Class ethos and political parties in ante-Brexit Britain: A shifting correspondence

The factors underpinning the outcome of the United Kingdom’s 2016 referendum on membership of the European Union are widely debated. Disagreements exist over the relative role of political parties and political attitudes, economic and cultural stances and, above all, social class and other forms of division. Bourdieu’s topological reimagining of class and its relationship to politics, I argue, can dissolve and adjudicate some of these competing claims. Drawing on data from the 2015 British Social Attitudes survey and deploying multiple correspondence analysis, I construct a model of the space of political position-takings in the period shortly before the referendum and explore its correspondences with the social space, political parties and stances toward the European Union. The results disclose the disconnection between specific sections of the social space and the Labour Party and the rise of the anti-EU UK Independence Party (UKIP) in the latter’s place.