Modern British Politics & Political History
University of Bath: David Moon
University of Bristol: Mark Wickham-Jones, Hugh Pemberton
Cardiff University: Stephen Thornton
University of Exeter: David Thackeray (PI), Richard Toye
Background
British politics presently confronts a number of distinct and severe, though interlinked, problems which are manifest in debates surrounding the 2015 UK General Election: declining voter turnouts; the decline of party and the increasing inability of politicians to mobilise mass support and activism through party structures; the impact of devolutionary pressures on a centralised political system, and the gap between parliamentary and extra-parliamentary political activity. These issues are at the heart of this bid. The initiator workshops held by this community revealed significant areas for further research which were be grouped into three broad areas: 1. Political engagement and parties; 2. Engagement, gender and political participation; 3. Political engagement and voting.
This community previously held an Initiator Award: Modern British Politics and History.
Project summary
The Accelerator award took forward the three themes identified by the Initiator award, piloting aspects of future projects, exploring these themes in conference discussions and seminars, and creating links with international collaborators. The funding enabled the academics involved to significantly expand their existing collaborations and develop bids drawing on specialist expertise across institutions in a way which was not previously possible for the group. This has resulted in several publications, public policy pieces and bids for grants to support future research. The community also established a Politics and History specialist group of the Political Studies Association (led by Pemberton and Moon) to develop long-term collaboration between the GW4 researchers and specialists with similar interests at other institutions.
