Quinn, Thomas (2023) Parliamentarians versus Party Members? Leadership Selection Systems in the British Conservative and Labour Parties. The British Journal of Politics and International Relations, 26 (2). pp. 569-596. DOI https://doi.org/10.1177/13691481231191915
Quinn, Thomas (2023) Parliamentarians versus Party Members? Leadership Selection Systems in the British Conservative and Labour Parties. The British Journal of Politics and International Relations, 26 (2). pp. 569-596. DOI https://doi.org/10.1177/13691481231191915
Quinn, Thomas (2023) Parliamentarians versus Party Members? Leadership Selection Systems in the British Conservative and Labour Parties. The British Journal of Politics and International Relations, 26 (2). pp. 569-596. DOI https://doi.org/10.1177/13691481231191915
Abstract
British parties have pioneered the use of ‘one-member, one-vote’ (OMOV) ballots to select their leaders. However, the elections of Jeremy Corbyn (Labour) and Liz Truss (Conservative) prompted calls to return leadership selection to parliamentarians. Critics claim that party members are non-centrist and liable to impose unsuitable leaders on MPs. This weakens the cohesion of parliamentary parties, undermining the functioning of Britain’s majoritarian democracy. This paper assesses the major parties’ leader-selection systems. It goes beyond existing research by identifying and applying four evaluative criteria for selection institutions: legitimacy, parliamentary acceptability, leader-eviction and timeliness. It shows that most criticisms of OMOV are overstated because the latter is heavily mediated by ex-ante and/or ex-post parliamentary controls, e.g. nomination thresholds, confidence votes, etc. OMOV generally produces leaders acceptable to MPs; ‘unsuitable’ ones typically arise when the parliamentary controls fail. However, key institutional weaknesses are identified: legitimacy in the Conservatives’ system and leader-eviction in Labour’s.
Item Type: | Article |
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Uncontrolled Keywords: | Conservative Party; electoral college; intra-party democracy; Labour Party; leader selection; one-member; one-vote |
Divisions: | Faculty of Social Sciences Faculty of Social Sciences > Government, Department of |
SWORD Depositor: | Unnamed user with email elements@essex.ac.uk |
Depositing User: | Unnamed user with email elements@essex.ac.uk |
Date Deposited: | 13 Sep 2023 13:00 |
Last Modified: | 27 Apr 2024 00:56 |
URI: | http://repository.essex.ac.uk/id/eprint/36161 |
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