Patrick Diamond
Biographic Data
| ID | 4128941 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Patrick Diamond |
| GIVEN NAMES | Patrick |
| FAMILY NAME | Diamond |
| SIGNATURE | DIAMOND P |
| AFFILIATIONS | Queen Mary University of London |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-0653-8499 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 47 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 123 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 44 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 3 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2007 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 7 |
Gordon Brown in Power: Was It a Missed Opportunity?
Keir Starmer’s statecraft: A critical appraisal of Labour in power
This article provides a critical appraisal of the Starmer government’s first two years in power and an overview of its policy agenda and political decision-making during this period. Our analysis is underpinned by the influential statecraft framework first set out by Jim Bulpitt. We make the following arguments. First, despite entering office with a landslide electoral victory, the new Labour government was ill-prepared for office, contributing t…
Prudence from the left: Economic restraint and UK social democracy since 1945
The political science debate over macroeconomic policy in western Europe has focused extensively on critiquing ‘austerity’ policies since the Great Financial Crash of 2008. That includes the literature on ‘austerity from the left’, which sought to explain the decisions of social-democratic parties to adopt policies that undermined the capacity of the state to intervene in the economy, the ideological goals of conventional social democracy, and ir…
The Crisis of English Local Governance During the Covid-19 Pandemic: The Breakdown of Central Control
The UK’s policy response to the Covid-19 pandemic reveals the problems that arise in a highly centralised polity where the executive faces few countervailing political pressures. Westminster is a power-hoarding political system despite two decades of devolution. Intergovernmental relations (IGR) mechanisms of coordination and conflict resolution have struggled to cope with the realities of a severely asymmetric devolution settlement, as was glari…
Hyper-active incrementalism’ and the Westminster system of governance: Why spatial policy has failed over time
This article seeks to explain why spatial policy in England has been so ineffective in recent decades. It offers a novel framework – ‘Hyper-Active Incrementalism’ – to conceptualise the way that public policy in this area is prone to being short-term, under-evaluated, reactive, fragmented, incremental and top-down. It applies this framework to a historical survey of spatial policy, offering a nuanced understanding of the causes of these pathologi…
Change and Continuity in British Politics: Can the Starmer Government's Approach to Governance Resolve the Crisis in the British State without Radical Reform
In this article, the key dilemmas that will confront the new Labour administration in Britain during its initial period in power are examined. The Starmer government is seeking to use the state pragmatically to improve British economic performance, stem the crisis in public services and strengthen the strategic capacity of Whitehall. However, embryonic approach represents a melding of disparate ideas and traditions that have yet to cohere into a …
The challenge of devolved English governance and the rise of political spatial inequality
The UK is characterised by spatial inequality between and within regions, alongside an over-centralised asymmetric model of governance. In England especially, these features are stark, and throughout the last decade, politicians have responded by forging a distinctive programme of English devolution focused on city-regions. In this article, we analyse the core drivers of the English devolution agenda to understand its impact on the future traject…
Instability and inequality in the British state
The UK state has been through many periods of perceived crisis, but the instability of the last decade has shaken some of the foundational institutions of British politics. Our main argument is that the rise of political instability relates to the failure of British politics to respond to structural inequality in society and politics. This includes growing economic and geographic disparities, as well as destabilizing divisions over long-standing …
Policy making: Getting your ducks in a row
Levelling Up the UK: If not the Conservatives, will Labour Learn the Lessons from Past Policy Failings
This article considers the levelling‐up agenda in the UK, examining the Johnson government's original proposals to tackle regional and local inequality and its continuation under new Prime Minister Rishi Sunak following the short‐lived premiership of Liz Truss. The 2022 Levelling Up in the United Kingdom White Paper is notable for the frank and wholesale critique it provides of previous governments’—both Tory and Labour—efforts to address the pre…
