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The UK's main parties have all announced their campaign promises ahead of the general election on 12 December.

To help you decide who you might vote for, use this manifesto guide to compare where the parties stand on the key issues.

A manifesto is the full list of official pledges parties make to voters, explaining what they would do if elected.

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Who should I vote for? Election 2019 manifesto guide

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The UK's main parties have all announced their campaign promises ahead of the general election on 12 December. To help you decide who you might vote for, use this manifesto guide to compare where the parties stand on the key issues.

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The Guardian: Conservative Party Leadership Election

The BBC: Conservative Party Leadership Election

ITV: Conservative Party Leadership Election

BBC Panorama : The Race for Number 10

Conservative Party Leadership Elections [House of Commons Research Briefing]
The Results : All First 5 Rounds *****July 2019
Boris Johnson defeats Jeremy Hunt

The Life of Boris Johnson [BBC Newsnight]

Boris Johnson : Downing Street First Speech as PM

Cabinet Reshuffle: Ministers leaving Cabinet

Cabinet Reshuffle

Boris Johnson's Cabinet Cull

Boris Johnson's Cabinet in numbers

Boris Johnson's First Day As PM

Who's Who in Boris Johnson's first Cabinet

EU will not renegotiate Brexit Deal [ J-C Juncker]

Brexit, Social Care, Police.. and more

Where Next? Channel 4 podcast

Economic problems

Boris Johnson rules out General Election amid European opposition to Brexit plans

Preparing Brexit : No Deal [from the Institute for Government]

Pledge of £3.6Bn for left behind towns

Poll boost for Tories

Brexit Balance has shifted toward No Deal: Dominic Raab

Boris Johnson and Nicola Sturgeon

Boris Johnson, DUP and Confidence and Supply Deal

The Border, Backstop and Brexit

20,000 extra police

Extra £2.1Bn for No Deal Brexit

August 2019

Boris Johnson's UK Tour

Brecon and Radnorshire By-Election Result

Brecon and Radnorshire By-Election Result

Mark Carney warns of instant shock of No Deal Brexit
Tory Rebels Threaten Boris Johnson Boris Johnson pledges £1.8 Billion for NHS Prime Minister's promise to level up school funding: analysis from Education Policy Institute The "man of the people" what would plato think of Boris Johnson? [Professor Lea Ypi]Analysis of Boris Johnson's Cabinet reconstruction Adequacy or otherwise of B. Johnson's NHS spending pledge Explainer on Northern Ireland Backstop from Institute for Government Boris Johnson has no intention of renegotiating EU Withdrawal Deal" Eu diplomats told Michael Gove accuses EU of intransigence New Rebel Bid to halt new deal Mr Johnson and plan to subvert democracy Ireland says no deal renegotiation on Irish Backstop Speaker Bercow Judge rejects Court action over £350M claim Will the Tory Party split? ON Dominic Cummings Lib Dems prefer Clarke or Harman to Corbyn B. Johnson to Berlin and Paris Leaks about post Brexit scenario Johnson confident EU will back down EU reject Johnson's bid to remove backstop Merkel gives Johnson 30 days"I'd lead temporary government" Ken Clarke Macron dampens hope of Brexit deal Boris Johnson in Europe: warmer words but a cold reality Pm warns Ministers over bullying, leaking and trying to stop Brexit Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe Boris Johnson asks Queen to prorogue Parliament What is Prorogation and why is Johnson using it?" A constitutional outrage" says Speaker
"Outrage is Phoney says Jacob Rees-Mogg
Prorogation Explainer Lord Young quits Ruth Davidson quits I million + sign anti-prorogation petition Gina Millar and the High Court Tory MPs change their minds on prorogation Scottish judge refuses to block prorogation plan B. Johnson warns MPs not to damage chance of Brexit deal An alternative Parliament to fight No-Deal Brexit? Education spending increase plans Boris Johnson and Sajid Javid September 2019 Public opposition to Johnson "coup"Observer on secret plan to shut down Parliament
Dominic Cummings'' "reign of terror"

