particular importance to Britons living overseas: their voting rights in the UK and Brexit. In light of this, the number of British expatriates registering to vote has risen sharply and provided an incentive to develop UK parties abroad. We, therefore, set out the history and organisational structures of the major British parties abroad, and report the results of a unique onl…
Social networkers and careerists: Explaining high-intensity activism among British party members
Drawing on survey data on the members of six British parties gathered in the immediate aftermath of the general election of 2015, this article asks what motivates members to engage in high-intensity election campaign activism. It argues that two factors are especially prominent: the aspiration to pursue a career in politics (which only accounts for a small minority of these activists) and becoming integrated into a local social network (which acc…
Appreciation
Why do only some people who support parties actually join them? Evidence from Britain
What makes people join a political party is one of the most commonly studied questions in research on party members. Nearly all this research, however, is based on talking to people who have actually joined parties. This article simultaneously analyses surveys of members of political parties in Britain and surveys of non-member supporters of those same parties. This uniquely enables us to model the decision to join parties. The results suggest th…
Participating Locally and Nationally: Explaining the Offline and Online Activism of British Party Members
Drawing on survey data on the members of six British parties gathered in the immediate aftermath of the general election of 2015, this article addresses the question of what members do for their parties during campaigns. It identifies a key distinction between traditional forms of activity and more recent forms of online campaign participation. While the well-established general incentives theory of participation continues to offer a useful basis…
African-German Cooperation towards Decolonising Higher Education: Cerm-ESA Approaches and Lessons Learnt
This paper looks into decolonisation as a guiding principle for North-South academic cooperation towards the United Nations 2030 Agenda on Sustainable Development adopted in 2015
Oh Jeremy Corbyn! Why did Labour Party membership soar after the 2015 general election
This article investigates the remarkable surge in individual membership of the Labour Party after the general election of May 2015, particularly after Jeremy Corbyn was officially nominated as a candidate for the leadership in June of that year. Using both British Election Study and Party Members Project data, we explain the surge by focussing on the attitudinal, ideological and demographic characteristics of the members themselves. Findings sugg…
We Didn’t See it Coming: 1 The Conservatives
This contribution to the ‘Britain Votes 2017’ special issue of Parliamentary Affairs focuses on the Conservative Party’s campaign. It was a campaign at which everything that could go wrong for the Conservatives did go wrong. The manifesto, which May’s Chief of Staff Nick Timothy believed would be an asset, turned into a liability, confirming the belief of her campaign consultant Lynton Crosby that the contest between the parties needed to be fram…
Organizing Political Parties: Representation, Participation, and Power
This book uses the newly collected Political Party Database to investigate how political parties organize in contemporary parliamentary democracies. It develops new approaches and new measures for testing mid-level theories about the origins and impacts of parties’ organizational differences. Chapters in the first section catalogue cross-party differences in areas such as financial and staffing resources, party relations with societal groups, and…
Who is willing to participate? Dissatisfied democrats, stealth democrats and populists in the United Kingdom
This article demonstrates that two quite distinctive types of political disaffection – ‘dissatisfied democratic’ and ‘stealth democratic’ – exist among British citizens, with the former being more prevalent. While both types manifest low trust in political elites, the dissatisfied democrat is politically interested, efficacious and desires greater political participation, while the contrary is generally true of the stealth democrat. However, stea…
Party rules, party resources and the politics of parliamentary democracies: How parties organize in the 21st century
This article introduces the first findings of the Political Party Database Project, a major survey of party organizations in parliamentary and semi-presidential democracies. The project’s first round of data covers 122 parties in 19 countries. In this article, we describe the scope of the database, then investigate what it tells us about contemporary party organization in these countries, focusing on parties’ resources, structures and internal de…
The membership of political parties in European democracies, 1960‐1990
So who really does the donkey work in 'multi-speed membership parties'? Comparing the election campaign activity of party members and party supporters
One of the traditional functions of party members is to campaign on behalf of their party at general elections. However, they are not the only people who volunteer for the job. In the context of the growing literature on ‘multi-speed membership’ parties, it is important to ask what non-members do for parties they support. This paper examines how different actors contributed to the electoral campaigns of six parties at the 2015 UK General Election…
Why Do Tories Defect to Ukip? Conservative Party Members and the Temptations of the Populist Radical Right
This research note draws on a new survey to reveal a widespread willingness among current Conservative Party members in Britain to countenance voting for the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) at future general elections. Those most likely to do so are cultural conservatives, but they are not overly right-wing on the distributional dimension of politics. They are particularly concerned about immigration and the European Union, do not feel v…
