A common perception of the Democratic Alliance is that it has gradually drifted to the ideological right over the last decade. We examined the evidence.

We were curious: has the DA really drifted rightwards over the last decade, as some observers claim?

First, some caveats.

Assessing the DA's ideological positioning over time is not straightforward. For a start, no political party is entirely homogenous: individual members and representatives may hold different views on issues and articulate those in different ways, although they are still bound by the same core values and belief that the party is the best political vehicle to serve the country.

As such, in assessing the evidence, we focused as much as possible on election manifestos, policy papers and statements made in public by the party's federal leader of the time -- rather than utterances by individual MPs or spokespeople.

It is also important to note that the DA's policies are not set by its leaders. A policy team drafts proposals, which are then voted on by delegates at the DA's policy conferences. As such, to refer to "Zille's policies" or "Maimane's manifesto", as we do here, is reductive but operates as shorthand for the leadership era in question -- recognising also that a party's political culture is influenced to at least some degree from the top.

Another aspect to acknowledge is...