Mr Gove refuses to say whether Government would abide by no-deal blocking legislation

Government suggests it may ignore No Deal prevention legislation[ [Channel 4]
Government will deselect Conservative MPs who vote to block No Deal Brexit Irish Border After brexit: all ideas beset by issues Tory deselection threat may boost plans to stop no deal Brexit Speculation of snap Election mounts
B. Johnson Downing Street statement Guardian vtdeo
This prorogation is improper; the government should reverse it [The Constitution Unit]
Boris Johnson: Commons Defeat
Boris Johnson's electoral gamble risks wrecking Tory Party
....the Boris Johnson pantomime will end
ITV coverage of Commons Defeat and aftermath with useful video clips The Tory Rebels Cornered Boris Johnson suffers triple Commons defeat Could there still be an election and what is happening with No Deal Brexit? Brexit: Bill designed to block No Deal Brexit "will clear Lords"
Jo Johnson quits

Police chiefs condemn Johnson

An early or late election?

Jo Johnson resignation and aftermath : Channel 4
On Constitutional Reform [Prof. Meg Russell]Opinion Poll[ Other polls are available]Farage seeks election pact with Tories Will Boris Johnson depose himself? Amber Rudd resignation Boris Johnson and possible court battle over Brexit delay law Amber Rudd resignation Andrew Neil interviews George Osborne [2017] Useful background on economic debate Amber Rudd Resignation 6 ways Johnson could evade block on No Deal Brexit
John Bercow resigns

Boris Johnson loses 6th vote in 6 days
Parliament prorogued A Northern Ireland -only backstop? Return of Theresa May withdrawal agreement? MPs look to bring back May's deal Mini Cabinet reshuffle Scottish judges rule Boris Johnson's prorogation unlawful Prorogation ruled unlawful Farage-Johnson Pact? Prorogation ruled unlawful No Deal Brexit and Neoliberalism Senior Tories rebuff Farage deal How UK's Brexit drama became a crisis
Our very democracy is at stake

Sam Gyimah joins Lib Dems
David Cameron on Boris Johnson
Boris Johnson in Luxemburg

Ruth Davidson

Nothing normal about this beast of a government

Boris Johnson and Jennifer Arcuri

Supreme Court Judgement

More on Supreme Court verdict

One Nation Tories Unhappy

Inflammatory Language

We will respect the law and we will come out by October 31st

Brexit Forecast

Boris Johnson and Brexit Backers

Michel Barnier on Boris Johnson

Boris Johnson's Terrible Week

Will Boris Johnson ignore Brexit delay law

From 40 hospitals to 6

Jennifer Arcuri

Conservative Party Conference

Boris Johnson and Journalist

Boris Johnson's unwinnable chess game

Veteran Boris Johnson aide quits

The Tories have lost their ideology
October 2019
Moment of Truth on Brexit deal

Could some Labour MPs support Boris Johnson Brexit deal?

The EU prepares to move on

Conservative Party conference

Conservative Party Conference

Dominic Cummings
Boris Johnson prepares for discussions with EU leaders
Dismay in Brussels

EU Parliament

Boris Johnson seeks fresh suspension of Parliament from October 8th

Boris Johnson's Brexit plan revealed

Boris Johnson in new court showdown

Deal or no deal but no delay

Boris Johnson and new deal proposals

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The Guardian: Conservative Party Leadership Election The BBC: Conservative Party Leadership Election ITV: Conservative Party Leadership Election BBC Panorama : The Race for Number 10 Conservative Party Leadership Elections [House of Commons Research Briefing] The Results : All First 5 Rounds ***** July 2019 Boris Johnson defeats Jeremy Hunt The

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David Baddiel tries to understand the United Kingdom's constitution.

David Baddiel tries to understand the United Kingdom's constitution.

What does a constitution do? Does not having a written constitution mean we don't really have a constitution at all? Should we? And where does the Royal Family fit in? David speaks to Lord Lisvane, a former Clerk of the House of Commons, and to Lord Turnbull, once the country's top civil servant, to understand these and other puzzling questions about the constitution.

Producer: Giles Edwards.

