Upload
others
View
2
Download
0
Embed Size (px)
Citation preview
Why Did Britain Vote for
Brexit?
Paul Whiteley (University of Essex)
Matthew Goodwin (University of Kent)
Harold Clarke (University of Texas at
Dallas)
The Referendum June 2016
The referendum on UK membership of the European Union on June
23rd 2016 occurred because the promise of a referendum was
included in the Conservative Manifesto for the 2015 election which
made it binding on the British government.
There is a large literature on the determinants of support for EU
membership and for further integration which relates both to Britain
and to other countries. (Eichenberg and Dalton, 1993; Franklin,
Marsh and McLaren, 1994; Gabel and Whitten, 1997; Gabel, 1998;
Hooghe and Marks, 2005, Maier and Rittberger, 2008; Armingeon
and Ceka, 2014).
However, much of this research does not recognize the large scale
volatility of opinions on this issue, a phenomenon which suggests
that the key drivers of attitudes to the EU must themselves be
subject to significant short-term changes.
Approval and Disapproval of UK
Membership, April 2004 to December 2015
32
36
40
44
48
52
56
2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015
Approve EU Membership Disapprove EU Membership
Perc
ent
44
40
52
38
Start of-->
Eurozone
Crisis
The Geography of the Referendum Vote Majority Leave (Blue) & Majority Remain (Yellow)
Percentages of Constituencies Voting to
Leave in the EU Referendum
63.4
1.7
72.577.2
87.6
69.0
78.2
21.9
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100
Britain Scotland Wales North Midlands South East South West London
Per
Cen
t
Predictors of Voting to Leave at the
Constituency Level in the EU Referendum
Predictors B s.e.
Percentage University Degree -.791*** .042
Percentage Manual Workers .236* .102
Percentage Home Owners .246*** .029
Minority/White Ethnicity Ratio -1.033* .530
Age:
Percentage 18-29 -.288*** .054
Percentage 65 and Older .131* .066
Percentage Turnout 2015 Election -.334** .056
Country:
Scotland -14.812*** .650
Wales -5.033*** .650
Constant 81.266*** .102
R2 = .89
N = 632
*** - p < .001; ** - p < .01; * - p < .05; one-tailed test.
Leave Voting by Social Demographics(Source: Internet pre and post panel survey of the referendum vote)
64
63
48
35
51
51
53
23
25
38
44
57
57
66
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
D/E
C2
C1
Social Grade-A/B
Man
Gender-Woman
White British
Ethnicity-Minority
18-25
26-35
36-45
46-55
56-65
Age-66+
Per Cent Vote Leave
What Explains Support for EU
Membership among the Public?
Hooghe and Marks (2005) provided a succinct summary of the
factors which influence public attitudes to the European Union
across Europe in their paper: ‘Calculation, Community and Cues’.
Calculations are about perceptions of the costs and benefits of
membership, which vary according to who are the winners or loser
in the process. People who have done well tend to favour UK
membership, and people who have been ‘left behind’ do not
Communities are about people’s social identities, with people
having an exclusive national identity being significantly more
Eurosceptic than those who acknowledge multiple identities such as
being both ‘British’ and ‘European’.
Cues are about who the public listens to when making up their
minds about how to vote in the referendum. These will include
politicians and political parties as well as experts and opinion
leaders.
What Does the Research on Earlier
Referendums in the EU Show? Franklin, Marsh and McLaren (1994) showed that referendum votes
held to ratify the Maastricht Treaty in 1992 very often involved public
reactions to short-term, national and domestic issues in addition to
longer-term considerations about the future of the European Union.
Thus the unpopularity of the governments in Denmark and France
helped to ensure a rejection of the Maastricht treaty in the former
country and near rejection in the latter. They contrasted this with
Ireland, which had a much more popular government at the time and
where the referendum passed easily.
National and European issues get mixed up in the minds of the
voters and much of the time they are reacting to what their own
governments are doing. This means public attitudes to key issues in
Britain such as the economy and immigration and the popularity of
political leaders are likely to play a key role in explaining support for
the EU in the Referendum
A Valence Theory of Attitudes to the
European Union The valence model of electoral choice hypothesizes that voters will
support a party that offers the best chance of delivering policies
such as economic prosperity and efficient public services, over
which there is widespread agreement about what should be done
(Stokes, 1963, Clarke et al. 2004: 8, Whiteley et al. 2013).
