Losing Political Office

Based on in-depth interviews conducted with British politicians, this book analyses the different impacts of leaving political office. Representative democracy depends on politicians exiting office, and yet while there is considerable interest in who stands for and gains office, there is curiously little discussed about this process. Jane Roberts seeks to address this gap by asking: What is the experience like? What happens to politicians as they make the transition from office? What is the impact on their partners and family? Does it matter to anyone other than those immediately affected? Are there any wider implications for our democratic system? This book will appeal to academics in the fields of leadership, political science, public management and administration and psychology. It will also be of interest to elected politicians in central, devolved and local government (current and former), policy makers and political commentators, and more widely, the interested general reader.

• Leaving political office
• Political leadership
• Losing elections
• Political psychology
• Retirement
• Role exit
• Redundancy
• British elections
• democracy
• British Politics

“Losing office can be a traumatic experience. Some struggle to come to terms with it, others find new outlets. This book offers insights from the lived experience of a necessarily brutal aspect of democratic politics.” (Prof Paul Burstow PC FRSA, UK)

“A thoughtful, sensitive - and long overdue - exploration of what it really feels like to leave political office and why it matters. Letting go of a cherished role and a deeply valued purpose that have been fundamental to one’s sense of identity is a transition of enormous significance - and here it is laid bare.” (aroness Tessa Jowell, DBE, MP for Dulwich and West Norwood 1992-2015, UK)

 “Elected politicians get little public sympathy when they lose office or their seats. But the adjustment  can be very difficult. Jane Roberts identifies  a genuine problem in a sympathetic and perceptive way and offers responses which should not  only help those who have lost office but also encourage those taking therisk of standing in the first place.” /Peter Riddell, Director, Institute for Government and former chair of the Hansard Society, UK)

“Understanding more about the dynamics of losing political office tells us important things about how democracy works or falters. Politicians like us are people and their reactions to losing are varied but very human. Politics is a business the needs to be designed around the realities of flawed  human nature and this book provides new insights into the democratic process.” (Professor Gerry Stoker, University of Southampton, UK)

• The Open University, United Kingdom

  Jane Roberts

Dame Jane Roberts is Visiting Fellow at The Open University Business School, UK, and a member of the Leadership Research Discussion Group at The Open University Business School. A medical doctor, she continues to practise as an NHS Consultant Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist and she has experience of healthcare management. She was Leader of the London Borough of Camden from 2000 to 2005. She chaired the Councillors Commission for the Department of Communities and Local Government (2007 to 2009) and amongst other roles, she chairs the think tank New Local Government Network. She also was joint editor of The Politics of Attachment (with S. Kraemer).

Policies and ethics