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BBC Radio 4 - David Baddiel Tries to Understand, The Constitution

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David Baddiel tries to understand the United Kingdom's constitution.

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http://alevelpolitics.com/ukconstitutiontimeline/

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https://foreignpolicy.com/

http://alevelpolitics.com/

http://fdslive.oup.com/www.oup.com/orc/resources/politics/intro/internationalrelations/books/library/index.htm

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PM Powers

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Theresa May's hopes of asserting her authority with a Cabinet revamp fell flat after senior ministers derailed her reshuffle by refusing to budge from their jobs.

Jeremy Hunt, the Health Secretary, successfully faced down the Prime Minister when she asked him to become business secretary, forcing Mrs May to tear up her plans to promote or move other ministers who were already pencilled in.

Then Justine Greening, who had been asked to become the new Work and Pensions Secretary, dug in her heels during two and a half hours inside Downing Street, refusing the new role before finally announcing she was quitting the Government altogether.

Mrs May's inability to impose her will on her ministers was openly mocked as "embarrassing" by some of her own MPs, with one Government source describing the day's events as "the night of the blunt stiletto".

Downing Street had billed the reshuffle as a new year...

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Theresa May's chaotic Cabinet reshuffle: Jeremy Hunt refuses job as business secretary as Justine Greening quits

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Theresa May's hopes of asserting her authority with a Cabinet revamp fell flat after senior ministers derailed her reshuffle by refusing to budge from their jobs. Jeremy Hunt, the Health Secretary, successfully faced down the Prime Minister when she asked him to become business secretary, forcing Mrs May to tear up her plans to promote or move other ministers who were already pencilled in.

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A Conservative manifesto pledge to slash the number of MPs in a bid to save £50m is set to be abandoned, according to reports.

Divisive proposals to reduce the size of the Commons from 650 to 600 seats will be dropped after the prime minister, Theresa May, failed to hold on to her party's majority in the general election, the Times said, citing "three senior sources".

The reform was intended to save £50m over five years and equalise the number of voters in each constituency.

But concern about getting a Commons majority for the move, which would mean a wide-ranging redrawing of constituency boundaries, has reportedly led to the change of direction.

Last year, the Boundary Commission published draft seat boundaries designed to equalise the size of constituencies and cut back on MPs. May's team are said to doubt that she will be able to get the required vote to enact the plan.

The commission is set to publish its latest proposals based on 600 constituencies next month, revealing which MPs would face the axe.

Labour opposes the reduction, which would cut the number of seats in its urban heartlands and result in the party losing more seats than the Tories. The Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, has previously labelled the plans "gerrymandering".

The Tory leadership is preparing to abandon the plan and ask the Boundary Commission to redo the review on the basis of keeping all 650 MPs to ensure that all constituencies are of broadly equal size, the Times said.

If abandoned, the plans will be the latest Tory manifesto pledge scrapped in the wake of the snap election in June.

May has already dropped plans to push through social care funding changes dubbed the "dementia tax", and an expansion of grammar schools since the election.
Topics

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Theresa May 'to ditch plans to cut number of MPs'

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A Conservative manifesto pledge to slash the number of MPs in a bid to save £50m is set to be abandoned, according to reports. Divisive proposals to reduce the size of the Commons from 650 to 600 seats will be dropped after the prime minister, Theresa May, failed to hold on to her party's majority in the general election, the Times said, citing "three senior sources".

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We've just flicked the switch on moving all our digital resources to instant digital download - via our new subject stores.

For every subject you can now access each digital resource as soon as it is ordered. This will always be the latest edition of each resource too (and we'll update you automatically if there is an upgraded version to use).

Simply add the required resources to your cart, checkout using the usual options and your resources will be available to access immediately via your mytutor2u account.

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Podcast series on democracy | tutor2u Politics

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We've just flicked the switch on moving all our digital resources to instant digital download - via our new subject stores. For every subject you can now access each digital resource as soon as it is ordered. This will always be the latest edition of each resource too (and we'll update you automatically if there is an upgraded version to use).

