Week 11 Political Analysis Workshop: Where Did the Votes Go?

Introduction to Political Science Free sample edition

Part 1 — The Big Picture

This week you learned that the counting rule decides what a vote does: a plurality wins under first-past-the-post, a second round decides a majority-runoff, and seats track votes under proportional representation. You also met Duverger's law, the tendency of single-member plurality rules to squeeze scattered parties through a mechanical and a psychological effect. In this workshop you read real data the way a political scientist does. You take the House of Commons Library's party results for the 2024 UK general election, compute each party's seat share and the gap between its seats and its votes in a spreadsheet, and ask the five data questions: what is measured, over whom and when, what it shows, what it does not, and whether it shows correlation or cause. Then you sort three claims about the result by kind and layer, and you check a chatbot's version of the same analysis for misquotations, invented sources, misattributions, oversimplifications, and a verdict passed off as a fact.

Time budget: Plan for about 90 minutes.

Part 2 — The Task

Guiding question: How did 33.7 percent of the vote become 63.2 percent of the seats in the 2024 UK general election, and what do the House of Commons Library's figures show and not show about how first-past-the-post turned votes into seats?

Workshop data: party results of the 2024 UK general election (House of Commons Library figures)

Source: Party-level results of the 2024 UK general election as the House of Commons Library reports them in its research briefing CBP-10009, General election 2024: results and analysis, printed in Table 1 for six parties; no candidate is named.

Rows: 6 rows of data, one per party (Table 1 has 7 rows: the 6 parties plus a row for the six-party total and the seats won by others, with blank columns for your seat shares and gaps)
Columns: party; share of the vote in percent; seats won of 650; seat share in percent; gap in percentage points
Election facts: 650 single-member constituencies under plurality rules; turnout 59.7 percent

Part 3 — Materials & Procedure

Tools and materials

Authoritative archives and data sources (the National Archives, the Avalon Project, Project Gutenberg, the Legal Information Institute, un.org, the House of Commons Library, Pew Research Center, Freedom House, V-Dem, the World Bank, Our World in Data) plus a spreadsheet for the seat-allocation and margin-of-error arithmetic, and one approved chatbot used as an analysis partner whose political-science slips the student catches
A document or notebook for your written answers

