Author Archives: admin

Economic justice requires more independence, not less

Posted on by
Reply

By Dr Jason Edwards

A republican economy should aim at maximising the genuine independence of economic actors. Only then can corruption be tackled at the root.

In part this essay is a response to Stuart White’s call in his introduction to the Democratic Wealth series to challenge the relevance of republican ideas for thinking about how to build a citizens’ economy. I will first point to a significant potential weakness in contemporary republican political theory. There is a danger in the republican view of non-domination, namely the failure to recognise in relation to a republican economic order that it is necessarily an order of power.

Continue reading this post at openDemocracy.

(Local) Information is power? Localism and local transparency

Posted on by
Reply

Dr Benjamin Worthy reflects on the Centre’s recent seminar on localism and local transparency.

One of the Coalition’s flagship transparency policies is now in place. Every local authority in England is publishing all their spending over £500 (see an example local authority here). Some are also publishing a host of other information from salaries to contracts and grants. Our seminar on Thursday discussed how this is developing and what impact it may have on the future.

In late September 2012 the Local Government Association surveyed 128 local authorities to find out what was happening (see here). The first finding was that everyone is publishing spending data, though there is variation in other information being published; 100% of councils that responded published spending data, 96% published salaries but only 54% published details of grants to community groups. There are also various strategies with which this links up – some authorities link it to FOI policy or communication, though some to none at all.

In terms of use, it seems that there is very little public interest as yet, with a sense there was no ‘demand’ for the data. The information is still seen as too ‘raw’ and is not yet useful, localised or contextualised enough to attract or interest local people. Local authorities indicated the biggest impact of the data had been to increase their accountability, with 80% feeling it helped ‘external accountability’ with the added benefit, from 50 % of those asked, of reducing the volume of FOI requests.

Discussion in the seminar focused on the ‘Armchair Auditors’; the idea, championed by Eric Pickles, that citizens will be the new auditors of their own authorities. Though there are some appearing, it may take time, particular skills and a certain enthusiasm (and stubbornness) to become one and not everyone is convinced. See this example and an interesting comment here.

However, one of the most important developments is not the data local authorities are releasing but the innovations. This can be developments such as Chris Taggart’s Openly Local where you can assess council spending at the push of a button or the wonderful ‘Where Does My Money Go’.

Data also becomes more useful when data is linked to other data. The survey points to some emerging use by community groups and other public bodies, with a great deal of interest in further ‘joining up’ of information across bodies and council boundaries and in the pushing of more innovative developments.

The future is likely to lie with initiatives such as this DCLG experiment where different kinds of data can be linked and made relevant, both for people and policy-makers themselves. These initiatives can move in many unexpected directs from prescription analysis that can save money to this amazing site in India, recommended by an audience member, which enables citizens to report who they paid a bribe to. The future of data is local, linked and may be unexpected.

Thank you to everyone who took part.

Reflections on Thatcher

Posted on by

By Dr Benjamin Worthy

The discussion following the death of Margaret Thatcher has quickly moved from a fragile peace to a divisive debate (see these ambiguous local press headlines). I don’t remember much about Thatcherism but I have vague memories, as Russell Brand wonderfully put it, of a woman on the TV telling people off and constantly saying no.

Having taught British politics I find it fascinating to see the differences between myth and reality in leaders from across time. Thatcher appears to be one leader who will be as wrapped in myth and controversy as Churchill. As Richard Vinen points out his great book on Thatcher, both left and right had an interest in creating a straw Thatcher, a repository of virtue or evil. Added to this, academics, supporters and others, including Thatcher herself, have piled on further layers of mystique. Her comments about there being ‘no such thing as society’, for example, are quoted out of context while her comments about immigration in 1978 are often forgotten.

Take Thatcher’s background as the famous ‘grocer’s daughter’. As Simon Jenkin’s (see a good article here) and biographer John Campbell argue in their works on Thatcher, Alderman Roberts was an important local politician – but Grantham gave her a ‘hinterland’ and an ‘outsider’ story to tell. More importantly the ‘outsider’ Thatcher developed her real contacts at that most establishment of places Oxford, where she gained the friendships that eventually found her a seat. An outsider perhaps but with at least one foot firmly in the establishment.

More interesting is Thatcher as a politician. Her portrait as an ideology driven ‘wrecker’ needs to be qualified. Vinen is not certain she ever read any of the ‘classic’ texts that were supposed to have inspired Thatcherism or that she regarded them as anything more than ‘polish’ (though this is not to underestimate her formidable intellect). Nor was she the first to privatise parts of government or acknowledge the financial arrangements were unsuitable-the prize for both of these goes to her ‘socialist’ predecessor. Her golden rule of politics was said to have been ‘always leave yourself a way out’ – not a very Thatcher thing to say.

