British Politics
| Published date | 01 March 1991 |
| Date | 01 March 1991 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9248.1991.tb00589.x |
| Subject Matter | Book Notes |
Political Studies
(1991),
XXXIX,
168-233
Book
Notes
British Politics
Andrew Adonis,
Parliament Today
(Manchester,
Manchester
University
Press,
1990),
viii
+
194
pp.,
L19.95
ISBN
0
7190 3082
X,
f4.95
pbk
ISBN
0
7190 3083 8.
Andrew Adonis’s book is hailed as an ‘invaluable’ and ‘essential’ guide to those wishing to
understand Parliament. It contains chapters examining the role, structure and day-to-day workings
of both the Commons and the Lords and addresses the issue
of
the effectiveness
of
MPs and peers and
the extent to which Parliament is adapting
vis-u-vis
the European Community. It concludes with a
chapter entitled ‘Whither Parliament?’ in which the author addresses the question of the reform of
Parliament, both its likelihood and possible specific proposals.
In taking this approach Adonis has written an interesting, even thought-provoking book.
However, it is a long way from being ‘essential’ reading for students of British politics, for it
suffers from two distinct disadvantages. First, the text is not only at times poorly written, but also
much of the analysis contained within it is muddled. In addition, the text contains a number of factual
errors. The second disadvantage is the author’s apparent belief in a need to challenge conventions
merely for the sake of challenging them, perceiving this
as
some kind of measurement
of
academic
virility.
In short, the study is diminished in value by the author’s failure to see beyond the superficial and his
own all too apparent preconceptions, factors which detract from what he
is
actually attempting to
outline, which, shed of these, would have made for a worthwhile study.
NICHOLAS D.
J.
BALDWIN
U’roxron
Coilege
of
Fuirleigh
Dickinson
Universify
Clifford Boulton (ed.),
Erskine May’s Treatise
on
the Law, Privileges, Proceedings and
Usage
of
Parliament
(London, Butterworth, 21st edn,
1989),
xliv
+
1,079
pp.
€80.00
ISBN
0
406 11471 4.
It was the late Sir Kenneth Pickthorn who said that procedure was the only constitution the poor
Briton had. If that is
so,
Britain has an extraordinarily large constitution. Recent editions of
Erskine
May
have been notable for their size and, indeed, their frequency: this is the third edition in
13
years.
Our
‘constitution’ is not as static as some observers appear to believe.
Erskine
Muy
constitutes essentially a well-ordered compilation of parliamentary rules and
precedent. Contrary to popular belief, it is not definitive. It is, though, unique and an essential (albeit
not sufficient) source for anyone wishing to understand how Parliament goes about its business. The
latest edition (the first was published in
1844)
updates the previous edition and a number of chapters
have been modified
or
substantially rewritten; the revised Standing Orders of the House of Commons
have, extremely helpfully, been included in an appendix.
As
a sizable
-
and expensive
-
work of reference, this volume will attract few individuals as
purchasers. It should nonetheless be within reach of all serious students of Parliament.
PHILIP NORTON
University
of
Hull
0032-3217/91/01/0168-66/$03.00
0
1991
Political Studies
Book
Notes
169
Rodney Brazier,
Constitutional Texts: Materials on Government and the Constitution
(Oxford, Oxford University
Press,
1990), xvi
+
622
pp.,
E45.00 ISBN
0
19
876246
1,
$35.00
pbk
ISBN
0
19
876245
3.
Rodney Brazier’s
Constitutional Texts
is an essential bedtime book for all British government
specialists. It is a companion work to his recent book on constitutional practice- ‘practice’ being here
treated as a broader term than ‘convention’ and embracing both legal and conventional
rules
that
regulate the constitution of central government. The scope is thus somewhat narrower than that of
Colin Turpin’s collection of texts, cases and materials on the constitution. About halfthe book in fact
deals at length with the Cabinet and prime minister, the rest covering ministers, the Crown,
Parliament and the judiciary.
A
wide sweep has been made through ministerial memoirs which are
used to give politicians’-eye accounts of many of the well and
less
well remembered episodes and
personalities that have shaped the lore and custom
of
our
constitution
-
Dugdale at Crichel Down,
Crossman at the Cabinet, Profumo at Cliveden, Fagan at Buckingham Palace. Members of Charter
88, eager to get on and give the United Kingdom a written documentary constitution, will find this an
essential working tool. It will probably persuade them to give up the job altogether. But they can
always lie back and enjoy the read. GEOFFREY MARSHALL
Queen’s College,
Ox
ford
Peter Catterall (ed.),
Contemporary Britain: an
Annual
Review
1990
(Oxford, Basil
When a number of years ago
I
took my degree at Oxford in Modern History (the period in fact ended
in
1878!),
there was no equivalent year-by-year record of events to which one could turn for reference.
If there had been one’s work would have been both less laborious and more factually accurate.
This 1990 edition of
Contemporary Britain
runs to
484
pages, and to have kept it to
so
moderate a
length could only be achieved by a determined effort to eliminate the inessential. Whether all the
decisions
to
this end will turn
out
to have been right only future historians can decide. Certainly
to
a
contemporary
it
does seem that this volume deals with everything that matters. ‘Contemporary
history’ is basically a contradiction in terms. What this book sets out to do, and in my judgement very
largely succeeds, is to assemble what seem to be the significant facts about happenings in this country
in 1989. Some of these will be seen by future historians as major events; many will be forgotten. They
will be very much affected by the two outside events referred to by Peter Catterall in his introduction.
