Marginal Wards and Social Class

Abstract

The critical importance of marginal constituencies and wards in determining national and local election results in England leads to the question ‘What makes a ward marginal? ’ The results of research on 384 electoral contests over ten years in Birmingham shows that the social class composition of a ward primarily determines its marginality or safety. The class composition associated with a high degree of marginality is as follows: for every non-manual worker there are likely to be twice as many foremen and skilled manual workers, and for every non-manual worker there are likely to be between one and a half and twice as many semi and unskilled manual workers. The further a ward departs from these ratios the more likely it is to be safe for the Labour or Conservative Party. The ratios are highly reliable in picking out marginal and safe wards in normal political periods involving only small swings of electoral opinion between the parties. During abnormal periods, such as the landslide against the Labour Party between 1965 and 1969, the ratios shift slightly but are nevertheless a good indicator of marginal propensity.

Coronary Disease in a Group of Norwegian Tram Drivers

“…In this study of 62 tram drivers (average age 59.0 years) the prevalence of coronary disease was 25.8 per cent. This is a far higher figure than usually reported in large American (Boas and Epstein 1954, Chapman et al 1957, Stamler et al 1960 and English (Brown et al 1957, Morris et al 1952 investigations where the prevalence of coronary disease in men in corresponding age groups usually varies between 5 and 10 per cent. There are no corresponding Norwegian statistics, but recent investigations from Oslo City Hospitals (Westlund 1961) suggest that the incidence of infarction in men is slightly lower in Oslo than in USA.…”

Parti Es and Participation in British Local Government and Some American Parallels

“…These tendencies have been noted in British case studies of Birmingham (Morris and Newton, 1971), Newcastle (Bealey et al, 1965), and Sheffield (Hampton, 1970). The second is the effect of party dominance on participation at the local level.…”