As a politician Thatcher is seen as a model conviction politician. But, as John Major and Jon Snow both tried to point out, the same Thatcher signed the Single European Act of 1986 and agreed the Anglo-Irish Agreement. Her privatisation began slowly and she backed away from reforming the NHS or privatising the Post Office. Only when she truly became an ideologue did she lose power.

Vinen highlights her famous 1988 Bruges Speech, seen now as the founding moment of the UK Eurosceptic movement in Britain, as one of the most misunderstood parts of her career. As a statement of Euroscepticism it leaves a lot to be desired. Parts of the speech are very pro-European, peppered with phrases such as ‘And let me be quite clear…Britain does not dream of some cosy, isolated existence on the fringes of the European Community. Our destiny is in Europe, as part of the Community’-she even begins the speech with a gentle joke about her supposed ‘anti-European’ views.

Even Thatcher’s ‘iron resolution’ over the Falklands war may not be all that it seemed-these papers from the National Archives reveal Thatcher open to the idea of a negotiated settlement (borrowing from Churchill again who said ‘jaw jaw is always better than war’).

The most confusing aspect is her legacy, which can be less a verdict and more an on-going debate. Thatcherism shaped the views of what the state, the economy and society should do. In 2004 this all seemed to have been settled. Post 2007 light touch approaches to banking and food safety seem more questionable.

Thatcher herself spoke of her key achievements as being variously the creation of Tony Blair or the changing of ‘values’ and ‘common sense’. None of these take us very far in understanding what it was Thatcherism did. The difficulty is that debate is on two levels. One level we can (and are) discussing economic and social changes Thatcherism created. On this one I broadly agree with Ken Livingstone’s assessment.

But on another level, the argument is about something harder to define-this may be what Thatcher meant about ‘values’. Both left and right believe Thatcher did something less tangible. To the right Thatcher made Britain ‘great’ again as Cameron said, saving us from a terminal sort of ‘spiritual’ as well as economic decline-though some interesting and much debated research points to 1976, that year of terrible economic crisis, as being the time when the UK was ‘happiest’. To the left Thatcher ‘broke’ something about Britain and what Alexei Sayle called her ‘prejudice wrapped up as policy’ destroyed something worth keeping- a sense of community as difficult to measure as happiness.

The events of the last few days have showed that she has one unarguable legacy. Her idol Winton Churchill spent much of his life a divisive and contrary figure but, a year shy of his 70 birthday, transformed into a figure of national unity and ‘the saviour of his country’ (as a very left wing historian said). By contrast Thatcher, who claimed quoting St Augustine she sought unity, has left division and conflict.

Dr Benjamin Worthy is a lecturer in politics at Birkbeck.

Why parties need to change, but not too much

Posted on by

Parties need to adapt to the changing ways in which people engage in politics, but they must also challenge  individualised consumerist politics and provide a platform for collective decision-making and accountability.

By Dr Danny Rye, Writer and Associate Lecturer at Birkbeck College

In a recent article for Labour Uncut, Peter Watt – a former General Secretary of the Labour Party – argued that traditional political parties are under threat.  Parties need to wake up to how the ways in which people engage (or not) with politics have changed.  In particular, parties need to use social media platforms to engage with members of the public beyond the narrow confines of a community of politicians or activists.  They need to seek invitations into and meet people in their worlds rather than making ‘clumsy attempts’ to entice them into traditional political settings.

This would require no less than a revolution, not just in the way that political parties engage with the outside world, but also how they are organised: for example becoming ‘flatter’, more ‘networked’, a new kind of ‘cyber party’ using web-based technologies to build relationships directly with voters.  This perhaps means departing from out-dated notions of ‘membership’ which suited the age of the mass class-based party, but is out of step with political engagement in the contemporary world (indeed, the Labour Party may have taken an important step towards this already with the launch last year of the Labour Supporters Network).

On the face of it, this is a sensible thing for parties to do.  Since the heyday of two party politics, we have undergone a social revolution.  People do not feel they need to be committed traditional political parties anymore: the social role they used to play has long been lost to the market (which is a problem all social institutions like churches, clubs and societies have faced) and allegiances based on class have dissolved, being replaced by a more fragmented identity politics, or by brands and consumer-oriented niche interests.  Similarly, political activity and commitments have shifted into the increasingly crowded market-place of single issue causes (like conservation or aid) and specialised interests, or relatively spontaneous ‘grass-roots’ campaigns such as those organised by 38 Degrees or Occupy.  In short, no one has to submit to the disciplines of party life because one can pick and choose which causes to support with no need for messy compromise or accommodation.

