Showing papers in "Political Studies in 1985"

Dominium in Thirteenth and Fourteenth-Century Political Thought and its Seventeenth-Century Heirs: John of Paris and Locke:

Abstract: Dominium, the notion of lordship, underwent important changes during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. An examination of the de potestate regia et papali genre, especially the tract by the D...

Voting Preferences and Attitudes to Public Expenditure

Abstract: Promises to cut taxation and public spending have become central themes in the economic management of the Governments of both Great Britain and the United States of America. Questions arise as to the degree of support for these policies from among the electorate given that the successful implementation of such policies, especially as an election approaches, is in part dependent on such support. Recent survey studies by Lewis’ in Bath and Edgell and Duke2 in Greater Manchester have suggested that preferences for spending are buoyant and that cleavages between the preferences of regular supporters of differing political parties are more pronounced than previously. The present paper examines whether the trends identified by Edgell and Duke, and Lewis, are substantiated by a much larger and comprehensive data base. In the Edge11 and Duke study of 948 respondents from two wards of Greater Manchester, ‘Health’ was the most favoured expenditure (78 per cent wanting more to be spent), followed closely by ‘Education’ (73 per cent). There were major differences between supporters of varying political parties. Some 64 per cent of stable Labour supporters3 wanted more spent on the ‘Welfare State’ (education, social services and health expenditures combined) as opposed to 19 per cent of stable Co.iservatives. Only 16 per cent of stable Labour supporters wanted more spending on ‘Law and Order’ (police and armed forces combined), a figure that rose to 43 per cent for stable Conservatives. In summary the results from the surveys of Edgell and Duke, and Lewis, bear a striking consistency: both record sustained support for favoured items of public expenditure; a marked relationship between party political support and public expenditure preferences and a mirroring of party policy by preference. There are methodological differences between the two studies yet a comparison between them indicates how preferences may have shifted over time. In Lewis’s earlier (1980) study there was majority support for public spending cuts (63 per cent) which was more pronounced among Conservative party supporters (76

Central Coordination and the Policy Network

Abstract: Where responsibility for a public service is divided between the centre and sub-national government, legislative intention is unlikely to match service delivery. This is the implementation gap or c...

On the Degeneration of the Public Sphere

Abstract: The paper interprets C. Wright Mills's distinction between ‘private troubles' and ‘public issues' as indicating both a conceptual and an institutional separation between civil society and the public sphere. It goes on to argue that Habermas's social theory is founded upon the view that ‘distorted communication’ should be analysed within an already institutionalized public space within civil society. Arguments that claim that the public sphere is degenerate on historical or theoretical grounds are rejected. The paper differentiates between pre-institutional and institutional levels of the public sphere and concludes by illustrating this conceptual distinction, first, through a brief discussion of ‘new social movements' and Alain Touraine's actionist sociology, and secondly, through a discussion of natural justice and public inquiries.

Regional Regeneration in Britain: The Territorial Imperative and the Conservative State:

Abstract: The Conservative White Paper on Regional Industrial Development was a frank and belated admission that the geography of relative depression no longer corresponded to the official map of the assiste...

Obedience to Authority in a Laboratory Setting: Generalizability and Context Dependency

Abstract: Social psychologist Stanley Milgram conducted an empirical, laboratory study of obedience to authority. Milgram suggested that his study and findings have applications and implications for the dive...

Contradictions in the Government of Educational Change

Abstract: In the context of declining rolls, contracting resources and mounting youth unemployment, The Department of Education and Science, encouraged by successive Administrations since the mid-1970s, has intervened to direct and restructure education. The paper argues that although there were differences of strategy within the DES there was nevertheless an underlying consensus on policy: to prepare a more vocational curriculum, to rationalize resources, and differentiate opportunities. The Department has claimed that the contradiction between its duty to control education and the powers made available have frustrated its purposes. This paper concludes, however, that the promotion of ideologies and practices of stratification contradict its principal duty to develop through education, individual powers and capacities.

