The UK with Dems/GOP

[Boobs]

I know this is a sensitive topic, and ultimately a doomed project regardless, but I tried to make a semi-realistic map of the constituencies of the UK voting in a scenario where it was effectively a two-party system of (American) Democrats and Republicans. However, the scenario is not "How would the UK vote" if it became part of the US tomorrow. Rather, there's an assumption of some long-term historical adjustment in voting patterns as well as the parties' appeals and bases.

Partially, I was inspired by this tweet, which obviously created a very unrealistic scenario but did do it based on demographic modeling.

https://twitter.com/notkavi/status/1480335772985147392?s=20

Instead I chose to do my map rather subjectively, although I'm sure most knowledgable people would be able to find dozens of disagreements, rightfully so, and I hope I can foster some interesting discussion at the very least.

The main problems from the start:
1. The United Kingdom is far more white than the United States, so a simple racial breakdown would obviously result in far too many Republican seats. Therefore, Democrats do far better among white voters and especially with white voters with no university education/qualifications. Minorities in the UK are far more likely to be South Asian and/or Muslim than in the United States, both of which would likely be solid Democratic groups (despite being less educated in general than their American equivalents), while Black and Caribbean voters in the UK have an obvious counterpart. It's possible non-British whites (in particular recent immigrants) could be the equivalent of Hispanic voters in the US - a nominally Democratic group that is trending away from being so.
2. The United Kingdom is significantly more urban, and specifically, denser than the United States. Even rural areas in the United Kingdom are more densely dotted with villages and such. Furthermore, the United Kingdom is geographically smaller, so cities are far more connected to one another, so rural areas are far less remote as well. To add to this, rural areas, at least in southern England, are generally well-off and decently affluent/middle class. This would entail a Democratic landslide if we go solely off of density as a determinative factor (and it is, in a sense, quite determinative in the United States)
3. The United Kingdom is more irreligious than the United States, and the religious in the UK are not as fanatical or evangelical as they are in the US. Gay marriage is at around 80-85% approval in the UK, higher than in the US, and abortion is a much less salient issue. On those notes, Democrats would dominate in the UK.
4. The constituent nations of the United Kingdom (Scotland, Wales, NI) do not have an equivalent in the US.

I chose to accommodate for these differences, implying better Democrat performances with white voters, while the GOP would do better in some urban areas and with irreligious voters.

Thankfully, there is at least a very useful starting point for the modern American alignment in the UK: the Brexit referendum. I think it is fair to say that most Remain areas in England would be a solid base for Democrats - generally more educated and socially liberal, with a "global" (scare quotes because globalism is an overwrought term) viewpoint.

However, Democrats would still win many Leave areas, especially those in urban centers and with large minority populations.

Without further ado, the map:



In general:

Urban centers - both leave and remain, white and nonwhite, deprived and affluent, well educated and poorly educated - would vote Democratic. A lot of this is to do with self-sorting in the United States, but it seems rather applicable here as well.

Tourist centers and seaside resorts would also vote Democratic. Areas with mining or other resource extraction industries would tend to vote GOP. (Welsh Valleys will be addressed below).

Well educated, Remain-y suburbs would vote Democratic - see Hertfordshire, Surrey, Oxfordshire, etc - while Brexit-y suburbs vote GOP, such as Essex and Kent.

Deprived central urban areas, as mentioned above, still vote Democratic despite their reception to Brexit. Suburban and exurban deprived areas, however, are more likely to be GOP, unless they are also home to a significant minority population.

Jews in this scenario would be a solid Democratic group, especially considering that there is not a significant Orthodox Jewish population in the UK. This makes Hendon, Finchley, Barnet, Bury, and East Renfrewshire some of the more (historically) solid Democratic urban-suburban areas.

Irish Catholics, both in Northern Ireland and in Merseyside and Wirral, are a solid Democratic constituency.