Underlying all this is a consumerist ideology, in which ‘free’ individuals make rational decisions based on their interests and desires.  The modern consumer-citizen can expect to get what she wants when she wants it, with little concern for ‘collective’ or ‘class’ interest, which belong to the drab paternalistic world of the past.  And if people do not need political parties to meet their interests, then all they are is a means by which the powerful and those that wish to join them seek to dominate others.  Why, then, should anyone else want to participate in them?  Indeed, why should parties as we know them even exist in a world where everyone potentially has their own platform?

I would argue that parties must have a future if representative democracy is to remain healthy.  Yes, they must change and adapt to the world as it is, but they must also provide a challenge to the individualistic and atomised politics, which ultimately lead to politics being dominated by remote elites.  Thus, any attempt to meet and engage people in ‘their worlds’ must not be to the detriment of three crucial roles that parties have to different degrees played (and should continue to play) in representative democracies.

Firstly, parties provide a structure for collective political activity and expression which individualised media and fragmented causes cannot.  In particular, the party provides an arena for debate and a system for making and influencing policy.  It provides clear rules and procedures and a context of shared values that gives focus and meaning to the process and its outcomes, even if that outcome is not the one desired by all participants.  Party members and activists I have interviewed as part of my own research have talked about how much they have valued being able to contribute to debates, even when they knew they would probably not get their way.  In attempting to attract more support, parties must not lose sight of this.  It is something that the fragmented politics of single issues and social media cannot offer.

Meeting the demands of all the fragmented competitive interests in society is impossible and  dividing people up into specific causes and atomised voices undermines the ability of people to act collectively.  If we cannot act collectively we run the risk of becoming dominated by those that can, or who do not need to: that is, ever more remote political elites and the powerful interest groups lobbying for a small slice of the policy pie. This leads the individual even less able to influence the context and content of politics, despite the opportunities they have to express their opinions and pursue their desires.  Parties can play an important role in educating people to understand this and providing them with a platform that is effective because it is collective.

Secondly, parties can and should provide some kind of ‘linkage’ between those that seek to govern and the generality of voters.  This, many would argue, is precisely the reason they must change.  However, the quality of this linkage is crucial too:  it is vital that action designed to make parties more ‘accessible’ and ‘relevant’ avoids the danger of hollowing them out even further.  Providing a more direct transmission belt between party representatives and the public could be an important act of ‘democratisation’ but the danger is that it bypasses the organised, collective power of a membership and replaces it with an uneven relationship between an elite with all the advantages and resources and a series of fragmented voices with no collective authority or power.  A democratic party organisation can supply that collective authority to speak to and challenge elites which a ‘network’ cannot.

Vibrant political parties that engage with supporters and give them real power can be vital to ensuring that the needs of real communities are reflected in the policy process, in other words to ensure that parties remain rooted in the places in which people live.  Of course, that means branching out into online communities too.  But however parties respond to the challenges of modern life, they must attempt to engage people not only by meeting them in their worlds on their terms, but also by challenging the atomisation of consumerist politics and drawing people into a greater sense of collective life.  Social media is part of this and must be used to help bring it about, but the medium must not become the message and it must not end up driving politics in a direction which is even more atomised and unequal.

This brings me to the third reason why so-called ‘traditional’ parties remain important:  stable, healthy party organisations with meaningful accountability mechanisms are a crucial check on overmighty leaders.  In our political system, parties are the means by which leaders are selected and their support sustained.  Whereas in some systems, parties are vehicles for leaders and can be discarded when they are no longer of use, here leaders are arguably vehicles for parties.  Thus they can be removed if they become detached, remote, or a threat to the political or electoral health of the party.  ‘Network’ parties in which political leaders communicate directly with the voters may allow leaders to circumvent the need for an active and powerful membership base whilst at the same time appearing to be more ‘democratic’.  This may make them more politically nimble and even more responsive to the public in some sense, but without proper structures of accountability and powers of recall, parties may be little more than empty brands, engaged with individuals on a superficial level: surfing the mood of the mass whilst providing no means to check the power of leaders and replace them from time to time.