Government Popularity in Great Britain under Conditions of Economic Decline

Abstract: Within the larger field of political economy (as contemporarily defined), one topic of inquiry seems to have elicited more than its share of attention over the course of the past decade. The number of studies aimed at quantifying the (assumed) relationship between macroeconomic conditions and popular support for the governing political parties or chief executives in western nations has blossomed in recent years.’ Commenting on the need for this type of study, Alt notes that the long-standing and well-developed interest by political scientists in the connections between politics and economics

James Mill and Scottish Moral Philosophy

Abstract: Among James Mill's intellectual starting-points were the idea of a conjectural history of moral institutions which he had adopted from Adam Smith and, more especially, John Millar, and the moral philosophy of Dugald Stewart. The reconciliation of these two strands of Scottish 18th-century moral thought is very problematic, but this presented no real difficulty for Mill since conjectural history lost its vital parts at his hands. This emasculation of the Smith–Millar tradition was as necessary for the Benthamite utilitarianism to which Mill was converted as it had been for the Common Sense moral philosophy of Stewart, and from this angle the former can be elucidated by comparison with the latter.

Marital Status, Sex and the Formation of Political Attitudes in Adult Life

Abstract: Little is known about the effect of adult experience on political attitude formation. Recent work on political and social change asks us to take on trust a quantum leap from personality and childho...

The Chinese Political Order after Mao: ‘Socialist Democracy’ and the Exercise of State Power

Abstract: The imperatives of modernization, legitimacy, and a permanent political order have been the major concerns of the Chinese Communist Party since 1976. A central part of the Party's response has been the campaign to promote ‘socialist democracy’. This article examines the formulation of that concept, as well as the prospects for its successful implementation. It suggests that the reforming zeal of many in the higher echelons of the Party's leadership may be more than matched by the bureaucratic conservatism of middle management.

Predictions of Voting Behaviour from a Pre‐election Survey

Abstract: Forecasting the results of an election on the basis of a pre-election poll of opinion is commonplace. Such polls account for a tiny fraction of all surveys conducted, but are publicized and discussed widely; when they get the result wrong, this too is highly visible. This research note examines the validity of traditional voting indicators. Surveys often overestimate the turnout rate, either because the questions used to predict turnout are poor, or because of a defect in sampling. To discover which explanation is more plausible, and to see if this could account for failure in predicting correct proportions of party support, a check was conducted on whether respondents and non-respondents in a single constituency pre-election survey actually voted in the election.

Herbert Spencer: Individualist or Organicist?

Abstract: It has long been assumed by political theorists that there are two opposed characterizations of the state. One is expressed by the individualistic school of thought, in which the individual is prim...

Corporatism, Public Policy and the Labour Movement: A Comparative Study:

Abstract: This article identifies two dimensions which distinguish corporatism, especially as defined by Philippe Schmitter, from pluralism. Noting that most discussions of corporatism have emphasized one di...

The Rise and Decline of Micronationalism in Mainland France

Abstract: The post-war period has seen the development of a number of ‘micronationalist’ movements in the regions of France. These have been based on cultural, economic and political demands. This has led them from a strategy of territorial lobbying to demands for autonomy but the cultural, economic and political strands of the movements have been poorly integrated. In the 1970s, much of the impetus of micro-nationalism was absorbed by the parties of the left which, in the course of the realignment of the party system, were able to accommodate most of their demands. The process is illustrated by an examination of Brittany and Languedoc.

Whatever Happened to Consensus Politics

Abstract: The term ‘consensus politics’ has frequently been used to describe post-war British politics. More recently it appears to have been overtaken by ‘the end of consensus politics’. The first part of this paper examines the different meanings of consensus in British politics, and analyses the concept with reference to the mixed economy and welfare. The second part examines the salient features of the consensus and how they emerged. The third section analyses the forces that have undermined the consensus and the conclusion considers evidence about the nature of the political agenda in the 1980s.

The Rise and Fall of the ‘Soviet Threat’:

Abstract: Between the announcement of the Truman Doctrine in 1947 and the Korean War in 1950, the view that there was a world-wide communist threat became firmly established in the minds of most Americans and many West Europeans. Economically backward and weak though the USSR may have been, many still believed that communism constituted a genuine political, if not military, menace to the West. There were three reasons for this. First, in the years between 1939 and 1949 the world market system had been drastically reduced in size as a result of Soviet expansion into Eastern and Central Europe and the Chinese revolution. Logically, many in the West therefore assumed that the process of decline would continue unless it was halted and contained by a decisive show of strength. Secondly, fears about the USSR were reinforced by the more general crisis of the world system that had begun after World War I and been accelerated by the world depression and World War 11. Because of its apparent ability to develop the productive forces more rapidly than capitalism while guaranteeing full employment, the USSR seemed to offer a real alternative to that which existed in the West. Finally, the fear of the USSR was strengthened by the post-war economic crisis in Western Europe, and the rapid process of imperial disintegration which was taking place in the former European colonies. This, and the increased influence of the communist parties in the world, led American politicians to the conclusion that without decisive action, forces controlled by, or at least sympathetic to the USSR, would take power, or would make it impossible for those in power to rule. As a result of Marshall Aid in 1948 and the formation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1949, political and economic stability returned-at least to Western Europe. However, although the problem of communism passed in the advanced capitalist countries, the strategic notion of the Soviet threat soon became fixed at the centre of American foreign policy.2 The ‘threat’ was to