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Membership of UK political parties - House of Commons Library

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As of July 2019, Labour had 485,000 members, compared to the Conservatives, who had 180,000 members. The SNP had around 125,500 members (December 2018), the Liberal Democrats 115,000 (August 2019), Green Party 48,500 (July 2019), UKIP 29,000 (April 2019) and Plaid Cymru 10,000 (October 2018).

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What does a tax-avoiding, polluting, privatising corporation have to do to get its way with the British government? Lobbyists operate in the shadows - deliberately. As one lobbyist notes: "The influence of lobbyists increases when it goes largely unnoticed by the public." But if the reasons why companies lobby are often obscured, it is always a tactical investment. Whether facing down a threat to profits from a corporate tax hike, or pushing for market opportunities - such as government privatisations - lobbying has become another way of making money. Here are the 10 key steps that lobbying businesses will follow to bend government to their will. "We all know how it works," said David Cameron of lobbying. But do we? Lobbyists are the paid persuaders whose job it is to influence the decisions of government. Typically, they operate behind closed doors, through quiet negotiation with politicians. And the influence they enjoy is constructed very consciously, using a whole array of tactics.
1. Control the ground

David Cameron and John Reid campaign against a proposed change to the UK voting system, April 2011. Photograph: Oli Scarff

Lobbyists succeed by owning the terms of debate, steering conversations away from those they can't win and on to those they can. If a public discussion on a company's environmental impact is unwelcome, lobbyists will push instead to have a debate with politicians and the media on the hypothetical economic benefits of their ambitions. Once this narrowly framed conversation becomes dominant, dissenting voices will appear marginal and irrelevant.

Everybody's doing it, including lobbyists for fracking and nuclear power, public sector reform and bank regulation. It doesn't matter if the new frame relies on fabrication. The referendum on an alternative voting system was not, as anticipated, so much a conversation about the merits of first past the post. No2AV was "very quick off the mark" to make it about cost to the public purse, explains Dylan Sharpe, of the No camp's TaxPayers' Alliance. They led with the claim that switching to AV would deny troops badly needed equipment and sick babies incubators. The Yes camp lost the vote two to one.

The trick is in knowing when to use the press and when to avoid it. The more noise there is, the less control lobbyists have. As a way of talking to government, though, the media is crucial. Messages are carefully crafted. Even if the corporate goal is pure, self-interested profit-making, it will be dressed up to appear synonymous with the wider, national interest. At the moment, that means economic growth and jobs.

Get the messaging wrong and you get fiascos such as High Speed 2 (HS2). In early 2011, lobbyist James Bethell of Westbourne Communications was parachuted in to rescue the £43bn project, which had initially been sold by ministers on the marginal benefits to a few commuters. Westbourne reframed the debate to make it about jobs and economic growth. The new messaging focused on a narrative that pitted wealthy people in the Chilterns worried about their hunting rights against the economic benefits to the north. The strategy was "posh people standing in the way of working-class people getting jobs," said Bethell. "Their lawns or our jobs," shouted the ad campaign.

Private healthcare also regrouped after the wrong messages went public. As Andrew Lansley embarked on his radical reforms of the NHS, private hospitals and outsourcing firms were talking to investors about the "clear opportunities" to profit from the changes. After comments by Mark Britnell, the head of health at accountancy giants KPMG giants and a former adviser of David Cameron, hit the headlines in May 2011 - Britnell told an investors' conference that "the NHS will be shown no mercy and the best time to take advantage of this will be in the next couple of years" - the industry got a grip. Lobby group The NHS Partners Network moved quickly to get everyone back on-message and singing from "common hymn sheets", as its chief lobbyist David Worskett explained. The reforms were about the survival of the NHS in straitened times. Just nobody mention the bumper profits.

3. Engineer a following

It doesn't help if a corporation is the only one making the case to government. That looks like special pleading. What is needed is a critical mass of voices singing to its tune. This can be engineered.

The forte of lobbying firm Westbourne is in mobilising voices behind its clients. Thirty economists, for example, signed a letter to the FT in 2011 in support of HS2; 100 businesses endorsed another published in the Daily Telegraph.