The Brexit Omnishambles and the law of large solutions
The UK's decision to leave the European Union (EU) in 2016 unquestionably represents a critical juncture in British politics. Yet the intervening years in which the terms of Britain's withdrawal have been painstakingly negotiated by the UK political elite appear less of a watershed, even if there have been significant alterations in particular fields of public policy. Path dependencies have reasserted themselves derailing the process of 'getting …
Post-Brexit challenges to the UK machinery of government in an ‘Age of Fiasco: The Dangers of Muddling Through
This article analyses the existing and potential effects of EU withdrawal on the UK machinery of government (MoG) in an 'age of fiasco'. Brexit has been a system-wide shock that has the potential to fundamentally alter British domestic policy and politics. Above all, departing from the European Union (EU) represents an unprecedented 'stress test' for the government machinery. Brexit has been the greatest challenge confronting the MoG since the Se…
Core Executive Politics in the Cameron Era, 2010–16: The Dynamics of Whitehall Reform
By the early 1990s, the core executive was established as the ‘new orthodoxy’ in the study of British government at the centre. Thirty years on, this article avers that its main assumptions are increasingly questionable in the light of more recent empirical evidence. The core executive approach may well have outlived its usefulness. This claim is derived from analysis of the Cameron premiership from 2010 to 2016. The focus is on how Whitehall ref…
Borders and identities in NI after Brexit: Remaking Irish–UK relations
The Future of Irish‐UK Relations: Borders and Identities after Brexit: Introduction
It is apparent that the consociational framework established by the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement (B/GFA) is under threat, while the UK's withdrawal from the EU poses major challenges for maintaining peace, prosperity and social cohesion in Northern Ireland (NI). The contributions to this special collection examine key elements of the post‐Brexit reality, with a particular focus on NI and the future of the intergovernmental bodies established by …
Irish Unification After Brexit: Old and New Political Identities
This article contends that the outcome of the prolonged dispute about the future constitutional status of Northern Ireland (NI) will be shaped by the emerging dynamic between ‘old’ and ‘new’ political identities in NI. The ‘old’ identities conceived political outcomes as defined by two monolithic ethno‐cultural blocs: nationalism (alongside republicanism) and unionism (alongside loyalism). Nationalism and unionism formed the ‘two communities mode…
The United Kingdom and the pandemic: Problems of Central Control and Coordination
The UK policy response to Covid-19 illustrates the problems arising where (1) a central government faces few countervailing political pressures as in Westminster systems; (2) the design of intergovernmental relations (IGR) mechanisms of coordination and conflict resolution fails to cope with the realities of a severely, asymmetric devolution settlement; and (3) local government faces serious collective action problems in influencing and mobilisin…
Myth and meaning: ‘Corbynism’ and the interpretation of political leadership
In its contribution to the study of political leadership, this article provides a distinctive analytical lens: political myth understood as meanings which animate a leadership project. Heavily constitutive of political leadership at a particular moment in time, political myths are important for understanding the resilience of a leadership project and the judgements of its actors. We demonstrate a way of applying this concept through an analysis o…
Destroying one Public Service Bargain Without Making Another: A Comment on Lowe and Pemberton, The Official History of the British Civil Service, Volume II : 1982–1997
This article responds to Lowe and Pemberton's second volume on the history of the civil service and analyses fundamental shifts in British governance at the centre that occurred during the 1980s and 1990s. The traditional ‘public service bargain’ (PSB) that underpinned the relationship between ministers and officials has been repeatedly undermined. The article examines how far prior civil service reforms relate to the changes of the contemporary …
New Jerusalems? The Labour Party's Economic Policy‐Making in Hard Times
This paper is an historical analysis of ideational change in the British Labour Party. It briefly examines two critical phases of economic policy formation: the aftermath of the Great Depression and the MacDonald administration's implosion in 1931 until the outbreak of the Second World War; alongside Labour's experience following the 2008 financial crisis and electoral defeat in 2010 through to Jeremy Corbyn's emergence as leader. Throughout both…
Should the centre‐left stay where it is or go populist