Peace, Needs and Utopia

Abstract: The well-entrenched minimalist notion of peace has recently been augmented by a notion of positive peace, defined as the absence of structural violence. This paper opens with a critique of Johan Galtung's usage, which conflates ideas better approached separately. It then criticizes the notion of human needs used by Christian Bay as the normative foundation for his idea of positive peace, and by comparing positive peace with Berlin's notion of positive liberty highlights the danger that positive peace might be pursued with direct violence. Despite what Popper argues, the peaceful Utopias of Bay and Galtung need not be pursued with direct violence. However, as they could justify the instrumental use of direct violence, they demand stronger normative foundations than Galtung and Bay have hitherto provided.

The Politics of Nietzsche's Philosophy: Nihilism, Culture and Power

Abstract: This article sketches an approach to what might be called the politics of Nietzsche's philosophy. Taking as its point of departure Nietzsche's diagnosis of nihilism in Western culture, the article aims to show that through his analysis of nihilism Nietzsche raises in an intrinsically political way the philosophical issue of how human agency is possible in an historical world. The methodology Nietzsche follows in constructing the problem provides a second arena of interest for political theory and philosophy. A critical dimension in Nietzsche's thought comparable to Marx's stems from the manner in which he related nihilism—a crisis of power manifest as a failure of self-understanding—to political experiences and reified cultural practices. Finally, the article concludes that Nietzsche could arrive at his overt politics only by combining his critical analysis of nihilism, culture, and power with uncritical assumptions about the modern determinants of nihilism.

The European Community and South Africa: Economic Reality or Political Rhetoric?

Abstract: This article examines the economic and political relationship between the European Community (EC) and the Republic of South Africa (RSA). From the economic perspective, the Community's objective of securing economic independence for the region, trends in EC–RSA trade and the arguments pertaining to mineral dependency are discussed. From the political perspective, Community statements on apartheid are compared with its foreign policy record. In particular, the Code of Conduct for European firms operating in the Republic is analysed within the framework of European Political Cooperation (EPC). The achievements, failures, future role and alternatives to the Code are considered and the limitations imposed by EPC in realizing a collective foreign policy are recognized.

Against Freedom of Expression

Abstract: This paper states a common western ideal of freedom of expression. Such an ideal is tenable, it is argued, only if its implementation makes possible a ‘sound mass communication’. A communication is sound if and only if it prepares the way for growth in knowledge, pluralism, and equality of access to mass media. In today's world, with centralized ownership of mass media, the implementation of the common western ideal of freedom of expression does not prepare the way for knowledge, pluralism, and equality. Hence this ideal of freedom of expression is not tenable. Only if freedom of expression is severely restrained by democratic planning does ‘a sound mass communication’ evolve.

The French Communists under Francois Mitterrand

Abstract: One of the most historically significant aspects of the presidency of Francois Mitterrand was his experiment with Communist participation in his government from June 1981 to July 1984. Mitterrand w...

On Apportionment and Proportional Representation

Abstract: Whatever else may have been in the minds of the early advocates of proportional representation (PR), two notions conceptually related to it must have been among them: (i) there must be a smaller body of persons that can somehow represent a larger body of persons or population, and (ii) the relative frequency or probability of the occurrence of some feature in the population must be roughly identical in the two bodies. Indeed, in one view of democratic representation, it is by virtue of (ii) that the smaller body actually represents the population. The validity of this view hinges very much on the features that should occur with equal probability in the representative body and in the population. Regardless of whether the view is accepted or not, we can immediately observe that (i) deals with the problem of delegating authority or power while (ii) is concerned with the derived problem of at least aprima facie technical nature. This paper focuses on (ii) assuming that the problem related to (i) has been solved, i.e. that we are in a situation where the representative body is about to be established and where there is a general consensus among the population that representation should be proportional. We shall first dwell on a few criteria that have recently been proposed for the evaluation of PR systems. After that we shall argue that in a deeper sense the problem of finding a ‘good’ PR system turns on the very difficult problems of the aggregation of preferences and, in particular, on the way in which the representative body is elected. Moreover, the elected body must also act, that is, make decisions. We shall argue that the way in which decisions are reached in the body also has some bearing on how representative the body is in the sense of PR.