Divisions among the public are about which party is best able to
deliver, not about the policy goals. The term valence was introduced
by Donald Stokes in his critique of the Downs spatial model of party
competition published nearly sixty years ago (Downs, 1957; Stokes,
1963). Spatial issues are those over which there is disagreement
about policy goals.
Stokes argued that the most important issues in elections are
valence issues concerned with economic growth and prosperity, the
protection of citizens from crime and terrorism, and the provision of
high quality public services.
Attitudes to EU Membership are Spatial But
with Valence Roots
Attitudes to UK membership of the EU is clearly spatial rather than a
valence issue, since there is widespread disagreement among the
public about the desirability of UK membership.
However, the source of this disagreement is a debate about whether
or not membership is delivering valence policies such as economic
prosperity, security, value for money in public spending, and more
generally if the EU is responsive and accountable to the voters.
If voters feel that the EU promotes prosperity, protects its citizens
from security threats, supports quality public services and enhances
democracy, then they are likely to support continued membership.
If on the other hand they think that the EU is failing to do these
things and worse still preventing a British government from doing
them, they are likely to oppose membership.
Variables in the Valence Model
Two key valence variables in the referendum debate concerned economic
performance and immigration. Both are valence issues in Britain since
there is an overwhelming majority of people who support economic
prosperity and also the control of immigration.
Voters also use their evaluations of political leaders as devices for judging
valence performance. In this case the focus is not so much on what is
delivered, but rather on who is delivering it. Voters will opt for a ‘safe pair of
hands’ or a leader they think is competent and trustworthy, and avoid a
leader who they think is not up to the job.
The third component of the valence model is partisanship or party
identification which plays a role in the valence model because it represents
a cumulative ‘running tally’ of performance evaluations in delivering on
valence issues in the past (Fiorina, 1981; Clarke et al. 2004, 2009).
Emotional reactions to the economy and the European Union are part of this
mix since affective reasoning is an important aspect of voter decision-
making alongside cognitive reasoning (Neuman et al. 2007)
Relationships are modelled using an internet pre-post panel survey in the
field at the time of the referendum with a sample size of 1,987 respondents
Perceived Costs and Benefits of Leaving the
European Union (internet panel survey data)
24
37
39
15
64
21
16
63
21
3
46
51
12
58
30
0 20 40 60 80 100
Better off
No Difference/DK
Economy - Worse Off
More Influence
No Difference/DK
Foreign Affairs - Less Influence
More Risk
No Difference/DK
Terrorism - Less Risk
More
No Difference/DK
Immigration - Less
Better Off
No Difference/DK
Personal Finances - Worse Off
Per Cent
Perceived Costs and Benefits of Continued
EU Membership
31
29
40
51
21
28
41
47
32
47
25
28
37
34
29
0 20 40 60 80 100
Agree
Neither/DK
Benefits British Culture - Disagree
Agree
Neither/DK
Erodes Sovereignty-Disagree
Agree
Neither/DK
Supply Needed Workers-Disagree
Agree
Neither/DK
More Terrorism-Disagree
Agree
Neither/DK
Keep Peace in Europe - Disagree
Per Cent
Emotional Reactions to UK Membership of
the European Union
23
12
20
26
44
14
19
12
32
50
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
Angry Happy Disgushed Hopeful Uneasy Confident Afraid Proud 1or MorePositive
1 or MoreNegative
Per
Cen
t
Words Selected to Describe Feelings About EU Membership
Perceived Risks of Leaving the European
Union (LeDuc’s Law)
12.3
3.0
6.57.0
4.5
12.7
7.3
12.8
11.6
3.4
18.9
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
16
18
20
0 - NotRisky
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 - VeryRisky
Per
Cen
t
Risk of Leaving EU
Logit Model of Voting to LeavePredictor B s.e.