Westbourne was also hired in 2011 to lobby against the top rate of tax, although who was behind its "50p tax campaign" remains a mystery. Ahead of the chancellor's annual Budget announcement in early 2012, letters appeared in the press demanding he scrap it. The FT's was signed by 20 economists. The Telegraph's by the bosses of 573 SMEs, described as the "bedrock" of British industry. A quick glance, though, revealed it included five managers from the Switzerland-based banking giant Credit Suisse. The paper's commentary noted the alarm this new call from "ordinary British business" would cause inside government.

4. Buy in credibility

Corporations are one of the least credible sources of information for the public. What they need, therefore, are authentic, seemingly independent people to carry their message for them.

One nuclear lobbyist admitted it spread messages "via third-party opinion because the public would be suspicious if we started ramming pro-nuclear messages down their throats". That's it in a nutshell.

The tobacco companies are pioneers of this technique. Their recent campaign against plain packaging has seen them fund newsagents to push the economic case against the policy and encourage trading standards officers to lobby their MPs. British American Tobacco also currently funds the Common Sense Alliance, which is fronted by two ex-policemen and campaigns against "irrational" regulation. Philip Morris is similarly paying an ex-Met police officer, Will O'Reilly, to front a media campaign linking plain packaging to tobacco smuggling. It is worth noting that a decade ago the tobacco giant coughed up $1.25bn to the European Commission to settle a long-running dispute over its own complicity in the illicit trade.

"The thinktank route is a very good one," said ex-minister Patricia Hewitt to undercover reporters seeking lobbying advice. Some thinktanks will provide companies with a lobbying package: a media-friendly report, a Westminster event, ear-time with politicians. "The exact same services that a lobbying agency would provide," says one lobbyist. "They're just more expensive."

The Birmingham and Fazeley viaduct, part of the proposed route for the HS2 high speed rail scheme. Photograph: HS2

In the mid-noughties, a lobbyist for Standard Life Healthcare, now part of PruHealth, worried about how they could get more people to buy private cover without being seen to undermine the NHS. The solution: "Get some of the thinktanks to say it, so it's not just us calling for reform, it's outside commentators ... it does need others to help us take the debate forward." The insurers did turn to thinktanks, including free-market advocates Reform. This has lobbied for more "insurance-based private funding" in the health service. Prudential, the insurance giant behind PruHealth, was Reform's most generous sponsor in 2012, investing £67,500 in the thinktank.

The BBC has also come under repeated recent criticism for inviting commentators from the leading neo-liberal thinktank, the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA), to talk about its opposition to the plain packaging of cigarettes, without disclosing the Institute's tobacco funding. Although the IEA does not disclose who funds it, BAT concedes it has recently paid the IEA £30,000, with more to come this year. Leaked documents from Philip Morris also reveal the thinktank is one of its "media messengers" in its anti- plain-packaging campaign.

6. Consult your critics

Companies faced with a development that has drawn the ire of a local community will often engage lobbyists to run a public consultation exercise. Again, not as benign as it sounds. "Businesses have to be able to predict risk and gain intelligence on potential problems," says ex-Tesco lobbyist Bernard Hughes. "The army used to call it reconnaissance; we call it consultation."

For some in the business, community consultation - anything from running focus groups, exhibitions, planning exercises and public meetings - is a means of flushing out opposition and providing a managed channel through which would-be opponents can voice concerns. Opportunities to influence the outcome, whether it is preventing an out-of-town supermarket or protecting local health services, are almost always nil.

Residents in Barne Barton in Plymouth were asked in 2011 what they thought about a 95-metre, PFI-financed incinerator being sited in their neighbourhood, just 62 metres from the nearest house. Although more than 5,000 people objected, the waste company's planning application was waved through. That's community consultation.

7. Neutralise the opposition

Lobbyists see their battles with opposition activists as "guerilla warfare". They want government to listen to their message, but ignore counter arguments coming from campaigners, such as environmentalists, who have long been the bane of commercial lobbyists. So, they need to deal with the "antis".

