Lib Dems (UK): What is their constituency?

[King of Kensington]

Is it fair to say "the Celtic fringe" + the liberal middle classes that are "too progressive to vote Tory and too "bourgeois to vote Labour"?  People to the left of much of the Labour electorate on social issues but to the right of Labour on economic issues?

And second, is Political Geography & Demographics supposed to only be for US politics?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

If you believe the opinion polls then the answer is 'increasingly rare'.

[Del Tachi]

I've always understood that the Lib Dems are rough ideological equals to the U.S. Democratic Party, and that Labour is what the U.S. Democratic Party used to be in the 1950s and 1960s. 

[King of Kensington]

Clinton though was very much a model for "New Labour."

[All Along The Watchtower]

I've always understood that the Lib Dems are rough ideological equals to the U.S. Democratic Party, and that Labour is what the U.S. Democratic Party used to be in the 1950s and 1960s. 

But the Democratic Party has never been socialist or even social-democratic.

[King of Kensington]

New England Yankees strike me a constituency that would vote Lib Dem under a British party system. 

[YL]

Is it fair to say "the Celtic fringe" + the liberal middle classes that are "too progressive to vote Tory and too "bourgeois to vote Labour"?  People to the left of much of the Labour electorate on social issues but to the right of Labour on economic issues?

This is a complicated question.  Their voting base, especially pre-Coalition, was really quite heterogeneous, and I'm sure some of it was just "plague on both your houses" voters who didn't like either Labour or the Tories for various reasons without being at all liberal in any sense of the word.  (This helps to explain why polls show a significant number of ex-Lib Dems now voting UKIP.)  Of course in their strongholds quite a lot of it was always tactical; their leaflets have always pushed squeeze messages (hence their reputation for dodgy bar charts, which is thoroughly deserved) more strongly than actual policies.

Based on my own experience (and having been one myself once) I think you would find that quite a lot of the urban middle class type of Lib Dem voters (pre-Coalition) wouldn't have  thought of themselves as right of Labour on economics.  (We're talking Blair-era Labour, of course.)  Their beef with Labour would have been on other matters (one of which is four letters long and ends in a Q).

[Filuwaúrdjan]

A fairly typical example of a LibDem barchart being...

[King of Kensington]

This is a complicated question.  Their voting base, especially pre-Coalition, was really quite heterogeneous, and I'm sure some of it was just "plague on both your houses" voters who didn't like either Labour or the Tories for various reasons without being at all liberal in any sense of the word.  (This helps to explain why polls show a significant number of ex-Lib Dems now voting UKIP.)  Of course in their strongholds quite a lot of it was always tactical; their leaflets have always pushed squeeze messages (hence their reputation for dodgy bar charts, which is thoroughly deserved) more strongly than actual policies.

Based on my own experience (and having been one myself once) I think you would find that quite a lot of the urban middle class type of Lib Dem voters (pre-Coalition) wouldn't have  thought of themselves as right of Labour on economics.  (We're talking Blair-era Labour, of course.)  Their beef with Labour would have been on other matters (one of which is four letters long and ends in a Q).

Yes, New Labour's positioning led the Lib Dems to outflank Labour on the left, especially on the questions of civil liberties and the Iraq war.  Didn't Tariq Ali call for a Lib Dem vote?

I would think Lib Dems are less likely to defect to UKIP though than Labour or Tories - Labour because of their appeal in working class communities, and the Tories because UKIP offers a new home for reactionary voters that previously voted Tory.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Ah, but reality is often very different from 'analysis' published in newspapers. A very high proportion of the old LibDem vote came via 'none of the above' protest (and had done - on and off - since 1974), particularly outside London and the South East. And, except in instances of surviving local personality cults, this vote is probably as lost for them as students or Guardian readers...

[Bacon King]

And, except in instances of surviving local personality cults

At this point, I feel like a local personality cult is almost the only thing that'll allow incumbent LD MPs to survive reelection

[King of Kensington]

Interesting:

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http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2014/03/ukip-have-taken-more-votes-lib-dems-most-think

Fewer Labour defectors than I thought.  Maybe ex-Labour voters that are now supporting UKIP defected after 1997.

[King of Kensington]

http://may2015.com/featured/ukippers-are-likely-to-have-voted-tory-in-2010-but-labour-in-the-1990s/

[You kip if you want to...]

