The Marketing of Political Parties

What is political marketing and how does it work? This question sits at the heart of this book. Using the British General Election of 2005 as a case study, this collection focuses on three important elements: the products offered by the parties; the campaign communication; and the perceptions, reactions and attitudes of the voters. Within each chapter is a discussion of the role of marketing in constructing the elements of an election campaign, how marketing informs the communicational aspects and how the strategy is perceived by the voters. This analysis, the first of its kind, allows us to understand how marketing informs the disparate elements of a campaign to understand if politics has entered a market-oriented phase. The book raises a number of important questions, particularly the extent to which marketing has become the new political ideology, and what affect this is having on the voter perceptions of the parties.