Polycentric governance and policy advice: Lessons from Whitehall policy advisory systems
In countries worldwide, the provision of policy advice to central governments has been transformed by the deinstitutionalisation of policymaking, which has engaged a diverse range of actors in the policy process. Scholarship should therefore address the impact of deinstitutionalisation in terms of the scope and scale of policy advisory systems, as well as in terms of the influence of policy advisors. This article addresses this gap, presenting a …
Better in kung fu movies than in political parties’: Labour’s Factionalism and a Reappraisal of Eric Hobsbawm’s Political Thought
Eric Hobsbawm will forever be a giant intellectual figure. Yet, an aspect of his work is underappreciated—the case for a more pluralistic, dynamic and intellectually inquiring Labour Party. As such, his political thought is particularly relevant given the recent election of Keir Starmer, and the avowed quest for ‘unity’ in bringing Labour back to power. Hobsbawm came to believe that political strategies which sought to exploit social and politica…
No easy life at the top
The crisis of globalization: Democracy, Capitalism and Inequality in the Twenty-First Century
The book establishes marriage as a pervasive idiom for the construction of collective identity in Syria, which is appropriated by individuals, sects, states and intergovernmental organizations alike. Its conclusions are relevant to scholars of Middle East studies, sectarianism, anthropology and politics.”
The United Kingdom and the pandemic: Problems of Central Control and Coordination
The UK policy response to Covid-19 illustrates the problems arising where (1) a central government faces few countervailing political pressures as in Westminster systems; (2) the design of intergovernmental relations (IGR) mechanisms of coordination and conflict resolution fails to cope with the realities of a severely, asymmetric devolution settlement; and (3) local government faces serious collective action problems in influencing and mobilisin…
Westminster’s Brexit Paradox: The contingency of the ‘old’ versus ‘new’ politics
The embedded nature of the British Political Tradition has created a series of pathologies about the way politics in Westminster is conducted. The endurance of the British Political Tradition emanates from its resilience to pressures for reform. Yet the rising anti-politics tide, the expression of which was vented in the 2016 European Union referendum, presents a critical challenge to the British Political Tradition. Given the political instabili…
Post-Brexit challenges to the UK machinery of government in an ‘Age of Fiasco: The Dangers of Muddling Through
This article analyses the existing and potential effects of EU withdrawal on the UK machinery of government (MoG) in an 'age of fiasco'. Brexit has been a system-wide shock that has the potential to fundamentally alter British domestic policy and politics. Above all, departing from the European Union (EU) represents an unprecedented 'stress test' for the government machinery. Brexit has been the greatest challenge confronting the MoG since the Se…
Hyper-active incrementalism’ and the Westminster system of governance: Why spatial policy has failed over time
This article seeks to explain why spatial policy in England has been so ineffective in recent decades. It offers a novel framework – ‘Hyper-Active Incrementalism’ – to conceptualise the way that public policy in this area is prone to being short-term, under-evaluated, reactive, fragmented, incremental and top-down. It applies this framework to a historical survey of spatial policy, offering a nuanced understanding of the causes of these pathologi…
Levelling Up the UK: If not the Conservatives, will Labour Learn the Lessons from Past Policy Failings
This article considers the levelling‐up agenda in the UK, examining the Johnson government's original proposals to tackle regional and local inequality and its continuation under new Prime Minister Rishi Sunak following the short‐lived premiership of Liz Truss. The 2022 Levelling Up in the United Kingdom White Paper is notable for the frank and wholesale critique it provides of previous governments’—both Tory and Labour—efforts to address the pre…
The challenge of devolved English governance and the rise of political spatial inequality
The UK is characterised by spatial inequality between and within regions, alongside an over-centralised asymmetric model of governance. In England especially, these features are stark, and throughout the last decade, politicians have responded by forging a distinctive programme of English devolution focused on city-regions. In this article, we analyse the core drivers of the English devolution agenda to understand its impact on the future traject…
Core Executive Politics in the Cameron Era, 2010–16: The Dynamics of Whitehall Reform