These are, of course, the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe, and the moves in Western
Europe towards the unification of the EC in 1992. What is left for anybody’s guess today is the likely
effect of the first of these on the second. Those responsible for the volume published in 1994 about
1993 will have much that is now unforeseeable to record.
Blackwell, 1990), xvii
+
484
pp.,
f35.00 ISBN
0
631 17237 8.
BOY D-CARPENTER
House
of
Lords
J.
C.
D.
Clark (ed.),
Ideas and Politics
in
Modern Britain
(Basingstoke, Macmillan, 1990),
This collection of
I5
essays has been assembled by Jonathan Clark to illustrate some of the relations
between theoretical arguments and practical politics in Britain during the past decade
or
so.
More
explicitly, it is about the impact of the ideas of the New Right.
The quality and scale of the contributions varies substantially. Amongst the more stimulating
chapters is a vigorous defence of the nation and national identity by Roger Scruton, an interesting but
somewhat perplexed consideration of the tensions generated by individualism in a market order by
John Gray, some stimulating reflections on theology, philosophy and politics by Stephen Grover, and
a sharp and well-informed critique of the evolution
of
the educational system since the early
1960s
by
Adrian Wooldridge. There are a few other plums in this pie, but also,
it
must be said, some offerings
xiii
+
271
pp.,
f40.00
ISBN
0
333 51550
1,
E14.99
pbk
ISBN
0
333 51551
X.
170
Book Notes
which are sketchy and in some cases rather too tendentious. This reflects a problem of which
I
am
sure
the editor is aware. When constructing
a
book like this, it is difficult to reconcile reasonably
dispassionate analysis of ideas and their political impact with contributions to the ongoing
ideological debate itself. Many of the authors here have in varying degrees contributed to New
Right thinking, and not surprisingly some feel the itch to carry their commitments forward
on
this
occasion too.
So
what we have in the outcome is an uneasy compromise between two contrasting
styles. NEVlL JOHNSON
Nufield College. Oxford
Keith Cowling
and
Roger Sugden (eds),
A
New Economic Policy in Britain: Essays
on
the
Development
of
Industry
(Manchester, Manchester University
Press,
1990),
vi
+
217
pp., f29.95
ISBN
0
7190
3270
9,
f9.95
pbk
ISBN
0
7190 3271 7.
When
I
was a lad you knew where you stood with the Labour Party and its view of industry: ‘public
sector good; private sector bad’. Now, as this book demonstrates, things aren’t as simple as they once
appeared to be either for industry
or
for the Labour Party. This collection of essays, written by
leading academic members of the Industrial Strategy Group which made detailed submissions to
Labour’s recent policy review, is designed to present non-technical analyses of the policies needed to
revive British industry in the
1990s.
Overall the essays are remarkably well intentioned, clearly
written and reveal the extent of innovatory thinking in the Labour Party.
The essays embroider the themes to be found in the recent statements of policy from the Labour
review. In
so
doing they reveal the extent
of
institutional innovation required to ‘assist’ industry: a
revamped and reorganized DTI, a Strategic Planning Agency, a National Investment Bank, a State
Holding Company, regional and local enterprise boards, and a Transnational Unit. The guiding
principle behind the new institutional framework, however, appears to be that the state should
‘intervene and regulate on the basis that
it
represents non-sectional interests’ (p.
55).
When
I
was a lad
in working-class South Yorkshire such a benign view of the state passed as political naivety!
DAVID JUDGE
Strath>lyde University
G.
F.
Dudley and
J.
J.
Richardson,
Politics and Steel in Britain,
1967-1988:
the
Life
and
Times ofthe British Steel Corporation
(Aldershot, Dartmouth Publishing, 1990), xii
+
31
1
pp., f35.00
ISBN
1
85521 072
X.
Although confining themselves to the political development
of
the steel industry in Britain the
authors have undertaken the difficult,
if
not impossible, task of describing in roughly
300
pages, the
consolidation of the
14
privately owned companies into the nationalized British Steel Corporation in
1967
and subsequently to the privatized British Steel, including the period
of
direction by the ECSC
through MMs Davignon and Narjes.
Although there is little to find fault with factually, the conclusions inferred are not always as
unambiguous
or
as clear cut as is made out. Governments and their promoted adherents at
ministerial level (and
I
had
19
in
10
years) do speak with forked and differing tongues (such as Benn
and Varley); and chairmen and their boards are not immune from comparable double talk when they
have to decide policy on confusing and changing situations and advice from differing relevant
sources. The book is worth reading but there is insufficient discussion
on
the impact of the
considerable technological change on policy; the reduced strength of the trade unions following
redundancy, the strike of
1980
and legal restrictions
(I
had
29
differing organizations to deal with);
and the growth of foreign competitive steel making in Japan, Korea and South America (to name a
few which are not mentioned). MONTY FINNISTON
Former Chairman, British Steel Corporation
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