Oh Jeremy Corbyn! Why did Labour Party membership soar after the 2015 general election
This article investigates the remarkable surge in individual membership of the Labour Party after the general election of May 2015, particularly after Jeremy Corbyn was officially nominated as a candidate for the leadership in June of that year. Using both British Election Study and Party Members Project data, we explain the surge by focussing on the attitudinal, ideological and demographic characteristics of the members themselves. Findings sugg…
Why do only some people who support parties actually join them? Evidence from Britain
What makes people join a political party is one of the most commonly studied questions in research on party members. Nearly all this research, however, is based on talking to people who have actually joined parties. This article simultaneously analyses surveys of members of political parties in Britain and surveys of non-member supporters of those same parties. This uniquely enables us to model the decision to join parties. The results suggest th…
The Presidentialisation of Politics Thesis Defended
Journal Article The Presidentialisation of Politics Thesis Defended Get access Paul Webb, Paul Webb * 1Politics, University of Sussex, Falmer, UK *Correspondence: [email protected] Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Thomas Poguntke Thomas Poguntke 2Political Science, Heinrich-Heine-Universität, Düsseldorf, Germany Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Parliamentary Affairs…
Constituting and Substantively Representing Women: Applying New Approaches to a UK Case Study
With critical mass theory increasingly rejected as an explanatory theory of women's substantive representation, new conceptual approaches and methods are being suggested that look toward the role of multiple actors and multiple sites of representation, and which point to the importance of critical actors. Within them, there is particular concern with what constitutes the substantive representation of women (SRW). At the same time, the constitutiv…
Professionalism and the Millbank Tendency: The Political Sociology of New Labour's Employees
This article analyses party employees, one of the most under-researched subjects in the study of British political parties. We draw on a blend of quantitative and qualitative data in order to shed light on the social and political profiles of Labour Party staff, and on the question of their professionalisation. The latter theme is developed through a model derived from the sociology of professions. While a relatively limited proportion of party e…
Are British Political Parties in Decline
This article seeks to examine evidence that British political parties may be in decline. A two-dimensional framework for analysis is utilized, which suggests that the overall picture is far from unambiguous. At most, a prima facie case can be made that the popular legitimacy of parties may be dwindling; similarly, party organizations only appear weaker than they were a generation ago at the local level - and even this may be a somewhat simplistic…
Competition and interaction: Party ties to interest groups in a multidimensional policy space
Political parties and interest groups play a vital role in incorporating societal interests into democratic decision‐making. Therefore, explaining the nature and variation in the relationship between them will advance our understanding of democratic governance. Existing research has primarily drawn attention to how exchange of resources shapes these relationships largely neglecting the role of contextual conditions. Our contribution is to examine…
Gender Politics and Conservatism: The View from the British Conservative Party Grassroots
Can conservatives be feminists? This article examines the issue by exploring the case of the British Conservative Party, drawing on a new survey of party members. Under David Cameron's leadership, reforms have been made to the party's parliamentary selection procedures and distinct women's policies developed, thus addressing both the descriptive and substantive representation of women. We examine party members' attitudes towards three types of ge…
The Continuing Advance of the Minor Parties
Journal Article The Continuing Advance of the Minor Parties Get access Paul Webb Paul Webb Professor of Politics, Department of International Relations and Politics, University of Sussex Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Parliamentary Affairs, Volume 58, Issue 4, October 2005, Pages 757–775, https://doi.org/10.1093/pa/gsi063 Published: 01 October 2005
Intra-party decision-making in contemporary Europe: Improving Representation or Ruling With Empty Shells
Political observers agree that parties in European parliamentary democracies are more likely than previously to give party members opportunities to vote in decisions about party policies or personnel. Observers are less agreed about the implications of these apparent procedural trends. Some, including Peter Mair, saw them as evidence of the hollowing-out of party democracies; others have seen them as enhancing citizens’ opportunities for meaningf…
The revolution of personal leaders
An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. Please use the Get access link above for information on how to access this content
The Feminisation of the Conservative Parliamentary Party: Party Members' Attitudes
Under David Cameron's leadership reforms have been made to the Conservative party's parliamentary selection procedures and distinct women's policy initiatives have been developed. This article, based on focus group data with party members, explores attitudes towards measures designed to recruit more women Conservative MPs. Broadly, we find that, despite widespread support for the principle of greater social diversity among PPCs, members are uncom…
Apartisanship and anti‐party sentiment in the United Kingdom: Correlates and constraints