By the early 1990s, the core executive was established as the ‘new orthodoxy’ in the study of British government at the centre. Thirty years on, this article avers that its main assumptions are increasingly questionable in the light of more recent empirical evidence. The core executive approach may well have outlived its usefulness. This claim is derived from analysis of the Cameron premiership from 2010 to 2016. The focus is on how Whitehall ref…
Change and Continuity in British Politics: Can the Starmer Government's Approach to Governance Resolve the Crisis in the British State without Radical Reform
In this article, the key dilemmas that will confront the new Labour administration in Britain during its initial period in power are examined. The Starmer government is seeking to use the state pragmatically to improve British economic performance, stem the crisis in public services and strengthen the strategic capacity of Whitehall. However, embryonic approach represents a melding of disparate ideas and traditions that have yet to cohere into a …
The Brexit Omnishambles and the law of large solutions
The UK's decision to leave the European Union (EU) in 2016 unquestionably represents a critical juncture in British politics. Yet the intervening years in which the terms of Britain's withdrawal have been painstakingly negotiated by the UK political elite appear less of a watershed, even if there have been significant alterations in particular fields of public policy. Path dependencies have reasserted themselves derailing the process of 'getting …
Governing as New Labour: An Inside Account of the Blair and Brown Years
The experience of governing at the strategic centre of the UK political system raises many important questions about the philosophy of public management and delivery, and the scope and scale of the British state. This article sheds light on those debates by offering an inside account of government at the centre during the Blair and Brown years, albeit from a particular ontological standpoint given the author's role as a Special Adviser in the Pri…
Instability and inequality in the British state
The UK state has been through many periods of perceived crisis, but the instability of the last decade has shaken some of the foundational institutions of British politics. Our main argument is that the rise of political instability relates to the failure of British politics to respond to structural inequality in society and politics. This includes growing economic and geographic disparities, as well as destabilizing divisions over long-standing …
The Westminster system under the Cameron coalition: Promiscuous partisanship’ or institutional resilience
This article applies Aucoin's paradigm of New Political Governance derived from the comparative literature on Westminster systems to review changes in the UK machinery of government during the Coalition era from 2010 to 2015. The paper examines whether coalition government imposed ‘checks and balances’ that prevented Conservative ministers from enacting a further wave of New Public Management-style reforms of the permanent bureaucracy comparable …
Assessing the Performance of UK Opposition Leaders: Jeremy Corbyn’s ‘Straight Talking, Honest Politics’
This article contributes to a burgeoning literature on political leadership, offering an interim assessment of Jeremy Corbyn’s tenure as leader of the UK Labour party. At the time of writing, the candidate of the party’s Left had been leader for a mere seven months. Media commentators and pundits have been critical of Corbyn’s platform and performance, gleefully predicting his imminent demise. On the other hand, the ‘Corbynistas’ who swelled Labo…
New Labour, politicisation and depoliticisation: The delivery agenda in public services 1997–2007
The Progressive Dilemmas of British Social Democracy: Political Economy after New Labour
This article traces the roots of ideas currently influencing the Labour party relating to the role of the state in Britain's political economy, exploring the trajectory by which such ideas have entered contemporary debate and how they continue to shape the party's agenda. Subsequent sections explore diverse interpretations of New Labour, the economic legacy of the Blair and Brown governments, the re-imagining of British political economy undertak…
Borders and identities in NI after Brexit: Remaking Irish–UK relations
Irish Unification After Brexit: Old and New Political Identities
This article contends that the outcome of the prolonged dispute about the future constitutional status of Northern Ireland (NI) will be shaped by the emerging dynamic between ‘old’ and ‘new’ political identities in NI. The ‘old’ identities conceived political outcomes as defined by two monolithic ethno‐cultural blocs: nationalism (alongside republicanism) and unionism (alongside loyalism). Nationalism and unionism formed the ‘two communities mode…
Myth and meaning: ‘Corbynism’ and the interpretation of political leadership
In its contribution to the study of political leadership, this article provides a distinctive analytical lens: political myth understood as meanings which animate a leadership project. Heavily constitutive of political leadership at a particular moment in time, political myths are important for understanding the resilience of a leadership project and the judgements of its actors. We demonstrate a way of applying this concept through an analysis o…
