Political Communication in the UK: A Study of Pressure Group Behaviour

The main political parties' adoption of 'soundbites' and 'spin-doctors' has led UK political communication to become dominated by a 'promotional culture'. This article describes the historical development of this trend and the academic debate it has stimulated over the 'quality' of contemporary political communication. The article then argues that by exploring how pressure groups have adopted similar promotional techniques a valuable new dimension can be added to this debate, which focuses on the ability to gain access to media coverage. Finally, this point is illustrated with a case study of Liberty, a civil liberties pressure group.     

Institutionalising the 'eternal return': textbooks and the study of British politics

Anthony Birch, The British System of Government
Ian Budge and David McKay (eds), The Developing British PoliticalSystem: the 1990s
Ian Budge, Ivor Crewe, David McKay and Ken Newton, The NewBritish Politics
Bill Coxall and Lynton Robins, Contemporary British Politics
John Dearlove and Peter Saunders, Introduction to British Politics
Patrick Dunleavy, Andrew Gamble, Ian Holliday and Gillian Peele (eds), Developments in British Politics 5
Bill Jones, Andrew Gray, Dennis Kavanagh, Michael Moran, Philip Nortonand Anthony Seldon, Politics UK
Dennis Kavanagh, British Politics: Continuities and Change
John Kingdom, Government and Politics in Britain: An Introduction
John P. Mackintosh, The Government and Politics of Britain
R. M. Punnett, British Government and Politics
Robert Pyper and Lyton Robins (eds), Governing the UK in the 1990s     

Leader Survival,Revolutions, and the Nature of Government Finance

Leaders face multiple threats to their political survival. In addition to surviving the threats to tenure from within the existing political systems, which is modeled using Bueno de Mesquita and colleagues' (2003) selectorate theory, leaders risk being deposed through revolutions and coups. To ameliorate the threat of revolution, leaders can either increase public goods provisions to buy off potential revolutionaries or contract the provision of those public goods, such as freedom of assembly, transparency, and free press, which enable revolutionaries to coordinate. Which response a leader chooses depends upon existing institutions and the structure of government finances. These factors also affect the likelihood and direction of institutional change. Tests of leader survival indicate that revolutionary threats increase the likelihood of deposition for nondemocratic leaders. Leaders with access to resources such as foreign aid or natural resource rents are best equipped to survive these threats and avoid the occurrence of these threats in the first place.     

The Relationship of Alternative Negligence Rules to Litigation Behavior and Tort Claim Disposition

Recently most states have abandoned the traditional tort defense of contributory negligence and substituted a form of comparative negligence. Using an extensive data set of auto accident injury claims, we provide evidence on the relationship between negligence rules and claimants' litigation decisions to retain attorneys, file lawsuits and litigate versus settle out of court. Litigation choices appear to be rational responses to the varying incentives created by alternative tort standards. We find that in contrast to comparative negligence, claims arising under comparative negligence are associated with greater probabilities of attorney involvement, higher average award levels, and longer delays in securing payment. Only 37% of claims involving attorneys in contributory negligence states result in a lawsuit being filed compared to 49% and 47% under the pure and modified forms of comparative negligence, respectively. The study provides the first statistical evidence on the litigation costs of the new forms of comparative negligence.     

Time and academic achievement

In questionnaire and achievement-test data from 1584 seventh- and ninth-grade students, relationships between academic achievement and amounts of time devoted to various uses related to school, family, peers, and the mass media are examined, with relevant demographic factors controlled. Multiple regression analyses support hypotheses of (a) a negative relationship among ninth graders between achievement and time spent listening to radio and records, (c) an interaction between parental occupation and time spent watching television, with trends toward positive association between achievement and TV time when occupational status is low and negative association when it is high, and (d) a positive relationship between reading and overall achievement and time spent on leisure reading. Hypotheses of positive relationships between achievement and time spent on homework in this age range and mere time spent with the parent receive no support. The relationship between achievement and time spent on household chores is explored without a hypothesis, and the relationship is found to be negative. The findings are discussed in terms of the impact of the adolescent subculture and in terms of the family, school, peer group, and mass media as agencies of socialization relevant to academic achievement.Professor Smith has a Ph.D. in sociology and a history of research on parental influence and parent-adolescent relations. Currently, he is conducting research on the antecedents of academic achievement.     

The case of Ohio v. Robinson. An 1870 bite mark case

In 1870, Ansil L. Robinson was charged with the murder of his mistress, Mary Lunsford, in Mansfield, Ohio, U.S.A. Evidence against Robinson included an attempt to match his teeth to bite marks on the victim's arm. Robinson was acquitted after a 3-week trial despite the evidence linking his teeth to the wounds. This trial represents an early and perhaps the first attempt to admit bite-mark evidence in a court of law in the United States. The acquittal resulted in the obscurity that prevented this case from coming to the awareness of the forensic dental and legal communities sooner.