Thus, in summary, whilst I agree with Peter Watt that parties must adapt to new realities, this must not be a pretext for abandoning the democratic role that old-fashioned organisations can play.  I do not suggest that parties as they are now perform these roles perfectly and at times there have been worrying indications that parties are responding to problems like membership decline by attempting to undermine the basis for it.

Parties are collective organisations trying to survive in an individualised age.  They are hierarchical broadcasters in an era of networks and interactive social media.  But whilst they must adapt to these changing modes of communication and engagement, they need to do so in such a way that provides a challenge to the individualism and atomisation that poses very real dangers to democracy.

E-mail:  d.rye@pol-soc.bbk.ac.uk / follow Danny on Twitter @dannyrye

 

Taming the PM?

Posted on by

By Ben Worthy and Mark Bennister

The classic essay question asks: what are the powers of the Prime Minister? Graham Allen’s Political and Constitutional Reform Select Committee has been wrestling with this issue since 2011. The driving force for this debate can be traced back to the 2003 parliamentary debate on the war in Iraq. There is recognition now that any prime minister would find it impossible to commit troops in similar circumstances without a substantive vote in favour in the House. Codifying the prime minister’s war making powers has never made it to the statute books, but maybe it should as an additional safeguard to convention. We now have fixed term parliaments, a Cabinet Manual, a Coalition Agreement and a more formalised cabinet system under this coalition government. Why not fix the Prime Minister’s power in law too?

In evidence to the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee Mark Bennister cautioned against codification. Prime Ministers gain power from a range of sources, both formal and informal. It is not only the institutional resources associated with leading the executive that empower a Prime Minister, but also the ‘skill in context’ or ability to shape situations to the leader’s advantage. Personal is indeed political. A dynamic and charismatic figure, whilst clearly not imperial in parliamentary democracies can stretch resources to support and enhance predominance. Michael Pinto-Duschinsky, also giving evidence, argued that the Prime Minister needed more partisan resources to do the job.

Mark Bennister warned against direct prime ministerial election, a particular interest of the Committee Chair. The only case of direct prime ministerial elections political scientists have to study occurred in Israel from 1996 to 2000. This form of presidential parliamentarianism or ‘presidentarianism’ proved a disaster, causing fragmentation of the party system and sclerosis as the prime minister’s position was weakened. The experiment was quickly shelved.

There are however perhaps better areas for reform and greater clarity. Prime Minister’s Questions could certainly do with an overhaul. It may be great political fun, but longer sessions with supplementary questions may reduce the Punch and Judy aspect. The Liaison Committee which questions the Prime Minister twice a year could meet more frequently with fewer members to provide a more focused and forensic probing. Another option could see an investiture vote in the Commons to confirm a new Prime Minister in post. Such a shift to positive parliamentarianism would locate the Prime Minister firmly within the legislature.

Does comparative research in this area help? In most countries we find ambiguity surrounding the role and powers of the prime minister. In Australia the Prime Minister is not even mentioned in the written constitution. Cabinet formality is stronger and more structured in Australia, but on Iraq John Howard could boldly state that it was ‘an executive decision’ to commit troops. However as Kevin Rudd and Bob Hawke found to their cost, Australian Prime Ministers remain in post at the gift of heir parliamentary parties and can be removed swiftly if the numbers in the party room or caucus swing against them. By contrast in Japan the Prime Minister is written into the constitution with their powers mapped. But this is no guarantee of stability; since 2006 Japan has had 7 Prime Ministers.

As Machiavelli would perhaps point out, codification may clarify but it is political power that counts.

Dr Ben Worthy is a lecturer in the Department of Politics at Birkbeck, University of London. Dr Mark Bennister is a Lecturer in Politics at Canterbury Christ Church University. He was previously a Teaching Fellow in British Politics at UCL, based in the Constitution Unit.

Poor Women’s Representation – ‘Shocking But Not Surprising’ – Don’t Blame the Women

Posted on by

By Dr Rosie Campbell and Professor Sarah Childs

Women’s under representation in Parliament has well and truly hit the headlines: Samantha Cameron isn’t happy about it; job-shares are suggested as the new solution; the Lib Dems face allegations of sexual harassment; and the 2013 Sex and Power Report confirms the ‘shocking’ but not surprising absence of women from public life.

Enough is enough, the recommendations of the 2008-10 Speaker’s Conference should be implemented immediately: it’s time for legislative sex quotas.

