Abstract

In May 2010 the Green Party of England and Wales made history when party leader Caroline Lucas won the Brighton Pavilion seat in the UK-wide Westminster election. The victory demonstrated that a niche party could win wider support in a first-past-the-post electoral system. Green Party of Canada (GPC) strategists jumped on the Lucas bandwagon, emailing GPC e-newsletter subscribers, calling for donations so that their leader might emulate Lucas (interview with Cantin 2010). The Scottish Green Party (SGP) said the victory ‘changes everything’, providing an excellent platform for the 2011 Scottish parliamentary election (Scottish Green Party 2010a). The SGP and GPC reactions may suggest they were consolidating base support through standard political communications methods, or – viewed through a political marketing lens – may reveal an attempt by either party to rework their niche appeal, using the Lucas victory for political validation.