My new explanation of this is, if you want, a version of path-dependency. Let me explain (short thread)
I had an aha moment at a recent conference, where a very experienced politician said that the current deadlock could only be resolved by a referendum or a general election.
What I found surprising was the mention of a general election. When the audience pointed out that both major parties have the same problem that they are split by Brexit, he conceded rapidly that a GE does not hold out the prospect of help.
The lesson? We tend to turn to the solutions we know. The basically two party system of the UK has always meant when the leadership of one runs into trouble, you turn to the other and voilà: solution found.
This explains quite a lot of what is going on: the calls for a general election. The absence of a LibDem bump. We all trust our habitual solutions to work. Aren’t they tried and tested? Haven’t they served us well for centuries?
I call this the hypothesis of disastrous stability.
