ABSTRACT
Party members are typically drawn from a narrow social group. The question for this chapter is whether the sudden and unexpected rise in membership of the SNP and Scottish Greens changed the profiles of the parties. The chapter introduces key ideas from a literature on political representation and then examines the perspectives of interviewees on how the surge might have changed the parties. Survey data are then used to provide a detailed picture of the demographic and socio-economic backgrounds of the members. The chapter provides evidence of some change within the memberships but not enough to challenge traditional patterns of under-representation of key groups.
