Party identification, political preferences and material conditions - Evidence from the British Household Panel Survey, 1991-2

The paper reports the results of analysing the first two waves of the British Household Panel Survey, conducted in 1991 and 1992. The connections between respondents' party identifications and voting choices are examined and related to a range of exogenous factors, including social location, ideology, policy preferences and changing material conditions. It is argued that identifications may be indistinguishable from voting choices and that, as a result, models that include party identification as an explanatory variable may be mis-specified.