Learning the Lessons from Defeat’: The Labour Party's Beckett Report, and the Alternatives
Prudence from the left: Economic restraint and UK social democracy since 1945
The political science debate over macroeconomic policy in western Europe has focused extensively on critiquing ‘austerity’ policies since the Great Financial Crash of 2008. That includes the literature on ‘austerity from the left’, which sought to explain the decisions of social-democratic parties to adopt policies that undermined the capacity of the state to intervene in the economy, the ideological goals of conventional social democracy, and ir…
The Future of Irish‐UK Relations: Borders and Identities after Brexit: Introduction
It is apparent that the consociational framework established by the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement (B/GFA) is under threat, while the UK's withdrawal from the EU poses major challenges for maintaining peace, prosperity and social cohesion in Northern Ireland (NI). The contributions to this special collection examine key elements of the post‐Brexit reality, with a particular focus on NI and the future of the intergovernmental bodies established by …
Destroying one Public Service Bargain Without Making Another: A Comment on Lowe and Pemberton, The Official History of the British Civil Service, Volume II : 1982–1997
This article responds to Lowe and Pemberton's second volume on the history of the civil service and analyses fundamental shifts in British governance at the centre that occurred during the 1980s and 1990s. The traditional ‘public service bargain’ (PSB) that underpinned the relationship between ministers and officials has been repeatedly undermined. The article examines how far prior civil service reforms relate to the changes of the contemporary …
New Jerusalems? The Labour Party's Economic Policy‐Making in Hard Times
This paper is an historical analysis of ideational change in the British Labour Party. It briefly examines two critical phases of economic policy formation: the aftermath of the Great Depression and the MacDonald administration's implosion in 1931 until the outbreak of the Second World War; alongside Labour's experience following the 2008 financial crisis and electoral defeat in 2010 through to Jeremy Corbyn's emergence as leader. Throughout both…
The PD and social-democratic parties in Europe
This article analyses the main challenges currently facing the Partito Democratico (Democratic Party, PD), drawing a comparison with other social-democratic parties in Europe. After illustrating how the party campaigned before the election and the decisions it took after the electoral defeat, we highlight the main causes of the party’s decline. First, the party was identified by voters as the main actor responsible for unpopular economic policies…
Breaking the Mould? Roy Jenkins’ ‘Radical Centre’ and British Social Democracy in the ‘New Hard Times’
Social democratic politics in Britain requires compelling answers to three animating questions that Roy Jenkins posed in his landmark 1979 Dimbleby lecture. Firstly, how can the British system of democracy be reformed to develop a culture of political participation and pluralism that leads to more equitable economic and social policies? Secondly, how can the centre‐left and left unite to forestall long periods of Tory dominance in electoral polit…
Der neue Egalitarismus: Lehren aus der wirtschaftlichen Ungleichheit in Großbritannien
Dieser Beitrag ist ein Plädoyer für einen neuen Egalitarismus. Viele Zeitgenossen — auch auf Seiten der Linken — bezweifeln, dass wirtschaftliche Ungleich-heit für die Politik überhaupt noch eine Rolle spielt. Im Folgenden möchten wir erklären, warum der Anstieg der wirtschaftlichen Ungleichheit, der in den letzten dreißig Jahren stattgefunden hat, von zentraler politischer Bedeutung bleiben sollte. Wir konzentrieren uns vor allem auf Armut und U…
Options for Britain: Europe
Future Directions for Labour
Governing as New Labour: An Inside Account of the Blair and Brown Years
The experience of governing at the strategic centre of the UK political system raises many important questions about the philosophy of public management and delivery, and the scope and scale of the British state. This article sheds light on those debates by offering an inside account of government at the centre during the Blair and Brown years, albeit from a particular ontological standpoint given the author's role as a Special Adviser in the Pri…
After the Third Way: The Future of Social Democracy in Europe
The social democratic parties were once the strongest political forces in Europe. Today, however, they appear disorientated and rudderless, crucially lacking the ideological, intellectual and organisational vitality which underpinned their strength in the post-war political landscape. Electorally marginalised, seemingly ideologically exhausted and often out-of-step with the contemporary zeitgeist, European social democracy is currently in profoun…