Lobbyists have developed a sliding scale of tactics to neutralise such a threat. Monitoring of opposition groups is common: one lobbyist from agency Edelman talks of the need for "360-degree monitoring" of the internet, complete with online "listening posts ... so they can pick up the first warning signals" of activist activity. "The person making a lot of noise is probably not the influential one, you've got to find the influential one," he says. Rebuttal campaigns are frequently employed: "exhausting, but crucial," says Westbourne.

Lobbyists have also long employed divide-and-rule tactics. One Shell strategy proposed to "differentiate interest groups into friends and foes", building relationships with the former, while making it "more difficult for hardcore campaigners to sustain their campaigns". Philip Morris's covert 10-year strategy, codenamed Project Sunrise, intended to "drive a wedge between various anti groups" and "position antis as extremists".

Then there are the more serious activities used primarily when big-money commercial interests are threatened, such as the infiltration of opposition groups, otherwise known as spying. Household names such as Shell, BAE Systems and Nestlé have all been exposed for spying on their critics. Wikileaks' Global Intelligence Files revealed that groups such as Greenpeace, Amnesty International and animal rights organisation Peta were all monitored by global intelligence company Stratfor, once described as a "shadow CIA".

8. Control the web

Today's world is a digital democracy, say lobbyists. Gone are the old certainties of how decisions were made "by having lunch with an MP, or taking a journalist out," laments one. It presents a challenge, but not an insurmountable one.

The lobbyists: Tim Bell and James Henderson of Bell Potinger. Photograph: Sarah Lee

One key way to control information online is to flood the web with positive information, which is not as benign as it sounds. Lobbying agencies create phoney blogs for clients and press releases that no journalist will read - all positive content that fools search engines into pushing the dummy content above the negative, driving the output of critics down Google rankings. Relying on the fact that few of us regularly click beyond the first page of search results, lobbyists make negative content "disappear".

Another means of restricting access to information is the doctoring of Wikipedia, "a ridiculous organisation," in veteran lobbyist Tim Bell's words. Accounts associated with his firm, Bell Pottinger, have been caught scrubbing Wikipedia profiles of arms manufacturers, financial firms, a Russian oligarch and the founder of libel specialists Carter-Ruck. "It's important for Wikipedia to recognise we are a valuable source for accurate information," says Bell, a master at killing stories. Other edits by lobbyists range from a computer in the offices of payday lender Wonga deleting references to "usury" from its entry, to a computer registered to the American multinational Dow Chemical repeatedly attempting to remove a large section from the company's profile detailing "controversies".

9. Open the door

Without doubt, lobbyists need access to politicians. This doesn't always equate to influence, but deals can only be cooked up once in the kitchen. And access to politicians can be bought. It is not a cash deal, rather an investment is made in the relationship. Lobbyists build trust, offer help and accept favour.

The best way to shortcut the process of relationship-building is to hire politicians' friends, in the form of ex-employees or colleagues. Bill Morgan is a good example. In recent years, he's been backwards and forwards twice between Andrew Lansley's office and health-lobbying specialists MHP. Its clients had "obviously benefited" from Morgan's inside knowledge of Conservative health policy, MHP wrote. They could "look forward to continuing to be at the heart of the major policy debates".

Lobbyists are Westminster and Whitehall insiders, among them many former ministers. "You may remember me from my time as Minister of State for Transport," wrote Stephen Ladyman as he lobbied a potential government client in his new role as a paid adviser to a transport company. "I do indeed and am delighted to hear from you," replied the official. "We would be interested to hear your proposals."He had just opened the door.

10. And finally ...

There is the perception, at least, that decisions taken in government could be influenced by the reward of future employment. It's a concern that has been expressed for the best part of a century. Today, however, the number of people moving through the revolving door is off the scale.
A Quiet Word: Lobbying, Crony Capitalism and Broken Politics in Britain by Tamasin Cave and Andy Rowell is published by The Bodley Head at £18.99.
The top rung of the Department of Health has in recent years experienced huge traffic towards the private sector. The department that sees more movement than any other, though, is still the Ministry of Defence. Since 1996, officials and military officers have taken up more than 3,500 jobs in arms and defence related companies. Two hundred and thirty-one jobs were secured in 2011/12 alone.

