What is the problem? The politicisation of violence experienced by Members of Parliament in the United Kingdom

Thesis

Political violence in otherwise ‘stable’ democracies seems to be a growing phenomenon – from the attempted coups in the United States of America (USA) and Germany to regular online trolling of elected representatives to senior women politicians across the world standing down because of threats (BBC, 2021; Schumacher, 2022; Camut, 2023). In the last ten years in the United Kingdom (UK), there have been two fatal attacks on British Members of Parliament (MPs), a terrorist attack on the Houses of Parliament and regular online abuse towards politicians (e.g. Collignon et al., 2022).

A gendered lens is helpful for developing a comprehensive understanding of this phenomenon. Feminist scholars have expanded our understandings of violence beyond a narrow conceptualisation of physical forms in areas of conflict to a multi-faceted phenomena that includes sexual harassment and online abuse in democracies (Krook and Restrepo Sanín, 2016a; Bjarnegård, 2018; Bardall, Bjarnegård and Piscopo, 2020; Collignon, Campbell and Rüdig, 2022).

Yet, this literature has paid less attention to the policy dimensions of the phenomenon. Therefore, this thesis applies an interpretative feminist approach to policy analysis (e.g. Bacchi, 2012a) and Feminist Institutionalism (FI) (e.g. Mackay and Krook, 2015) to explore if, how and why violence against politicians has been politicised as a policy problem.

The thesis’ driving research question is ‘How and why has violence (including abuse, intimidation and harassment) against MPs become politicised in the UK during the period from 2010 to 2021?’ with the sub-research question, ‘Has the phenomenon been politicised in a gendered way and, if so, how and why?’ The multi-method qualitative study interprets and traces the discursive emergence of the policy problem and concrete policy change through policy debates, documents and original interviews.

I find that the phenomenon of violence towards MPs in the UK has been politicised from a gender-neutral problem of predominantly physical threats that demands a security response to a multi-faceted policy problem involving a range of institutions and actors including Parliament, political parties and the police.

I pose that a key part of the explanations for the politicisation is likely the long-term ‘gendering’ of relevant political institutions, such as policy discourse and parliamentary and policy architecture. Yet, the phenomenon has been gendered in a largely individualist, protectionist way, without a diagnosis of structural inequalities and related prognosis that political institutions should be transformed.

Advancing understandings of gender and political violence as a policy problem has important implications for research and practice on addressing violence in politics and democratic participation and policymaking in the UK and around the world.

Authors: Phillips, H

• DOI: 10.5287/ora-yejmpejmm
• Type of award: DPhil
• Level of award: Doctoral
• Awarding institution: University of Oxford
• Language: English