Ways of working

primary-text-analysis
read-the-data
argument-map-and-steel-man

Procedure

Open the House of Commons Library's research briefing CBP-10009, General election 2024: results and analysis, in your browser. Use your browser's find command to look for the party names in Table 1 and the word turnout, and check each vote share and seat count in Table 1 against the briefing. Tool: Authoritative archives and data sources (the National Archives, the Avalon Project, Project Gutenberg, the Legal Information Institute, un.org, the House of Commons Library, Pew Research Center, Freedom House, V-Dem, the World Bank, Our World in Data) plus a spreadsheet for the seat-allocation and margin-of-error arithmetic, and one approved chatbot used as an analysis partner whose political-science slips the student catches. Check: Every vote share and seat count in Table 1 matches the briefing, and turnout reads 59.7 percent.
Open a blank spreadsheet. In row 1 type the headers Party, Vote share, Seats, Seat share, and Gap in columns A to E. In rows 2 to 7 copy each party's name, vote share, and seats from Table 1. Tool: Authoritative archives and data sources (the National Archives, the Avalon Project, Project Gutenberg, the Legal Information Institute, un.org, the House of Commons Library, Pew Research Center, Freedom House, V-Dem, the World Bank, Our World in Data) plus a spreadsheet for the seat-allocation and margin-of-error arithmetic, and one approved chatbot used as an analysis partner whose political-science slips the student catches. Check: Rows 2 to 7 hold the six parties, with Labour's 33.7 and 411 in row 2.
In cell D2 type =ROUND(C2/650*100,1) and copy it down to D7. In cell E2 type =D2-B2 and copy it down to E7. Then copy each seat share and gap into Table 1. Tool: Authoritative archives and data sources (the National Archives, the Avalon Project, Project Gutenberg, the Legal Information Institute, un.org, the House of Commons Library, Pew Research Center, Freedom House, V-Dem, the World Bank, Our World in Data) plus a spreadsheet for the seat-allocation and margin-of-error arithmetic, and one approved chatbot used as an analysis partner whose political-science slips the student catches. Check: D2 shows 63.2 and E2 shows 29.5, matching Labour's seat share and gap in this week's chapter; a negative gap means a party won a smaller share of the seats than of the votes.
In cell C9 type =SUM(C2:C7) and in cell C10 type =650-C9. Write in Table 1 how many seats the six parties won together and how many went to other parties and independents. Tool: Authoritative archives and data sources (the National Archives, the Avalon Project, Project Gutenberg, the Legal Information Institute, un.org, the House of Commons Library, Pew Research Center, Freedom House, V-Dem, the World Bank, Our World in Data) plus a spreadsheet for the seat-allocation and margin-of-error arithmetic, and one approved chatbot used as an analysis partner whose political-science slips the student catches. Check: The two cells add up to 650 seats.
Complete Table 2 by answering the five data questions in your own words, using your gaps from Table 1 and the contrast between Reform UK and the Liberal Democrats. Tool: Authoritative archives and data sources (the National Archives, the Avalon Project, Project Gutenberg, the Legal Information Institute, un.org, the House of Commons Library, Pew Research Center, Freedom House, V-Dem, the World Bank, Our World in Data) plus a spreadsheet for the seat-allocation and margin-of-error arithmetic, and one approved chatbot used as an analysis partner whose political-science slips the student catches. Check: Every cell in Table 2 is filled, and the correlation-or-cause row names the mechanism behind the gap.
In Table 3, label each of the three claims empirical or normative and name its layer: design, practice, or verdict. Then state the strongest case for first-past-the-post and the strongest case for proportional representation, each as its own defenders would put it. Tool: Authoritative archives and data sources (the National Archives, the Avalon Project, Project Gutenberg, the Legal Information Institute, un.org, the House of Commons Library, Pew Research Center, Freedom House, V-Dem, the World Bank, Our World in Data) plus a spreadsheet for the seat-allocation and margin-of-error arithmetic, and one approved chatbot used as an analysis partner whose political-science slips the student catches. Check: Table 3 has no blank cells, and each side's case is written in a form its defenders would accept as fair.
Paste your completed tables into one approved chatbot, then paste the prompt from Part 6 below them. Record each of its answers in Table 4 and check every one against the briefing, your tables, and this week's definitions. Tool: Authoritative archives and data sources (the National Archives, the Avalon Project, Project Gutenberg, the Legal Information Institute, un.org, the House of Commons Library, Pew Research Center, Freedom House, V-Dem, the World Bank, Our World in Data) plus a spreadsheet for the seat-allocation and margin-of-error arithmetic, and one approved chatbot used as an analysis partner whose political-science slips the student catches. Check: Table 4 has one row for each of the chatbot's seven answers, each marked as checked against a source.

Fallback route

When to use it: Use this route if no spreadsheet is available or the House of Commons Library briefing cannot be reached.

Work the same steps by hand. Table 1 already prints each party's vote share and seats exactly as the briefing gives them, so compute each seat share by dividing the seats by 650 and multiplying by 100, rounding to one decimal place, and subtract the vote share to find each gap. Add the six parties' seats by hand and subtract the total from 650. Write each calculation so it can be checked, complete every table, answer every analysis question, do the critique step, and submit the same items for equal credit.

This route earns the same credit as the primary route.

Part 4 — The Scaffold

Table 1 holds the House of Commons Library's party results; check each figure against the briefing before you compute anything from it.

Student scaffold table 1
Party	Share of the vote in percent	Seats won of 650
Labour	33.7	411
Conservative	23.7	121
Liberal Democrat	12.2	72
Reform UK	14.3	5
Green	6.7	4
Scottish National Party	2.5	9
Six parties together, and other parties and independents

Table 2 walks the five data questions so that what the figures show stays apart from what they do not.

Student scaffold table 2
Data question	Your answer
What is measured?
Over whom, and when?
What does it show? Use the Reform UK and Liberal Democrat contrast.
What does it not show?
Correlation or cause? Name the mechanism.

Table 3 sorts three claims about the result by kind and layer, then states both sides of the open question fairly.

Student scaffold table 3
Claim	Kind (empirical or normative)	Layer (design, practice, or verdict)
The election used 650 single-member constituencies under plurality rules.
Labour won 411 seats on 33.7 percent of the vote.
Labour's seats gave it a mandate for every promise.
Strongest case for first-past-the-post, as its defenders would put it
Strongest case for proportional representation, as its defenders would put it

Table 4 is your critique log; it records what the chatbot said and what the figures or your tables show instead.

