{"id":68,"date":"2015-03-03T13:31:51","date_gmt":"2015-03-03T13:31:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.edgehill.ac.uk\/election\/?p=68"},"modified":"2015-05-12T11:45:37","modified_gmt":"2015-05-12T10:45:37","slug":"unnacustomed-as-i-am","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.edgehill.ac.uk\/comment\/2015\/03\/03\/unnacustomed-as-i-am\/","title":{"rendered":"Unaccustomed as I am\u2026.."},"content":{"rendered":"

This Spring sees the last lot of party conferences before the big event.<\/p>\n

Some are specific national conferences, like the Conservative Welsh Conference<\/a> that has just taken place.\u00a0 Others are UK wide, like the Lib Dem conference <\/a>due to take place later in March (13\/14\/15th<\/sup>) and Ukip\u2019s event<\/a> in Margate. Organisations such as \u201cgrassroots\u201d organisation Conservative Home also hold events around this time.<\/p>\n

Party conferences serve a wide range of functions, from policy-making, to socialising, from training to selling.\u00a0 But the ones just before a General Election are those in which each party tries to make the event a \u201cshop window\u201d on vote winning policies and camera friendly delegates.<\/p>\n

For everything happening on stage, there is as much if not more going on just out of sight.\u00a0 The aim is to get the best camera angles, the best speeches, the most TV coverage.<\/p>\n

Likely policy announcements are trailed weeks in advance with a drip-drip approach to media management.\u00a0 Sessions are timed so that the most vote-worthy happen at the times most likely to provide an audience.\u00a0 And of course the Leader\u2019s speech is briefed out in advance and planned with a good clutch of soundbites in mind.<\/p>\n

This might make attending conference as a delegate seem a little pointless.\u00a0 But party members still compete for places at these events and put great stress on being there and taking part.<\/p>\n

As a regular conference goer I find it fascinating to watch the changes that happen as the electoral cycle goes round.\u00a0 Conferences shortly after an election can be loud and argumentative.\u00a0 Those shortly before tend to be well disciplined and worthy.<\/p>\n

In 2005, Florence Faucher-King published her work on the anthropology of party conferences. She spent years immersing herself in four different party cultures (Labour, Conservative, Liberal Democrat and Green).\u00a0 From who has votes to who has voices, this is a fascinating look at how the tribes behave.<\/p>\n

But the tribe of members is arguably less important at a pre General Election conference than the tribe of media. This Spring, watch out for those manifesto moments.<\/p>\n

(I\u2019ll be taking a separate look at any comment worthy party conference happenings as this blog goes on. The BBC\u2019s Parliament Channel<\/a> often covers large amounts of each party conference so it\u2019s the place to go to for conference obsessives).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This Spring sees the last lot of party conferences before the big event. Some are specific national conferences, like the Conservative Welsh Conference that has just taken place.\u00a0 Others are UK wide, like the Lib Dem conference due to take place later in March (13\/14\/15th) and Ukip\u2019s event in Margate. Organisations such as \u201cgrassroots\u201d organisation […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1269,"featured_media":70,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32286],"tags":[53,32341,32278,32290,32303,32340],"class_list":["post-68","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-election-2015","tag-conferences","tag-election-2015","tag-general-election","tag-general-election-2015","tag-party-conference","tag-politics"],"yoast_head":"\nUnaccustomed as I am\u2026.. - Comment<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.edgehill.ac.uk\/comment\/2015\/03\/03\/unnacustomed-as-i-am\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Unaccustomed as I am\u2026.. - Comment\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"This Spring sees the last lot of party conferences before the big event. 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