Evaluate the view that democracy in the UK is suffering from participation crisis (30 marks)
Political participation is when citizens take an active role and do something that contributes to a political
debate or process. There are traditional methods of participation and modern methods of participation.
Traditional methods of participation include voting and joining a political party while modern methods
of participation rely on the use of the internet; blogging, and e-petitions. A participation crisis is a
situation where a large proportion of the population do not engage with the political process. Some may
point to the growing membership of pressure groups as evidence that the UK is not suffering from a
participation crisis, but I disagree. Elections are the main method of participation, and general election
turnouts have been at historically low levels. Thus, I believe that the UK is suffering from a participation
crisis and I shall evaluate my viewpoint in this essay.
The most important form of political participation is voting; it is when citizens transfer mandate to
elected officials and hold them to account. In the UK, there is parliamentary sovereignty, thus the most
important elections are the general elections to the Westminster Parliament. General election turnout
from 1945 to 1992 was relatively high, above 75%. Turnout in 1950 reached an all time high at 84%.
Since 1997, general election turnout has been at historically low levels. For example, the turnout for the
2017 general election was 68.8% and it declined even more in 2019 at 67.3%. As UK is a representative
democracy, it is vital that turnout is high so that the resulting government can claim a legitimate
mandate to enact the policies in their manifesto. Taking the 2015 election for example, out of the 66.1%
of the electorate that participated in 2015, only 36.9% voted for the Conservative Party. This means that
the 2015 Conservative majority government was endorsed by just 24.4% of potential voters. How could
the Conservative government claim to have legitimate mandate when it was only endorsed by 24.4% of
potential voters? It is evident that fewer people are voting in general elections, and things get even
worse below the national level; the Alternative Vote referendum in 2011 had a turnout of 42% and the
Scottish Parliament election 2011 had a turnout of 50%.
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