This article seeks to examine evidence of the existence and growth of anti‐party sentiment in the UK. While it is clear that the available data cannot unambiguously confirm these phenomena, at least aprima faciecase can be made on the basis of such evidence. Regression analysis suggests that while erosion of the class cleavage in the country is associated with the loosening of partisan commitments, the shortcomings of party governments in the are…
Election campaigning, organisational transformation and the professionalisation of the British Labour Party
This paper deals with the relationship between election campaign innovation and organisational change within parties. Using the case of the British Labour Party, the paper considers how far campaign changes of the past few years entail the organisational transformation of the party. Broadly speaking, it seems reasonable to conclude that the professionalisation of Labour's election campaign personnel has had significant implications both for polic…
Social networkers and careerists: Explaining high-intensity activism among British party members
Drawing on survey data on the members of six British parties gathered in the immediate aftermath of the general election of 2015, this article asks what motivates members to engage in high-intensity election campaign activism. It argues that two factors are especially prominent: the aspiration to pursue a career in politics (which only accounts for a small minority of these activists) and becoming integrated into a local social network (which acc…
Participating Locally and Nationally: Explaining the Offline and Online Activism of British Party Members
Drawing on survey data on the members of six British parties gathered in the immediate aftermath of the general election of 2015, this article addresses the question of what members do for their parties during campaigns. It identifies a key distinction between traditional forms of activity and more recent forms of online campaign participation. While the well-established general incentives theory of participation continues to offer a useful basis…
Wets and Dries Resurgent? Intra-Party Alignments Among Contemporary Conservative Party Members
This article maps new survey data to show that there are three main ideological tendencies among Conservative Party members today and that they differ significantly on a range of contemporary political issues. The Liberal conservatives are the youngest, most male, claim to be the most active of these tendencies, and are distinguished by being the least hostile to Europe and immigration, to environmentalism or to feminist values, but the Tradition…
Presidentialization and the politics of coalition: Lessons from Germany and Britain
IntroduzioneIn this article, we seek to re-consider the ‘presidentialization of politics’ argument in the light of recent developments in Germany and the United Kingdom. The experiences of coalition government suggestprima faciegrounds for the erosion of the presidentialization process in each country. Germany has operated with a Grand Coalition in which domination of the executive by the Chancellor would seem less likely, whereas the long histor…
Political parties and democracy: The ambiguous crisis
This study reviews the case for the often-claimed crisis of party in established democracies, and argues that such a contention rests at least in part on ambiguous evidence. Consequently, there is an urgent need for research that provides a better understanding of citizen attitudes towards democratic institutions and processes. An interesting example of such research can be found in work recently conducted on citizens in the United States, which …
Political Participation: The Vocational Motivations of Labour Party Employees
Party employees are an under-researched group in political science. This article begins to address this oversight by examining Labour Party employees using new quantitative and qualitative data. It argues that party employment should be regarded as a form of political participation and as a consequence, existing models of political participation can be utilised to help explain why people work for political parties. After testing these proposition…
Planning Social Welfare: The Hong Kong Experience
Union, Party and Class in Britain: The Changing Electoral Relationship, 1964–1983
The membership of political parties in European democracies, 1960‐1990
Election campaigning, organisational transformation and the professionalisation of the British Labour Party
This paper deals with the relationship between election campaign innovation and organisational change within parties. Using the case of the British Labour Party, the paper considers how far campaign changes of the past few years entail the organisational transformation of the party. Broadly speaking, it seems reasonable to conclude that the professionalisation of Labour's election campaign personnel has had significant implications both for polic…
Trade Unions and the British Electorate
Trade unions and electoral mobilization party-union linkages since 1964 - the organizational dimension party-union linkages since 1964 - the political and social dimensions electoral change in modern Britain trade unionist voting behaviour since 1964 - partisan and class dealignment trade unionist voting behaviour since 1964 - sectoral effects and political attitudes trade unions and the electoral future of the Labour Party
Are British Political Parties in Decline
This article seeks to examine evidence that British political parties may be in decline. A two-dimensional framework for analysis is utilized, which suggests that the overall picture is far from unambiguous. At most, a prima facie case can be made that the popular legitimacy of parties may be dwindling; similarly, party organizations only appear weaker than they were a generation ago at the local level - and even this may be a somewhat simplistic…
United Kingdom