Party leaders have said it before, and no doubt they’ll say it again:

“… political parties… need to actively go out and encourage women to join in, to sign up, to take the course, to become part of the endeavour” – David Cameron

The problem is that exhorting women to participate in politics will not address the ‘scandalous’, as Cameron also put it, under-representation of women at Westminster. Men are nearly 80% of MPs; women are not even half-way to equal presence. Labour does the best with a third of its MPs female. The Tories at 16% come second, more than doubling their number in 2010. The Lib Dems trail in last, at just 12%, with fewer women candidates and MPs in 2010 than in 2005. The situation is depressingly familiar at other levels of government. Despite Nordic levels of women’s representation when first created, overall trends in Scotland and Wales are of stalling or falling numbers with campaigners there calling for legislative quotas too.

The reasons why fewer women seek parliamentary selection need addressing and greater diversity is required overall, but the most pressing problem is not that women aren’t putting themselves forward but that the parties fail to select and support qualified women to stand in winnable seats

Cameron again: “Just opening up and saying ‘you’re welcome to try if you want to’ doesn’t get over the fact that there have been all sorts of barriers in the way”.

These barriers were examined extensively in evidence given to the Speakers Conference. Yet only some of its recommendations have since been introduced. The coalition opted for a voluntary approach to one key recommendation – publication of candidate diversity data. Without this the public can’t see what is going on.

The barrier of party demand on the ground was widely cited. Equality and Human Rights Commission research shows local parties frequently pick candidates who fit an archetypal stereo-type of a white, male professional. The parties have addressed this barrier in different ways – with only Labour using a party quota, All Women Shortlists. The Speaker’s Conference recommended that Parliament should consider legislative quotas in the absence of significant improvements in the numbers of women in 2010 – there was none. Indeed, there is talk of declining numbers of Conservative and Lib Dem women in 2015.

The global evidence is clear: well-designed and properly implemented quotas are the most effective way to address the under-representation of women. The coalition could act. Legislative quotas – ensuring all parties use quotas – provide ‘political cover’. And both leaders’ positions on quotas are on the record. Clegg isn’t “theologically opposed”; Cameron said he would use some AWS in 2010, although he didn’t. We are pretty confident that Labour would be supportive, given its record.

We acknowledge that most people are hostile to quotas, but if we want real change they are the only mechanism proven to deliver. Quotas are not the electoral risk that some activists suggest. Studies show that being an AWS candidates does not cause electoral defeat; current selection processes are not meritocratic – Cameron said so himself. Nor do quotas produce unqualified or poor quality MPs – Labour’s 97 AWS women were equally as successful in being promoted. For some, the bottom line is what local parties regard as top-down measures. But if the truck is with ‘outsider’ women ‘being imposed’ then local parties should recruit local women to stand for selection.

Candidates are being selected as we write – the time to act is now. So, Messrs Clegg and Cameron, please be constitutionally radical and leave a legacy of gender equality from this Coalition Government. Let’s have a Parliament that closer approximates the sex balance of the UK in 2015. At a minimum, set up a second Speaker’s Conference to implement the recommendations of its predecessor, and to work with other institutions across the four nations. Or be even more radical: to expedite women’s representation introduce a bill establishing legislative sex quotas. The alternative is for us to wake up the day after the 2015 election and find the party leaders once again bemoaning the under-representation of women at Westminster.

Claire Annesley, Rosie Campbell, Sarah Childs, Catherine Durose, Elizabeth Evans, Francesca Gains, Meryl Kenny, Fiona Mackay, Rainbow Murray, Liz Richardson and other members of the UK Political Studies Association (PSA) Women and Politics group.

Women on top – promotional patterns in the House of Commons

Posted on by

By Peter Allen

This week saw the publication of the Counting Women In report ‘Sex and Power 2013’. As I have written elsewhere, with Philip Cowley, the media reacted by focusing on a the most troubling cases, The Observer announcing that the number of women in professions including politics to be ‘plummeting’, despite plummeting of any sort being in short supply.

Much of the focus has been on the number of women in the Cabinet, something we address there, showing that the Cameron Cabinet has exactly the same number of women in right now as Blair did at a comparable point in his premiership (the percentage is slightly lower given an overall increase in the number of ministers eligible to attend Cabinet).

Behind much of this comment, however, seems to lie an assumption that women do badly in parliament – that once elected, they will struggle to get on, and get promoted, relative to their male colleagues. This simply isn’t the case.

Looking at the largest group of women ever elected to parliament at the same time, the 1997 intake, there is no (statistically) significant difference between the promotional paths of men and women, with women actually having more success in reaching the very top jobs in British politics.

178 Labour MPs were elected for the very first time in May 1997, 114 men and 64 women. Out of this group, only 10 ever made it into Cabinet office during the Labour government of 1997-2010 – five men and five women. In terms of percentages, that’s 8% of the Labour women, but only 4% of the men.