While Scotland is a relatively left-leaning nation, it would be a bit silly to have all constituencies vote Democratic. Edinburgh and Glasgow would obviously be Democratic strongholds, as well as the Clydeside and many of the middle class suburbs. Aidirie and other more working-class, formerly industrial suburbs seem like the few possible areas for the GOP to gain a foothold in the commuter belt. Additionally, some areas more dependent on oil would also be receptive to the GOP.

Areas where minority languages (Gaelic, Welsh) are prominent are considered to be Democratic-leaning areas, although it is possible they may swing away a la far Northern Maine francophones. Possibly.

The problem child: Wales. Specifically, the Welsh Valleys. The most accurate American equivalents are solidly Republican, but that seems very silly and unsatisfying for some of the safest Labour parts of the country. I chose to split the difference, with certain areas voting D and others GOP, partially off of relative Brexit support. But ultimately, that is the part of the country I am most unsatisfied with, and I would enjoy some (hopefully constructive) criticism.

Ultimately we end up with 350 Democrats and 300 Republicans, equivalent to a 234-201 split in the US, similar to the results after the 2018 election.

I want to thank poster Alcibaides for his help thoughout this wee project.

Have (hopefully not too infuriating) fun.

[Boobs]

Jews in this scenario would be a solid Democratic group, especially considering that there is not a significant Orthodox Jewish population in the UK. This makes Hendon, Finchley, Barnet, Bury, and East Renfrewshire some of the more (historically) solid Democratic urban-suburban areas.

British Jewry is more Orthodox and traditional than American Jewry, including a sizeable nominal Orthodox population. Most who belong to synagogues belong to Orthodox synagogues.  Reform Judaism is weak in the UK. 

Right. I believe I meant Hasidism, which I think is much less prevalent in London (outside of Hackney) than in the greater NYC area.

[Boobs]

Thank you Al for this, I appreciate it. It does bring up a point about the - not exactly certain how to phrase this, but - geographic distribution or human geography of population in the UK vs the US. In the sense that contemporary American urban areas are far larger, if also more suburban, than British ones, while Britain (by virtue of its smaller size, earlier industrialization, and in general the continuance of it being inhabited by the same group of people, under the same general society for a thousand or more years compared to the three hundred year inhabitation of the Americas by Europeans) lacks the truly remote rural areas that are present in America - and thus emerges the dichotomy in influence and "worldliness", for lack of a better term (connectiveness, were it a word), between these analogous areas.

Another obvious reason for the issue is the lack of rigid class voting in the United States. The old world class system does not exist in the US, for many reasons, and even where & when a similar structure emerged in America, rarely did that result in a politic that resembles European voting patterns (such as the South for much of its history, as sectional/cultural issues overruled class-based ones).

Which is a long and hyper-focused way of bringing us to the increasing difficulty of doing this kind of project, as fun as it undoubtedly is. American voting patterns have become increasingly strange from a European perspective (and often look even stranger once look you at detailed results) which makes getting things to fit rather hard. And one reason for this is that the divergent political histories of the United States and Western Europe mean that often the places that have the most in common in most respects are now very different in other ways: in this case it means that even the worst patches of postindustrial despair in Britain are nothing like what can be found in the various Rust Belts of the United States, but similar comments apply to other types of area.

In many senses, I agree. The "strangeness" of politics in different countries is clear and I think almost impossible to appreciate without having lived in the country or countries themselves. And the contrast with the "[x politician] would be a member of [y party] in [z country]" memes, really does make it obvious that politics is far more than just - and far more interesting than - alignments about policy and ideology.

I do have some questions I think you might able to answer. While they're often grouped together as the Welsh Valleys, do the various individual valleys have significant differences between them that would make them more or less likely to vote Democratic in this hypothetical scenario? Evidently, in the real-world alignment, they do all fit quite well together as Labour constituencies. But for example, would the Rhondda's religious history (both historical and its contemporary irreligion) and relatively long Welsh-speaking history make it more likely to be a Democratic constituency? I'm not too familiar on the differences between the Welsh Valleys, only their overall character.