The Progressive Dilemmas of British Social Democracy: Political Economy after New Labour
This article traces the roots of ideas currently influencing the Labour party relating to the role of the state in Britain's political economy, exploring the trajectory by which such ideas have entered contemporary debate and how they continue to shape the party's agenda. Subsequent sections explore diverse interpretations of New Labour, the economic legacy of the Blair and Brown governments, the re-imagining of British political economy undertak…
Response to Roy Hattersley and Kevin Hickson
Spending Wisely: Principles for a Good Spending Review': The First Report of the Fabian Commission on Future Spending Choices
This article examines the work of the Fabian Society Commission on Future Spending Choices published in June 2013. The Commission is undoubtedly the most detailed and ambitious attempt by a centre‐left think‐tank to analyse the structure of UK public spending since Labour's 2010 defeat. The Commission makes an eloquent case for a strategic approach to UK public spending, filling the substantial void in thinking on the centre‐left since Labour's 2…
Dynamic Social Security after the crisis: Towards a new welfare state
The conservative bias in social attitudes to the welfare state is manifested in entrenched support among the public for traditional welfare and social security benefits, chiefly higher pension payments and public expenditure on health care. This pattern has been reinforced by the 2008 financial crisis and the Great Recession as public support for social protection strategies geared towards “new” social risks – structural changes in labour markets…
B ritish Pluralism
Pluralism began in the academy as a philosophical tendency but soon emerged as a powerful force in shaping the ideas and ideologies of major parties in British politics, in particular promoting a distinctively liberal view of the role of the state reconciling equality with liberty. In the postwar era, the pluralist political tradition began to shape dominant views of race, integration, and multiculturalism, leading to an enduring consensus in par…
The Predistribution Agenda: Tackling Inequality and Supporting Sustainable Growth
The concept of predistribution is increasingly setting the agenda in progressive politics. But what does it mean? The predistributive agenda is concerned with how states can alter the underlying distribution of market outcomes so they no longer rely solely on post hoc redistribution to achieve economic efficiency and social justice. It therefore offers an effective means of tackling economic and social inequality alongside traditional welfare pol…
New Labour, politicisation and depoliticisation: The delivery agenda in public services 1997–2007
Labouring in the Shadow of the British Political Tradition: The Dilemma of ‘One Nation’ Politics in an Age of Disunification
The British state is in flux and the Labour party is struggling to shape an effective response to the politics of disunification. This article reflects on the nature of Labour's governing project and its conception of modern statecraft which has evolved since the party became a serious contender for power in the aftermath of the First World War. We argue that Labour's initially pluralising instincts cultivated in opposition have been checked by t…
Assessing the Performance of UK Opposition Leaders: Jeremy Corbyn’s ‘Straight Talking, Honest Politics’
This article contributes to a burgeoning literature on political leadership, offering an interim assessment of Jeremy Corbyn’s tenure as leader of the UK Labour party. At the time of writing, the candidate of the party’s Left had been leader for a mere seven months. Media commentators and pundits have been critical of Corbyn’s platform and performance, gleefully predicting his imminent demise. On the other hand, the ‘Corbynistas’ who swelled Labo…
Learning the Lessons from Defeat’: The Labour Party's Beckett Report, and the Alternatives
Introduction: The Progressive Dilemma in British Politics
This special edition reflects on the contemporary relevance of the insights and concerns of David Marquand's book The Progressive Dilemma . In this Introduction, the editors set the scene for these reflections. They consider the structural changes that have occurred in politics since the 1990s: the impact of globalisation, the erosion of class identities, the rise of ‘identity politics’ and the continued fragmentation of the party system. There h…
Britain: No poster‐child for neo‐liberalism
The crisis of globalization: Democracy, Capitalism and Inequality in the Twenty-First Century
The book establishes marriage as a pervasive idiom for the construction of collective identity in Syria, which is appropriated by individuals, sects, states and intergovernmental organizations alike. Its conclusions are relevant to scholars of Middle East studies, sectarianism, anthropology and politics.”