Government is the arms industry's biggest customer and the MoD's closeness to its suppliers is widely known. It is also gaining a reputation for its disastrously expensive contracts that deliver poor value for taxpayers and often poor performance for the military. More than one commentator has asked whether the two are connected.

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The truth about lobbying: 10 ways big business controls government

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Tamasin Cave and Andy Rowell: From trying to stop plain packaging on cigarettes to pushing through HS2 and opening the countryside to fracking, big business employs lobbying companies to persuade government to meet their interests. But what are the tricks of their trade?

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The number of prisoners who vote has dropped from one in ten to one in 28 over the past decade.

The government introduced legislation in 2006 to allow inmates to vote after the European Court of Human Rights ruled that the British government had violated a prisoner's rights by refusing him the ability to participate in an election.

Ten per cent of prisoners, or 322, voted in the 2007 general election but this dropped to 3.5 per cent, or 143, at last year's local and European elections. In the 2016 general election, 160 prisoners, about 4 per cent, voted.

The Irish Prison Service said it had fully complied with the law in "facilitating prisoner voting in general and local elections and referenda". It said it

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Election 2020: Prisoners must be encouraged to vote, says charity as numbers fall

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The number of prisoners who vote has dropped from one in ten to one in 28 over the past decade. The government introduced legislation in 2006 to allow inmates to vote after the European Court of Human Rights ruled that the British government had violated a prisoner's rights by refusing him the ability to participate in an election.

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(Image: National Assembly for Wales)

The Queen has approved changing the law in Wales so 16 and 17-year-olds can vote in Welsh elections.

The Senedd and Elections (Wales) Act has today received Royal Assent.

It is the biggest change to the franchise in Wales since the voting age was reduced from 21 to 18 in 1969.

It will also introduce a new name Senedd Cymru/Welsh Parliament and extends the voting franchise to foreign nationals and 16 and 17-year olds - will not come in the force until early May 2020.

It will increase the number of people eligible to vote by 70,000.

Wales now joins Scotland, Guernsey, Jersey and the Isle of Man, as places people aged 16 and 17 can vote.

A separate piece of legislation is currently progressing through the Senedd on extending the right to vote for 16- and 17-year olds for the next council elections in Wales, due to take place in 2022.

Academic Laura McAllister led the Expert Panel on Assembly Electoral Reform and recommended votes at 16 and 17. She's argued it will "resuscitate our failing democracy".

Elin Jones AM, Llywydd of the National Assembly for Wales said: "I am honoured to mark this significant chapter in the story of our Assembly with the passing of the Senedd and Elections Wales (Bill) into an Act of the Assembly.

"We will have a new name, which will reflect our status as a mature legislature, and we will see the biggest extension to the franchise since 1969 - notably giving 16 and 17 year olds the right to vote in the Welsh General Election for the first time in 2021.

"It is a moment of great pride to watch our Assembly grow and evolve in order to continue to be at its best to serve the people of Wales."

Jess Blair, Director of Electoral Reform Society Cymru said: "This is a real step forward for young people across Wales, and a real campaign victory. 16 and 17 year olds will now rightly have a say over critical issues that affect their future, such as health, education and the economy. As we've already seen in Scotland, this is a boost for our democracy as a whole - strengthening citizenship and boosting political engagement.

"Over the past few years we've spoken to hundreds of young people across Wales - the first set of young people that will be voting in 2021 - and they can't wait to vote for the first time and truly have their voices heard.

"These changes send a decisive signal that 20 years after devolution Wales now has significant powers to do things differently and change the way elections work."

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Over 16s will vote in the next Assembly election as the Queen says yes

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The Queen has approved changing the law in Wales so 16 and 17-year-olds can vote in Welsh elections. The Senedd and Elections (Wales) Act has today received Royal Assent. It is the biggest change to the franchise in Wales since the voting age was reduced from 21 to 18 in 1969.