Benefits-Costs of Leaving EU
Economy-Influence 2.500*** .578
Immigration-Terrorism 1.030** .367
Risk Assessments of Leaving EU -.371*** .062
Emotional Reactions to EU -.304*** .096
Importance of Europe as Issue .599* .270
Left Behind in Economy -.039 .147
Party Leader Images:
Cameron -.029 .056
Corbyn -.054 .053
Farage .194*** .055
Johnson .196*** .056
Partisanship:
Conservative -.539* .322
Labour -.060 .321
Liberal Democrat -.347 .443
UKIP -.338 .563
SNP 1.416 .741
National Identity:
English .185 .243
Scottish -1.592** .552
Welsh -.323 .594
European -.841 1.305
Other -.287 .463
Campaign Contact:
Remain Campaign -.083 .194
Leave Campaign .270 .278
Socio-Demographics:
Age -.006 .007
University Education .093 .236
Gender .026 .221
Social Class -.148† .101
Constant 1.289 .753
McKelvey R2 = .89
Percentage Voters correctly classified = 93.2
Percentage reduction in classification error (Lambda) = 86.2 per cent
N = 1780
Impact of Important Predictors in the Model
of Voting to Leave
Scottish Identity, -0.32
Boris Johnson, 0.44
Nigel Farage, 0.44
Conservative Party Id, -0.07
Importance Europe Issue, 0.14
EU Emotions, -0.52
Risk Leave, -0.71
Immigration-Terrorism, 0.75
Economy-International Influence, 0.88
-1.00 -0.75 -0.50 -0.25 0.00 0.25 0.50 0.75 1.00
Change in Probability Vote Leave
Explanatory Power of Rival Models of Voting
to Leave in the EU Referendum
0.16 0.15
0.26
0.71 0.710.73
0.85
0.90
0
500
1000
1500
2000
2500
0
0.1
0.2
0.3
0.4
0.5
0.6
0.7
0.8
0.9
1
Socio-Demographics
NationalIdentities
Party Id EU Emotions LeaderImages
Risks Benefit-CostFactors
CompositeModel
Ak
aik
e I
nfo
rma
tio
n C
rite
rio
n
Mc
Ke
lve
y R
2
McKelvey R2 AIC
Modelling the Perceived Risks of Leaving
the EU Benefits-Costs of Leaving EU
Economy & International Immigration-
Influence Terrorism
Predictor B s.e. B s.e.
Negative Attitudes towards
Immigration .227*** .013 .474*** .020
EU Control of UK Economy .140*** .023 .204*** .036
Left Behind in Economy .007 .052 .012 .018
Party Leader Images:
Cameron -.046*** .004 -.063*** .006
Corbyn -.029*** .004 -.051*** .006
Farage .039*** .005 .062*** .007
Johnson .051*** .004 .082*** .007
Partisanship:
Conservative -.044* .028 -.093* .042
Labour -.090*** .026 -.133** .040
Liberal Democrat -.141*** .040 -.199** .061
UKIP -.050† .038 -.092 .059
SNP .020 .063 .006 .097
National Identity:
English .042* .021 .091** .032
Scottish -.098* .047 -.085 .072
Welsh .062 .052 .145* .081
European -.138* .061 -.238** .094
Other -.067† .046 .049 .071
Campaign Contact:
Remain Campaign -.026* .012 -.029† .019
Leave Campaign -.013 .018 .005 .027
Socio-Demographics:
Age .001 .001 .002* .001
University Education -.041* .020 -.039† .030
Gender .006 .018 .018 .028
Social Class -.024** .009 -.023* .013
Constant -.020 .052 -.137† .080
R2 = .69 .75
N = 1736
*** - p < .001; ** - p < .01; * - p < .05, † - p < .10, one-tailed test
Note: high scores on benefit-cost factors indicate pro-Leave
perceptions.
Conclusions
Two key predictors in the Brexit model were cost-benefit calculations
of the economy and fears of immigration and terrorism
Emotional Feelings about UK membership of the European Union
played an important role as well with negative emotions outweighing
positive emotions
Leadership evaluations of Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage had a
direct influence on the vote whereas Cameron and Corbyn did not.
However, they had an indirect effect via perceptions of the risks of
leaving.
Leave won because they had both a negative (‘fear of immigration’)
and a positive (‘take back control’) appeal, whereas the Remain
appeal was largely negative (‘risks of leaving’). The latter shifted
opinion towards remain but it was not enough to counteract the
appeal of Brexit.
Had the referendum taken place at the same time as the general
election in 2015, Remain would probably have won.