European Empires in Conflict: The Brexit Years

Law and Critique - On 29 March 2017, the United Kingdom (UK) Government notified the European Council (EC) of its intention to withdraw from the European Union (EU) legal order. On 31 January 2020,...     

Reparations in the Long Run

This paper explores how policy-makers during the Second World War attempted to “learn the lessons” of history from the reparations settlement imposed after the First World War. It shows how these lessons were developed and articulated in the formulation of, in particular, American foreign policy, and also their consequences for foreign policy during and after the Second World War. The paper demonstrates the important role of European advisors in shaping American policy, thereby illustrating that not all American lessons of history were born in the USA. It also draws out how many of these lessons have found an echo in the historiography of German reparations that has emerged over the past fifty years. In both periods the issues of enforcement and compliance, the issues that concern us generally in this volume, dominated the debate between advisors and policy-makers.     

A response to charles t. goodsell

Goodsell's definition of rituals and administration logically and experientially rings true. Formalizing the relationship between them was both unique and obvious, since we all have an intuitive sense that some of our administrative habits are ritualistic; we regularly complete paperwork, stop for coffee, make phone calls, etc. However, Goodsell has afforded us the opportunity to refer to some of these habits, such as red tape (immigration procedures) or administrivia (staff meetings) as rituals which help promote the social continuity. Similarly, we can rationalize that our comfortable administrative habits need not be changed because they unify.

Yes, the concept of rituals can be applied to many aspects of administration, but to what end? Ritualists suggest some rituals “work” while others do not, so we know little about when or how rituals are effective. To simply state that the concepts and philosophies of rituals offer a means to better understand administration leaves one cold. Goodsell provides little help in discerning how and why rituals are important to understanding administration. Since he links administration to rituals without an explicit purpose for doing so, he contributes to the perception that bureaucracies consist of meaningless tasks and tangles that prevent efficient government operations.     

Re‐reading the city: Deregulation and neighbourhood change

Abstract

Processes of deregulation and privatisation have been gradually transforming the familiar residential and tenurial structures of English cities. Patterns of access to housing have changed and, to varying degrees, the social composition and social roles of neighbourhoods. This paper explores some aspects of these changes in three types of residential area, examines some of the interconnections and indicates the ways in which these changes link to broader and more fundamental social transformations.