Regional variations in British voting trends—1966–1979: Tests of an ecological model

Abstract

Johnston R. J. (1981) Regional variations in British voting trends—1966–1979: tests of an ecological model, Reg. Studies 15, 23–32. Analysis at the regional scale indicates considerable deviations from the national trends in voter partisan preferences between elections. An ecological model developed by Butler and Stokes (1974) is presented to account for these deviations, with considerable success, especially with respect to the electoral performance of the Labour Party. Several hypotheses are presented which could account for the results presented, as the starting-point for further research using other data sources.