Analysing the voting cluster of political parties: A case study of district Lahore Pakistan (1970-2013)

A voting cluster is a connotation that denotes party loyalty rather than ethnic and social cleavages. The theory of voting cluster surfaces when the units of analysis are characterized by political parties and the voter instead of their nomenclatures. This makes this study significant and different given that it highlights the value of shifting the primary focus away from the nomenclature. With the nomenclature changing in every election, it is likely that political parties, their features, and trajectories are misconstrued. Thus, looking at the voting cluster of each political party and analysing of these clusters data, gathered from different surveys and reports, provide a deeper and accurate understanding of voting patterns. This approach of voting cluster provides us an additional platform for analysis along with the conventional focus on nomenclatures of political parties. Focus of the study is to evaluate the changing pattern of voting clusters and their shift from one party to another. The qualitative content analysis research method has been used to understand the cluster pattern and why a voting cluster make or break from one party to other. The study maintains that there is no standalone factor that helps a political party to sustain a voting cluster.