The next office down the ministerial ladder has a similar story – only 17% of Labour men made it to office of Minister of State compared to 20% of women.

Now turning to the lesser offices, lower down the governmental pecking order, men outnumber women. Undersecretary of State, for example; 14% of Labour men counted this as their highest office compared to only13% of women, and as for PPS, this was the best it got 18% of men compared to just 16% of women. Finally, looking at those MPs who never got off the backbenches and into governmental office of any kind, this was again the case for more men than women, 47% and 44% respectively.

Highest office reached (n=178); no statistically significant differences (Fisher’s exact test).

The obvious retort to this is that despite the percentages, there are still more men in these positions overall, which is true. However, what this highlights is that the problem is the low number of women in parliament overall, not that they are being passed over for promotion in favour of men.

As academic work, including my own, has repeatedly shown, candidate selection is the real battleground here, in addition to other political pipeline institutions such as local councils – for example, why don’t more women make the transition from councillor to MP? This is a common route to parliament, one which 42% and 63% of the 2010 and 1997 intakes respectively, but three-quarters of MPs who did so are men. A concerted effort to get more women making this move would have a big effect on their numbers in parliament.

Focusing on the number of women in Cabinet may be an easy target and may engage the media, but it misses the point. It is no doubt true that women have suffered from discrimination in parliament, but it would seem that this hasn’t stopped them getting on, ultimately beating their male colleagues to the top jobs.

Peter Allen is a doctoral research student in the Department of Politics. He writes about political careers and has published work in Parliamentary Affairs and British Politics.

Britain in the EU

Posted on by

By Dr Dionyssis G. Dimitrakopoulos

This blog post summarises parts of a lecture Dr Dimitrakopoulos gave to British diplomats at the Foreign Office on 18 February 2013.

Britain has been described as an ‘awkward partner’ (George, 1994) within the EU but the chequered history of her membership is even more complex. Although it is true that until 1997 there were only two major episodes of positive engagement (the establishment of the single European market in the second half of the 1980s and John Major’s short-lived attempt, upon his arrival at 10 Downing Street, to place the UK ‘at the heart of Europe’) a more thorough understanding of Britain’s 40-year history as a member of the EC/EU ought to be couched not only in contemporary debates on the future of European integration but also Britain’s own past, present and future.

For a start, Britain’s accession to the then European Communities was a sign of an undeclared defeat. As Hugo Young appositely notes,

‘For the makers of the original “Europe”, beginning to fulfil Victor Hugo’s dream, their creation was a triumph.  Out of defeat they produced a new kind of victory.  For Britain, by contrast, the entry into Europe was a kind of defeat: a fate she had resisted, a necessity reluctantly accepted, the last resort of a once great power, never for one moment a climactic or triumphant engagement with the construction of Europe’ (Young, 1998, 2).

Indeed, not only did Britain’s governments shun the opportunity to participate in this process from the beginning – in the 1950s – but their pronouncements were matched by further concrete action: Britain played a major role in the establishment of the European Free Trade Association which was meant to be a counter-weight to the emerging European Communities, and was devoid of a common external tariff and a common trade negotiator vis-à-vis third countries, i.e. two ‘state-building’ features of the EEC. Britain was initially joined by Austria, Denmark, Portugal, Sweden, Norway and Switzerland, nearly all of which [i] subsequently became full members of the EC/EU (as did Finland that became a full member of EFTA in 1986 but joined the EU only nine years later).  In addition, far from its usual position as a leading decision shaper in international affairs, Britain has had to apply three times in order to join the European Communities.

Since then, by and large Britain’s membership has been marked by a number of paradoxes or even contradictions: a sceptical member state but also one whose basic preferences are often (though not always) congruent with key developments in the process of integration as indicated by the single market project, successive enlargements, market-based approaches to a series of policy issues, including employment.

