Political Power and Democratic Control in Britain

by Beetham,David

• ISBN13: 9780415096447
• ISBN10: 0415096448
• Format: Nonspecific Binding
• Copyright: 1999-06-28
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

This volume is a comprehensive analysis of the formal institutions and processes of the British liberal democratic state, detailing the absence of effective checks and balances and the inability of Parliament to render the executive open and accountable. It measures democratic practice in the UK against a unique index of democratic criteria specially constructed by the authors.

Table of Contents

List of figures, tables and boxes	vii
Foreword	ix
Acknowledgements	xiii
List of abbreviations and acronyms	xvii
Introduction
Auditing Democracy in Britain	3	(19)
Introducing the Democratic Criteria
Ancient and Modern	22	(23)
The governing culture in Britain
Part 1 Elections and Mandates
Introduction	41	(4)
The Other National Lottery	45	(34)
The Political effects of Westminster elections
The Independence of Elections	79	(21)
Government and outside influences on elections
Sticking to the Manifesto	100	(23)
Election mandates in action
Part 2 The Core Executive
Introduction	119	(4)
Does the Cabinet Really Govern?	123	(28)
Cabinet government or quasi-presidential rule?
Ministers and Mandarins	151	(40)
The powers of ministers, bureaucrats and their departments
Agents of Power	191	(42)
The role of agencies and quangos in government
Government Below the Centre	233	(38)
Government at regional and local level
Networks in Power	271	(28)
External influences working within government
The Rules of the Game	299	(37)
Britain's informal and flexible executive
Part 3 Checks and Balances
Introduction	333	(3)
Giving Account to Parliament	336	(34)
How ministerial responsibility works in practice
A Parliament Bound	370	(34)
Party constraints on scrutiny and accountability
Heckling the Steamroller	404	(36)
The imbalance of power between government and Parliament
The Rule of Law	440	(61)
The limited role of the judiciary
Part 4 The Balance Sheet
Findings Good in Parts	473	(16)
Measuring British democracy against Democratic Criteria
Conclusions Tying Down Gulliver	489	(12)
The absence of a written constitution
Appendix The Democratic Audit	501	(2)
Table of cases	503	(1)
Bibliography and sources	504	(1)
Books and articles	504	(14)
Official documents	518	(5)
Index	523