A socio-spatial analysis of voting for political parties at the 2007 federal election

The 2007 federal election in Australia saw voters throw out of office the Howard Coalition Government, which had been in power for more than a decade, and elect the Rudd Labor Government. That represents a fundamental change in Australia's socio-political landscape. This paper provides an analysis of voter support for parties focusing on the disaggregated spatial level of local polling booths. Relationships between votes for political parties for the House of Representatives and the demographic and socio-economic characteristics of populations living in polling booth catchments across all the electorates in Australia are modelled to identify key demographic and socio-political dimensions underlying voter support for political parties