From Ted to Ed: Electing British Party Leaders

Since 1965, British political parties have radically, and repeatedly, changed the ways in which they choose their leaders. In this article, I explain how and why these changes occurred and assess the consequences of the ‘new’ selection procedures adopted by four ‘mainstream’ parties: Labour, the Conservatives, the Liberal Party and the Liberal Democrats. In the first section, following Sjoblom and Stark, I outline a theoretical framework which purports to explain the criteria used by parties in parliamentary systems when choosing their leaders. I then examine the four parties in turn and consider two questions. First, how and why has the process of selecting British party leaders changed over time; and secondly, to what extent, and why, have the ‘new’ selection procedures adopted since 1965 produced different outcomes, resulting in the election of leaders who would not have been chosen had the decision rested with their party's elites and/or MPs alone?     

Beyond Compliance Monitoring: New Strategies for Safety Regulators

Although the advent of general duty legislation makes the task of the regulator far less clear-cut, inspectorates are still involved in monitoring and to some extent enforcing compliance with rules of various sorts. Monitoring compliance in this way is crucially important, but this article seeks to identify strategies that go beyond compliance monitoring, by drawing on research on the causes of accidents and the nature of organizations. The strategies identified include: auditing the auditors; proactive investigation; supporting company safety staff; advising on organizational design; exposing performance; and promoting regulatory crisis. These are all ways in which regulators can encourage companies to improve their management of risk, ways that are not focused on identifying noncompliance with rules of any sort.     

Britain and its Armed Forces Today

As defence becomes a political football once again this article examines the relationship of the UK's military with the country from which it is drawn and which it serves. It argues that all three elements of the classic Clausewitzian trinity: the state, the people and the military, there are major problems. These are undermining the capabilities of the armed forces and will ultimately place far greater limitations on future government's use of the armed forces in support of British policies overseas. This will have significant implications for Britain in the future if it wishes to continue to "punch above its weight".     

Civil Rights and Social Welfare: Some Thoughts on the Contemporary Relevance of T. H. Marshall

This article draws on T H Marshall's celebrated classification of civil, political and social rights to examine the use of the courts by individuals seeking to establish rights to particular forms or models of welfare service provision. It argues that tensions between the collective and individual aspects of social rights, the relationship of social rights to inequality, and the difficulty of quantifying (and therefore enforcing) legitimate expectations, all make the use of litigation to establish social rights intensely problematic. Drawing on the recent UK Supreme Court case of R (on the Application of McDonald) v Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, it goes on to suggest that it is unhelpful to think of social rights in terms of human rights: instead, we would do better to adopt Marshall's emphasis on the citizenship basis of social rights and on the social and political context within which they necessarily exist.