Instruments of Reform

Reformers have had a choice of political instrument since parties and pressure groups both emerged during England’s Cavalier Parliament. There have been twelve partisan configurations, in all but one of which parties have selected certain issues and left the rest to groups, which worked with independent-minded backbenchers. The first five configurations—structured by attitudes towards the court, James II, the Hanoverian succession, George III, and the social order—left considerable policy space for non-partisan reformers. During the exceptional sixth configuration, the era of the first two reform acts, groups agitated so effectively that parties accepted some of their demands: in the process the Tories were transformed into Conservatives and the Whigs into Liberals, while the scope for group and backbench activism was reduced. The seventh configuration saw both parties become more disciplined and develop broad alternative programmes, causing many groups to affiliate with one or the other. The eighth configuration, the era of two world wars, was complicated by Labour’s gradual supersession of the Liberals and by continuous international crisis. The ninth, 1945–70, saw Labour and the Conservatives dominate the domestic agenda. During the tenth and eleventh configurations, both parties first became more extreme, partly to manage the trade union movement, and then, with that most powerful of groups tamed, moderated their ideological positions. The twelfth, since 2016, has seen the parliamentary system become dysfunctional, the two main parties fragmenting internally over how to interpret and respond to the Brexit referendum.