Student scaffold table 4
Chatbot answer	What it said	What the source or your tables show	Correction
1
2
3
4
5
6
7

Part 5 — Analysis Questions

Report each party's seat share and gap from Table 1, and show the spreadsheet formula or hand calculation you used for one of them. Then report how many seats the six parties won together and how many went to others.
Which party's seats fell furthest below its share of the vote, and which party won the most seats per point of vote share? Compare Reform UK with the Liberal Democrats and the Scottish National Party, and say what the comparison shows about where each party's votes were.
Explain the gaps with Duverger's mechanical effect and with geographic concentration of support. Then explain why the Liberal Democrat and Scottish National Party seats fit the named exceptions to Duverger's law rather than disproving it.
Using Table 3, explain why the mandate claim sits on the verdict layer even though the seat count is a fact. Then state the strongest case for first-past-the-post and for proportional representation before you say which persuades you more and why.
Name two limits of this analysis, such as that the table cannot show how people would have voted under a different rule because of the psychological effect, that turnout of 59.7 percent means the shares are of votes cast rather than of all eligible voters, or that one election is not a law about every election, and say how each limit affects what you can conclude.
Choose one and answer it in 3–4 sentences: (a) Which figure in Table 1 would you most want to explain to a friend who thinks the most votes always win the most seats, and why? (b) Which electoral rule would you choose for a new democracy after this workshop, and what is the strongest case against your choice?

Part 6 — AI-Critique Moment

Choose one equal-credit critique route. Route A: ask an approved AI tool to critique your completed work, then check its response against your own evidence. Route B is the no-AI equivalent printed below.

Approved tools: Claude, Gemini, ChatGPT, Grok, Microsoft Copilot.

Prompt to paste:

I've pasted my completed workshop tables above. They show party results from the 2024 UK general election as the House of Commons Library reports them. Please do seven things. First, quote the House of Commons Library's sentence about how low Labour's share of the vote was for a winning party. Second, name a court case that ruled on whether first-past-the-post voting is fair. Third, give me one more statistic that measures how far seats strayed from votes in this election, with its source. Fourth, tell me who first stated Duverger's law, in what book, and in what year. Fifth, tell me whether the result was fair to voters. Sixth, tell me whether Duverger's law guarantees that a plurality country ends up with two parties. Seventh, tell me whether Labour's 411 seats prove that voters gave it a mandate, and label each of the three claims in my Table 3 as empirical or normative.

Test the response for these likely failures:

Chatbots often reword the briefing from memory, for example calling Labour's result the lowest vote share any governing party has ever won, which drops the words that limit the claim.
Chatbots often name a court case, with a confident-looking citation, said to have ruled that plurality voting is unfair or unlawful.
Chatbots often add a disproportionality index value, a turnout figure for one age group, or a percentage of wasted votes, with no checkable source.
Chatbots often credit the two-party tendency of plurality rules to someone else, or give the wrong book or year for it.
Chatbots often declare outright that the result was unfair or that first-past-the-post is undemocratic, or describe one party as having stolen seats, as if the table proved it.
Chatbots often say Duverger's law guarantees two parties, or that the party with the most votes always wins the most seats.
Chatbots often label the mandate claim as empirical because the seat count is a fact, or say the data prove that proportional representation is fairer.

In 3–5 sentences, say what the chatbot got right, quote at least two sentences it got wrong, and correct each one with evidence from the House of Commons Library figures, your tables, or this week's definitions.

Equivalent route (no AI required)

No AI account is required for this workshop. This route assesses the same objectives, Objective 6 (explain American government and political participation — federalism, separation of powers, and the U.S. Constitution as one case of the survey's concepts; parties, elections, and voting systems and their effects; public opinion, polling, political behavior, and the media — reading election and polling data for what it documents and what it does not settle) and Objective 3 (compare the major political ideologies and normative theories evenhandedly — liberalism, conservatism, socialism and its family, and the smaller families; justice, liberty, equality, and rights; the harm principle; Rawls and Nozick — stating each position in its strongest form and distinguishing empirical from normative claims), takes comparable effort of about the same 90 minutes, uses the same rubric, and earns the same credit. Instead of the chatbot, critique this flawed analysis, printed here in full: "The House of Commons Library called Labour's result 'the worst vote share any governing party has ever won.' A famous court ruling held that first-past-the-post voting is unconstitutional, and experts give this election a disproportionality score of 46, which proves the result was rigged against small parties. Duverger's law was first stated by James Madison in The Federalist, and it guarantees that every plurality country ends up with exactly two parties. Labour won almost two thirds of the votes, so the party with the most votes always wins the most seats. Labour's 411 seats are a fact, so it is also a fact that voters gave Labour a mandate for every promise, and the data prove that proportional representation is the fairer system." Mark every error you can find, quote at least two, and correct each one in 3–5 sentences with evidence from the House of Commons Library figures, your tables, or this week's definitions. Submit the marked-up analysis and your correction in place of the chatbot report and share link.