There were two main sets of local elections held in Great Britain in 1995. The first ever elections to the (29) new unitary Scottish local authorities were held in April. Despite allegations of Tory gerrymandering during the legislative process establishing these councils (as reported in the 1995 Political Data Yearbook ), the Conservatives experienced a severe beating at the hands of Scotland’s electors on 6 April. Returning 11.3 percent of the …
Apartisanship and anti‐party sentiment in the United Kingdom: Correlates and constraints
This article seeks to examine evidence of the existence and growth of anti‐party sentiment in the UK. While it is clear that the available data cannot unambiguously confirm these phenomena, at least aprima faciecase can be made on the basis of such evidence. Regression analysis suggests that while erosion of the class cleavage in the country is associated with the loosening of partisan commitments, the shortcomings of party governments in the are…
United Kingdom
Anatomy of a Naval Disaster: The 1746 French Expedition to North America, by James Pritchard
Attitudinal clustering within British parliamentary elites: Patterns of intra‐party and cross‐party alignment
This article builds a picture of attitudinal groups both within and across British parliamentary parties. It illustrates how this can be achieved through a cluster analysis of British Candidate Survey data, the clusters being defined in terms of core political beliefs and attitudes towards European integration. This approach serves to shed light on the possibilities and dilemmas of cross‐party coalition building in the country. In particular, the…
The lessons of comparative politics: Russian political parties as independent variables
The study of comparative politics suggests that, while Russia is undeniably unique, and while it would be naive to expect cues for research always to be provided by studies of Western and Eastern and Central European parties, a greater emphasis should be placed on research into party organization and institutionalization in Russia. This would achieve a better balance between our understanding of parties as dependent variables that are influenced …
United Kingdom
United Kingdom
Political parties in Western Europe: Linkage, legitimacy and reform
A variety of evidence suggests that political parties in western Europe have been encountering significant (and in one or two cases severe) problems of public disenchantment. This seems to stem from two broad sources: first, a widespread sense that they are failing in the performance of some of the classic political functions attributed to them, and second, perceptions of impropriety and undue privilege. This article discusses each of these probl…
United Kingdom
Parties and Party Systems: Modernisation, Regulation and Diversity
ONE of the outstanding themes of party development in the United Kingdom since 1997 has been the effect on party politics of the Blair government’s programme of institutional reform. Carried through in the name of ‘modernisation’, the impact of this programme was primarily evident in two ways in 2000. The first was the consolidation of devolved party systems stemming from the reform of subcentral government; relatedly, the first direct election o…
Political Participation: The Vocational Motivations of Labour Party Employees
Party employees are an under-researched group in political science. This article begins to address this oversight by examining Labour Party employees using new quantitative and qualitative data. It argues that party employment should be regarded as a form of political participation and as a consequence, existing models of political participation can be utilised to help explain why people work for political parties. After testing these proposition…
A Note from the Editors
A Note from the Editors
Professionalism and the Millbank Tendency: The Political Sociology of New Labour's Employees
This article analyses party employees, one of the most under-researched subjects in the study of British political parties. We draw on a blend of quantitative and qualitative data in order to shed light on the social and political profiles of Labour Party staff, and on the question of their professionalisation. The latter theme is developed through a model derived from the sociology of professions. While a relatively limited proportion of party e…
Party Responses to the Changing Electoral Market in Britain
The British Prime Minister: Much More Than ‘First Among Equals’
Reviews a wide range of evidence to demonstrate three things. First, election campaigns have become more candidate-centered, with parties offering leaders greater prominence in their election campaigns and the media devoting greater attention to them. This development seems to have taken place since 1960, which coincides with the spread of mass access to television in Britain, and the erosion of class politics. Second, today’s major-party leaders…
The Continuing Advance of the Minor Parties
Journal Article The Continuing Advance of the Minor Parties Get access Paul Webb Paul Webb Professor of Politics, Department of International Relations and Politics, University of Sussex Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Parliamentary Affairs, Volume 58, Issue 4, October 2005, Pages 757–775, https://doi.org/10.1093/pa/gsi063 Published: 01 October 2005
Political parties and democracy: The ambiguous crisis
This study reviews the case for the often-claimed crisis of party in established democracies, and argues that such a contention rests at least in part on ambiguous evidence. Consequently, there is an urgent need for research that provides a better understanding of citizen attitudes towards democratic institutions and processes. An interesting example of such research can be found in work recently conducted on citizens in the United States, which …
Political science (62 works) · Law (49 works) · Politics (47 works) · Sociology (45 works) · Law (44 works) · Political economy (34 works) · Electoral Systems and Political Participation (31 works) · Political and Economic history of UK and US (25 works) · Economics (18 works) · Social Policy and Reform Studies (18 works)