UKIP voters are another matter. Thatcher-Blair-Cameron swing voters, to put it very crudely.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Who'd have thought that voters not attached to any particular party would be the most likely to swing behind a new one?

[You kip if you want to...]

Who'd have thought that voters not attached to any particular party would be the most likely to swing behind a new one?

"Common sense" or "flakey"?

[H. Ross Peron]

Ron Wyden Democrats.

[Antonio the Sixth]

A fairly typical example of a LibDem barchart being...

LOL, I love how this makes it look like the Conservative vote would have been enough to put the Libdem over the Labour guy, even though by the numbers they show he would still have lost by 3000 votes. This is Fox News territory.

[You kip if you want to...]

A fairly typical example of a LibDem barchart being...

LOL, I love how this makes it look like the Conservative vote would have been enough to put the Libdem over the Labour guy, even though by the numbers they show he would still have lost by 3000 votes. This is Fox News territory.

http://www.buzzfeed.com/jimwaterson/decidedly-dodgy-liberal-democrat-graphs#.bhK2zvezb

[Indy Texas]

I can see how Labour would have eroded their "market share" by venturing into neoliberalism/Third Way-ism in the '90s.

But I never understood why the old Liberal Party began to decline to begin with. If anything, you'd think they would have been a more logical place - in terms of ideology - for supply side economics and neoliberalism to grow in the 1970s and 1980s than the Conservative Party would have been.

[You kip if you want to...]

Another (more cynical) way to view the LibDems is that to win seats as... varied... as Brent Central/Redcar and Westmorland & Lonsdale/Twickenham at the same time, your only real electoral strategy is one of shameless local level populism, supported by very well targeted tactical votes and protest voters.

[Indy Texas]

Another (more cynical) way to view the LibDems is that to win seats as... varied... as Brent Central/Redcar and Westmorland & Lonsdale/Twickenham at the same time, your only real electoral strategy is one of shameless local level populism, supported by very well targeted tactical votes and protest voters.

I doubt 99% of the Americans ITT understand the reference. Please clarify.

[DC Al Fine]

But I never understood why the old Liberal Party began to decline to begin with. If anything, you'd think they would have been a more logical place - in terms of ideology - for supply side economics and neoliberalism to grow in the 1970s and 1980s than the Conservative Party would have been.

I think a better question to ask is why the liberal parties in Canada and United States didn't decline. After all, the patter in most of the west is a conservative party versus a labour party, with other ideologies bringing up the rear.

[King of Kensington]

Another (more cynical) way to view the LibDems is that to win seats as... varied... as Brent Central/Redcar and Westmorland & Lonsdale/Twickenham at the same time, your only real electoral strategy is one of shameless local level populism, supported by very well targeted tactical votes and protest voters.

The Liberal Party of Canada - after their disastrous 2011 showing  -  sort of looks like the Lib Dems at the moment in terms of their composition - though it was never a party for "protest votes."  They current hold low income immigrant heavy seats like Etobicoke North, university centers like Kingston and Guelph, urban elite seats like Toronto's St. Paul's and Montreal's Westmount as well as some holdouts in rural Atlantic Canada. 

[Indy Texas]

But I never understood why the old Liberal Party began to decline to begin with. If anything, you'd think they would have been a more logical place - in terms of ideology - for supply side economics and neoliberalism to grow in the 1970s and 1980s than the Conservative Party would have been.

I think a better question to ask is why the liberal parties in Canada and United States didn't decline. After all, the patter in most of the west is a conservative party versus a labour party, with other ideologies bringing up the rear.

Liberalism in the way that the original Liberal Party was liberal (free trade, extending the franchise, etc) is just part of what America is. Our Left and Right parties are just extensions of that premise. Old Toryism would require existing institutions in need of defending - there were/are none here: no peerage, no Church, no monarchy. Socialism/social democracy requires a sense of community cohesion that our individualist society of temporarily embarrassed future millionaires lacks. And because those things weren't there, we never had any major issues with fascism or communism, which is why we also lack a European-style center-right/Christian Democracy presence.

We're Americans. The rich want as much money to stay in their private bank accounts as possible, consequences to society be damned. The poor want as much money to flow into their private bank accounts as possible, consequences to society be damned. We're not interested in tradition or class or national identity or the well-being of the community. And the rest of our politics is determined by how we feel about fetuses and guns.