The PD and social-democratic parties in Europe
This article analyses the main challenges currently facing the Partito Democratico (Democratic Party, PD), drawing a comparison with other social-democratic parties in Europe. After illustrating how the party campaigned before the election and the decisions it took after the electoral defeat, we highlight the main causes of the party’s decline. First, the party was identified by voters as the main actor responsible for unpopular economic policies…
Westminster’s Brexit Paradox: The contingency of the ‘old’ versus ‘new’ politics
The embedded nature of the British Political Tradition has created a series of pathologies about the way politics in Westminster is conducted. The endurance of the British Political Tradition emanates from its resilience to pressures for reform. Yet the rising anti-politics tide, the expression of which was vented in the 2016 European Union referendum, presents a critical challenge to the British Political Tradition. Given the political instabili…
Giving up on the workers? Not yet
Breaking the Mould? Roy Jenkins’ ‘Radical Centre’ and British Social Democracy in the ‘New Hard Times’
Social democratic politics in Britain requires compelling answers to three animating questions that Roy Jenkins posed in his landmark 1979 Dimbleby lecture. Firstly, how can the British system of democracy be reformed to develop a culture of political participation and pluralism that leads to more equitable economic and social policies? Secondly, how can the centre‐left and left unite to forestall long periods of Tory dominance in electoral polit…
The Westminster system under the Cameron coalition: Promiscuous partisanship’ or institutional resilience
This article applies Aucoin's paradigm of New Political Governance derived from the comparative literature on Westminster systems to review changes in the UK machinery of government during the Coalition era from 2010 to 2015. The paper examines whether coalition government imposed ‘checks and balances’ that prevented Conservative ministers from enacting a further wave of New Public Management-style reforms of the permanent bureaucracy comparable …
Polycentric governance and policy advice: Lessons from Whitehall policy advisory systems
In countries worldwide, the provision of policy advice to central governments has been transformed by the deinstitutionalisation of policymaking, which has engaged a diverse range of actors in the policy process. Scholarship should therefore address the impact of deinstitutionalisation in terms of the scope and scale of policy advisory systems, as well as in terms of the influence of policy advisors. This article addresses this gap, presenting a …
Better in kung fu movies than in political parties’: Labour’s Factionalism and a Reappraisal of Eric Hobsbawm’s Political Thought
Eric Hobsbawm will forever be a giant intellectual figure. Yet, an aspect of his work is underappreciated—the case for a more pluralistic, dynamic and intellectually inquiring Labour Party. As such, his political thought is particularly relevant given the recent election of Keir Starmer, and the avowed quest for ‘unity’ in bringing Labour back to power. Hobsbawm came to believe that political strategies which sought to exploit social and politica…
Political science (45 works) · Politics (42 works) · Law (41 works) · Law (36 works) · Sociology (33 works) · Political and Economic history of UK and US (32 works) · Political economy (30 works) · Economics (23 works) · Social Policy and Reform Studies (22 works) · Public Administration (15 works)