More recently, the terms of the domestic debate on Britain’s membership have not only returned to the themes of the late 1980s and early 1990s but can be seen as evidence of the British political elite beginning to catch up with the continental European debate on the future and the finalité politique of European integration – a debate essentially launched by Joschka Fischer’s famous speech at Humboldt University in May 2000. This involves a struggle between the supporters and opponents of essentially two quite different options for the future of Europe, namely neoliberalism and regulated capitalism. Indeed, on the one hand, David Cameron’s recent speech at Bloomberg and other pronouncements made by senior Tories place them firmly on the side of those who support unfettered markets, a neoliberal Europe – that is arguably the essence of contemporary Tory Euroscepticism for they see the EU as an actual or even just potential source of intervention in the economy. As the emerging debate on the UK’s membership of the EU is bound to reveal, when Mr Cameron refers to ‘flexibility’ he actually has in mind what many on the Continent as well as the UK call ‘social dumping’. In that sense, the recent developments in the debate in the UK mark a return to the early 1990s, when the late John Smith, then Labour leader, was castigating the Major-led government for trying to turn the UK into the sweatshop of Europe, trying to compete with Taiwan on low wages, rather than with Germany on skills, as he put in a speech in the House of Commons. The fact that Mr Cameron has singled out the EU’s Working Time Directive makes him particularly vulnerable to that line of attack because that directive (like others in the socio-economic and environmental domains) actually allows individual member states to pursue higher standards. So, if Mr Cameron wants flexibility, this is bound to mean the dilution of standards, not their improvement.

The Labour Party’s response was largely couched in Ed Miliband and his team’s preference for ‘responsible capitalism’ which has a clear social democratic ‘flavour’. This is good news for those who want to have real choices not only in national electoral contests but also the forthcoming European elections for, ultimately, the kind of Europe that we want is inextricably linked to the kind of Britain we want.

References cited

George, S. (1994) An Awkward Partner.  Britain in the European Community. 2nd edn. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Young, H. (1998) This Blessed Plot: Britain and Europe from Churchill to Blair. London: Macmillan.

[i] Norway and Switzerland are the two exceptions.

Job-Shares for MPs: A Step on the Way to Resolving a Major Problem

Posted on by

By Dr Rosie Campbell and Professor Sarah Childs

In a blog on Wednesday, Ruth Fox from the Hansard Society argued that job-shares for MPs are a marginal solution for a major problem. Dr Fox is right, introducing job shares will not solve the significant under-representation of women in the House of Commons overnight. To do that, international research clearly demonstrates, parties need to employ equality guarantees.

These can take the form of all-women-shortlists, zipped lists in proportional representation list systems, or reserved seats for women. So far, for the UK Parliament, only Labour has been prepared to adopt such measures; unsurprisingly they are the only party to deliver more than 30% women MPs. Women in the Conservative parliamentary party constitute 16% and in the Liberal Democrats just 12%.

The need for equality guarantees is acknowledged in the Liberal Democrats’ proposals, but given past division on this, we’d be surprised if they moved to adopt them. But in the absence of such measures – indeed even when a party uses equality guarantees – job sharing is another measure that should help deliver more women into politics.

Ruth Fox outlines some of the challenges of adapting the role of an MP to accommodate job-share. How will conflict of how to vote be resolved? As any job share team knows, there must be clear expectations, set out at the point of interview (and in politics at the point of election), as to how the job will be divided; who will work on what day, who will take responsibility for what, and how decisions will be made. Different job shares might approach the issue of voting differently, by either agreeing that ‘who is there on the day makes the decision’ or by agreeing a position in advance, or in respect of different policy areas.

In any case, we doubt very much that job-share candidates from either ends of a party’s ideological spectrum, or taking opposing views on conscience issues, would put themselves up for selection as a team in the first place. Crucially, and just like other MPs, job share MPs are accountable for how they act: both to the party selectorate and ultimately to the electorate. If they failed to make the partnership work – for whatever reason – they would be unlikely to be reselected or reelected.

Dr Fox also questions what would happen in the event that one member of the job-share stepped down. We do not think this need be particularly problematic, given that both MPs in the job-share will have been elected. If one should be removed from office then the other could choose to continue as a full-time MP until the next election, or they could choose to stand down with their job-share partner. Accordingly, job-shares need not increase the likelihood of by-elections

Furthermore, it is our belief that job-share MPs may prove to be more attractive at the ballot box than critics imply. The professionalisation of politics and the narrowing of the political class is an issue that resonates with many.

Philip Cowley’s work with Rosie Campbell shows that voters respond negatively to candidates without local connections, those with high incomes, and those who have only worked in political occupations. Job-sharing might encourage the local GP who wants to maintain a reduced practice, or someone who runs a family business, or the parent who wants to do the school run a couple of times a week to consider standing.

The challenges for job-sharing at Westminster are by no means insurmountable, as Dr Fox admits. And we believe them to be worth the extra cost. We do not imagine that Parliament will suddenly become dominated by job-share MPs, just as other organisations that allow job-shares are not; neither will they double the numbers of women in the House. But they would facilitate people, men and women, who make a contribution to society beyond their ‘day jobs’, through caring for children or dependent adults, sustaining a professional career or contributing to their local community, to stand for election to Parliament. Crucially, job share enables them to do so without having to put aside all of their other commitments.

