The Policy Vane:a Research On The Election Manifestos Of The British Political Parties (1900-2005)

Britain is the birthplace of modern party politics and the election manifesto. As an important part of party politics, the election manifesto is the fine reflection of policies, ideas and ideology of British political parties. In a two-party system, after one party won the election campaign, its manifesto became an important basis for the domestic and foreign policies implemented by the party. Therefore, the election manifesto occupies an important place in party politics, and especially for the research on party policies, it is also an important indicator for the research on the national conditions and the will of the people of different historical periods in modern Britain.The scholars who study British modern history have paid high attention to the election manifestos of British political parties, and have frequently quoted them when they studied the policy orientation and the key problems of politics, economy and society in Britain. But, so far, the researchers, both foreign and domestic, consider these election manifestos mainly as the background information and the relevant evidence when they study the political, economic and social issues and especially on the political system, policies of the political parties or some election campaigns in Britain, but these researches have no focus on the origin, evolution and the making mechanism of the election manifesto itself, and the researches need more efforts on the relationship and the interaction of the election manifesto with the electoral system, the party politics and the themes of the times, etc. Therefore, this dissertation focuses on the election manifestos of British major political parties since 1900 and the major political, economic and social issues that Britain faced, tries to analyze:1, the evolution of the election manifestos in form, in content and the formation mechanism; 2, the interaction and the mutual influence between the election manifestos and the political politics, and between the manifestos and the electoral system; 3, the position and function of the election manifestos in the formation of political parties'philosophy and the party construction; 4, the way and the degree of the election manifestos'impacts on solving the political, economic and social issues, and summarizes them . These analyses are helpful to understanding the vital function of the policy-making in the party construction and activities. And the author also hopes that these analyses can be helpful about: how to make the policies more scientifically, how to correctly reflect the public opinion and timely guide the public opinion in the policy-making process, how to combine the party's policies with certain economic, political theories, how to constantly adjust the policies according to the economic and social changes, and to expand the social basis of the party, and how to learn from the mistakes of British parties in the policy-making.This dissertation mainly consists of eight parts. The introduction mainly expounds the important position of the election manifestos in British party politics, the researches relevant and the significance of research on the manifestos. The first chapter briefly introduces the origin of the election manifestos and the close relationship with the parliamentary system and the party politics. It also gives some consideration about the universal suffrage system, the first-past-the-post system, the responsible cabinet system and the party system, and their influences on the evolution of manifestos in content and in form, including the profound influences of the party ideologies and political, economic theories on the election manifestos. The second chapter analyzes the manifestos of the three main parties during the beginning of the 20th century respectively, and the major political, economic and social issues at the time. The early twentieth-century manifestos inherited from the nineteenth-century manifestos in content and in form, they were simple in form and rough in content, but they still truly reflected the major domestic and foreign issues of this period and the ideas of different parties, and predicted the future roles and the development of the major parties. The third chapter analyzes the election manifestos and the most important change of British party politics between the two World Wars, including the rise of the Labour Party and the decline of the Liberal Party. The forth chapter puts emphasis on the guide functions and correlative reactions in the manifestos of the Labour Party and the Conservative Party in the construction of the welfare state after World Warâ…¡. The fifth chapter focuses on the reflection in the manifestos of the Conservative Party which tried to guide the public opinion with reform policies and the reflection in the manifestos of Labour Party which tried to change its own policies, and thereby analyzes the relationship between the parties and the public opinion. The sixth chapter systematically analyzes the changes in the themes, the evolution in the forms and the variation in the ways of forming of manifestos since 1900. The last part of the dissertation includes some conclusions and illuminations. Importance should be attached to the followings: the vital function of policies by the parties for the political mobilization and economic development; the establishment of efficient policy-making institutions and the mechanism to determine scientifically the party guideline and policies; the better understanding of the public opinion and the ability to reflect it correctly and guide it in the policy-making both effectively and timely; the using of new political and economic theories to improve the theoretic thinking and the strategies in the policy-making, the increase of the efficiency both for the policy guiding in the practice and solving political, economic and social problems; the increase of the efficiency for the policy both guiding in the practice and solving political, economic and social problems; the changes of policies according to the political ,economic and social developments, and the consolidation and expansion of the social basis a political party must rely on; finally, the welfare policies must correspond with the level of the national economic development.