Theory and Practice in Public Policy: the Case of the New Federalism

Abstract: President Reagan's New Federalism has been identified as part of a broad programme of radical reforms based on market-oriented economic and political theories This article tests the extent to whic

Civil Disobedience and Punishment

Abstract: The renaissance of the protest movement against nuclear weapons in Europe has witnessed a renaissance in civil disobedience as a form of political action. Peace protesters trespass on Ministry of Defence property, damage fencing, obstruct traffic. Trade unionists and local councillors, meanwhile, contemplate campaigns of civil disobedience as a response to industrial relations and local government legislation. Civil servants, even, embark on civil disobedience when they leak government documents to the press or Members of Parliament.' Such instances as these raise again important questions concerning the nature and justification of civil disobedience. One issue, in particular, which will be considered here concerns the relationship between civil disobedience and punishment: if an agent is prepared to engage in acts of civil disobedience should he also be prepared to accept punishment for his disobedience and, further, is punishment for disobedience morally justified?2

The Expedience of Tradition: Ireland, International Organization and the Falklands Crisis

Abstract: The Fianna Fáil Government of Charles Haughey adopted a publicly conspicuous position of independence during the Falklands crisis of April–June 1982. Mr Haughey defended the departure from European Community solidarity and the active role in the UN Security Council on the grounds of ‘traditional neutrality’ while his critics accused him of opportunism and improvisation for domestic political advantage. The sharp deterioration in Anglo-Irish relations caused by the episode has not proved lasting. Nor has there been any significant change in Ireland's overall international relations.

Reproduction and Development: a Case for a ‘Darwinian’ Mechanism in Marx'sTheory of History

Abstract: An attempt is made to meet the criticism that G. A. Cohen's functional interpretation of Marx's theory of history fails for lack of a causal mechanism to explain how functional consequences occur. It is argued that Marx's work contains rudiments of a ‘Darwinian’ mechanism of historical selection, by which those production relations survive that best ensure reproduction of the productive forces. This necessitates the abandonment of Cohen's implausible ‘scarcity thesis’.

Cohen and Lukes on Rights and Powers

Abstract: If the conceptual distinction between ‘base’ and ‘superstructure’ cannot be maintained, then clearly, Marx’s theory of history loses coherence, since if these are indistinct, it is invalid to affirm a systemic causal connection between them.‘ In the 1859 Preface to A Critique of Political Economy Marx refers to ‘property relations’ as the ‘legal expression’ of the relations of production? But it is arguable that the identification of the superstructure as a distinct ‘level’ of the social totality, which is located ‘above’ the relations of production, is confounded by the use of legal terms (property ownership/non-ownership) to define production relations. I f the law is implicated in economic relations how can the base/superstructure distinction be maintained? Cohen3 offers a solution to this problem which involves the elimination of legal terms from the description of production relations, so that ‘property relations’ (assigned to the superstructure) are distinguishable from ‘production relations’ (assigned to the base). This is accomplished by conceptualizing ownership as the enjoyment of ‘rights’ over productive forces/persons, and by identifying as constitutive of production relations effective ‘powers’ which normally correspond to ownership ‘rights’. Steven Lukes has, more recently, subjected Cohen’s analysis to close s c r ~ t i n y . ~ Lukes argues that, since the imputation of powers to persons involves an inescapably normative element, an objective description of the economic structure is impossible. This allegedly undermines Cohen’s rightslpowers distinction. In what follows it will be argued that Lukes’s critique of Cohen is unconvincing.5 That rights and powers are distinct, Cohen argues, is demonstrated by their possible divergence. The possession of ‘effective powers’ does not entail the possession of the appropriate rights, nor vice versa. A power may be either

Lindblom, Wildavsky and the Role of Support

Abstract: Lindblom's and Wildavsky's central concern with the relationship between intellectual matters and government is discussed in terms of a theory of support bargaining. The pursuit of support is held to dictate both the emergence of ideas and the process of government. Any independence of intellectual ideas from social advancement is seen as attained by structuring of the support-bargaining process to make ‘fact-forming’ groups in some degree independent of those who use the facts. Lindblom's and Wildavsky's theories concerning budget strategies, incrementalism and policy analysis are considered in relation to the theory of support bargaining.