Job-shares should be strongly supported by those who want to see more women elected to Westminster. This support need not be dependent upon job-share delivering a large number of women MPs at the next election. And their value is not limited to women. Job-share is about enabling both women and men who currently feel unable to participate in politics but have a significant contribution to make. The value of job-share is also symbolic – about making it clear that being a representative is a job not just for the professional or unencumbered politician but a job open to all.

This post was originally published on Huffington Post.

What Do MPs Read?

Posted on by

By Dr Benjamin Worthy

How to be an MP by Paul Flynn (Biteback Publishing, 2012)

In the past few years there have been several attempts to understand how our elected and non-elected representatives work, what they do and what they think, including Emma Crewe’s great anthropological study of the Lords and Tony Wright’s thoughts on what MPs are for.

How can we know what MPs think? One way is to find out what they are reading. Following a Freedom of Information Request, the Daily Telegraph revealed the top ten books borrowed by MPs from the House of Commons Library in 2012. They are as follows:

Ten most borrowed books from House of Commons library in 2012

  1. How to be an MP, by Paul Flynn
  2. How Parliament Works, by Robert Rogers
  3. The new few, or a very British Oligarchy, by Ferdinand Mount
  4. Losing small wars: British military failure in Iraq and Afghanistan, by Frank Ledwidge
  5. Erskine May’s treatise on the law, privileges, proceedings and usage of Parliament, edited by Malcolm Jack
  6. Years of Lyndon Johnson, vol 4, by Robert Caro
  7. Outside in, by Peter Hain
  8. A Journey, by Tony Blair
  9. Chavs, by Owen Jones
  10. Back from the brink, by Alistair Darling

The article itself makes much of the first two books – it looks as though MPs don’t know what they are doing or how Parliament works. But the list may be cause for optimism. The first two books are both useful, detailed guides to Parliamentary activity. It could be eager and enthusiastic members are using respectable guides to improve how they work-this is perhaps supported by the presence of the bible of Parliamentary procedure, Erskine May, half-way down.

Some of the others books are the sort of book you want our representatives to read. Owen Jones’ ‘Chavs’ is a recent study of what he sees as the demonization of the working class while Frank Lewidge’s is a searing assent of recent British military performance. The Robert Caro book on Lyndon Johnson (beloved of Gordon Brown and Michael Gove while his wife was in labour and apparently  the inspiration for Osborne’s tactics against the SNP) is part of a vast four volume study of one of history’s great legislators, who passed laws no one else could before becoming unstuck in Vietnam.

This list tells us a little bit more than the rather eclectic mix of books chosen by Prime Ministers on Desert Island discs – David Cameron (‘River Cottage’ by Hugh Fearnley -Whittingstall), Nick Clegg (‘The Leopard’ by Giuseppe Lampedusa) ,Gordon Brown (‘The Story of Art’ by Ernst Gombrich), Tony Blair (‘Ivanhoe’ by Walter Scott), Margaret Thatcher (‘a survival manual’). It also is more indicative of what is being really read rather than the lists of summer holiday reading politicians provide, though the thought of Ed Milliband’s spur of the moment ‘kindling’, Iain Duncan Smith being inspired by Dickens or Nick Clegg reading ‘A Place of Greater Safety’ makes for a good story.

By way of a comparison here is an FOI request by the Reading Post for the most popular books borrowed from libraries in the local area.

1. The Woman Who Went To Bed For A Year by Sue Townsend
2. A Visitor’s Guide to the Ancient Olympics by Neil Faulkner
3. Bring up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel
4. Phantom by Jo Nesbo
5. Fault Line by Robert Goddard
6. The Soldier’s Wife by Joanna Trollope
7. Fifty Shades of Grey by EL James
8. Cop to Corpse by Peter Lovesey
9. Hugo by Asa Butterfield
10. Are You Smart Enough to Work for Google? by William Poundstone

As a point of interest, FOI has proved rather a boon for researchers of libraries. There are some extraordinarily overdue books in Cornwall and a list of those banned from Hull libraries. On a more serious note Anti-library closure group ‘Voices for Libraries’ has used FOI to fight closures up and down the country while a Huddersfield local paper has calculated through statistics on lending which are the most efficient libraries in their area.

Dr Ben Worthy is a lecturer in the Department of Politics at Birkbeck, University of London.