Marginal seat
Oxford Dictionary of Politics:
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marginal seat
A constituency in which the distribution of party support is relatively evenly balanced so that the incumbent party has a narrow majority and a small net movement of voters will lead to its changing hands. In many constituencies, the socio-economic make-up of the electorate is such as to permanently skew support to one political party, and incumbents have substantial majorities which are normally unassailable by challengers. Such one-party ‘safe’ seats predominate in many political systems, in which case the outcomes of elections are decided in the ‘marginals’, the often small number of seats in which there are genuine prospects of partisan change. For this reason, the parties tend to concentrate their campaigning efforts on wooing voters in marginal constituencies, and the latter also attract especial attention from the opinion polls. It may be noted that seats can, of course, shift between the ‘marginal’ and ‘safe’ categories reflecting population movements, boundary changes, and political realignments.
— Stan Taylor
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Marginal seat
"Swing seat" redirects here. For the piece of playground furniture, see Swing (seat).
A marginal seat or swing seat is a constituency held with a small majority in a legislative election, generally one conducted under a single-winner voting system. In Canada, they may be known as target ridings. The opposite is a safe seat.
These seats only require a small swing to change hands and therefore are typically the focus of most campaign resources. The concentration of money and manpower in areas where they will make the most difference is known as targeting.
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Strategies for securing swing seats
The creation of policy that will benefit a particular seat, at the expense of other taxpayers, is known as pork barreling. [1]
Political parties often face tension between the holders of marginal seats and safe seats. Safe seats tend to be allocated far less discretionary resources—governmental as well as political—from their political party than do marginal seats.
A similar phenomenon happens in United States presidential elections, where the Electoral College system means that candidates must win states rather than votes. Again, resources are concentrated towards the swing states with the smallest majorities.
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Oxford Dictionary of Politics
The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Politics. Copyright © 1996, 2003 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.
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