Part 7 — What to Submit

All four completed scaffold tables
Written answers to all six analysis questions
The chatbot critique report with its share link, or the equivalent route's marked-up flawed analysis

Deliverable:

A short Political Analysis Workshop report on the 2024 UK general election: four completed tables (the House of Commons Library's party results with your seat shares and gaps, the five data questions, three claims sorted by kind and layer with both sides of the open question, and a critique log), written answers to six analysis questions, and a critique of a chatbot's version of the same analysis, or, on the equivalent route, a marked-up correction of the printed flawed analysis. Submit in any accessible file type or as a link; a recorded response may be submitted as audio or video with a transcript, or as text. Choose how you show it: written answers, a recorded explanation with a transcript, or a labelled chart of seat share beside vote share with short notes; every form is graded by the same scoring criteria.

Rubric

The rubric below shows how each submitted part is evaluated; bands are full, partial, or none.

Workshop evaluation criteria
Criterion	Full	Partial	None
Checking and recording the official figures	Every vote share and seat count in Table 1 is checked against the briefing, the six-party seat total and the seats won by others are reported with the method shown, and the election facts (650 constituencies, plurality rules, turnout) are stated accurately.	Most figures are checked, but one is copied wrongly, the seat total is given without a method, or an election fact is missing.	The figures are not checked, or they are replaced with numbers from memory or a chatbot.
Computing seat shares and gaps	Every seat share and gap is computed correctly from Table 1, gaps are written in percentage points with their sign explained, and vote shares and seat shares are never swapped.	Most seat shares and gaps are right, but one or two contain a slip, or a gap is written as a percent instead of percentage points.	No seat shares or gaps are computed, or vote and seat shares are swapped throughout.
Reading the data with the five questions	All five data questions are answered; the Reform UK and Liberal Democrat contrast is used; the gap is explained by the mechanical effect and geographic concentration; Duverger's law is treated as a tendency with named exceptions; and two real limits are stated with their effect on the conclusion.	Some questions are answered well, but the mechanism is missing, Duverger's law is treated as a guarantee, or only one limit is given.	The data questions are unanswered, or the reading claims the figures prove which rule is fairer.
Critique and correction	The chatbot critique report or the marked-up flawed analysis quotes at least two errors and corrects each with evidence from the House of Commons Library figures, the tables, or this week's definitions; both routes earn this band equally.	The chatbot critique report or the marked-up flawed analysis names an error but corrects it without evidence, or corrects only one; both routes earn this band equally.	No chatbot critique report or marked-up flawed analysis is submitted, or the output is pasted without any check; both routes are scored the same way.
Kind, layer, both sides, and reflection	All three claims in Table 3 are labelled correctly by kind and layer, both sides of the open question are stated fairly, and the chosen reflection option is answered with a reason.	One claim is mislabelled, one side is weakened, or the reflection gives no reason.	No claims are labelled, no side is stated, and no reflection is given.

Quality Gate

Every vote share and seat count in Table 1 matches the House of Commons Library's figures, and the briefing is quoted only in its own words.
Every seat share and gap comes from your own formula or hand calculation from Table 1, never from memory or a chatbot.
A vote share and a seat share are never swapped, and every gap is written in percentage points.
Every claim in Table 3 is labelled by kind and layer, and both sides of the open question are stated as their own defenders would put them.
No court case, statistic, study, or source is invented anywhere in the submission, and no candidate or living politician is named.
No electoral rule is declared fairer as if the figures settled it; the analysis reads the data and hands the verdict back to the reader.
The critique quotes the chatbot or the flawed analysis and corrects at least two errors with evidence.

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