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Internet voting could help more people vote, but can it ever be secure enough to use?

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Plans to move the House of Lords outside of the London are under consideration as part of a drive to reform the institution that would fit with the government's pledge to "level up" the regions.

James Cleverly, the Conservative party chairman, confirmed parliament's second chamber - home to almost 800 appointed peers - could be relocated to York or Birmingham.

It follows the Tory government's pledge to do more to boost economic performance in struggling towns in northern England and the midlands as the Conservatives seek to reward new-found support in areas traditionally represented by Labour.

Questioned about the plan, first reported in the Sunday Times, Mr Cleverly told Sophy Ridge on Sky News: "It's one of a range of things that we are looking into.

"It's about demonstrating to people that we are going to do things differently. The Labour party lost millions of voters because they failed to listen."

Recommended

A wider reform of the Lords could be part of a constitutional overhaul trailed in the Conservatives' general election manifesto. The driving force behind sweeping changes is Dominic Cummings, the prime minister's chief adviser.

The Palace of Westminster, which houses both the Commons and the Lords, is due to be vacated for several years from 2025, under a six-year plan to restore the historic building by the Thames.

Shifting the Lords to northern England during that period, and potentially permanently, would be a highly symbolic way for Boris Johnson to demonstrate his determination to "level up" the rest of the UK with the capital.

Under current plans, the £4bn refurbishment of parliament would see peers move just over the road into the QEII Centre in Westminster, opposite Westminster Abbey.

However, Mr Johnson could use the opportunity to permanently move the House of Lords to the north of England. A decision on any new location for the second chamber is expected to be made this spring, as part a wider constitutional review.

Recommended

Last week, the Tory party confirmed it was planning to move its headquarters outside London.

"When the prime minister stood up the day after the general election and said this is going to be a people's government, he meant it. And that meant connecting people with government and politics," Mr Cleverly said on Sunday.

"Because the referendum in 2016 wasn't just about our relationship with the EU, it was about millions of people and their relationship with politics as a whole. So we're looking at a whole range of ways of connecting people, in the kind of places where we won representation for the first time in decades."

Meanwhile, the Labour party has nominated the former Commons speaker John Bercow and former deputy Labour leader Tom Watson for peerages.

Jeremy Corbyn's former chief of staff Karie Murphy has also been nominated, despite a continuing investigation by the Equality and Human Rights Commission into the handling of anti-Semitism in the party. Ms Murphy's role is expected to come under scrutiny during the probe.

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Conservatives plan to move House of Lords out of London

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Plans to move the House of Lords outside of the London are under consideration as part of a drive to reform the institution that would fit with the government's pledge to "level up" the regions. James Cleverly, the Conservative party chairman, confirmed parliament's second chamber - home to almost 800 appointed peers - could be relocated to York or Birmingham.

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GIVEN the departure of two cabinet ministers within a week, a growing sexual-harassment scandal and the general air of pandemonium that permeates the party, it is easy to forget that the Conservatives still have a country to run. Yet the wheels of government have to turn. The people with the job of keeping the show on the road are the whips: the MPs who corral their colleagues into backing their party's policies. But the "neglected toilers in the engine room of Parliament", as one former whip calls them, are showing signs of flagging, too. A parliamentary institution whose origins stretch back to the 18th century is starting to creak.

The multiplying allegations of sexual misbehaviour by MPs on all sides demonstrate the flaws of an ancient system in a modern age. A complaint to the whips is one of the few avenues available to young parliamentary staffers with little job security. The whips' office has to fill the void where a proper human-resources department should be, says Rob Wilson, a former Tory whip. "It's not cut out for it," he says. Whips have demonstrated a blasé attitude to sexual misdemeanours in the past. "Sexual misconduct can probably be dealt with," writes Helen Jones, a former government whip, in a recent book. "It will be awful for the person involved, and even worse for his wife or family, but the damage often fades with time."

This approach may not be surprising given that the whips' job is fundamentally amoral. Their business is to ensure that the government can pass its legislation-or, for opposition whips, that it is defeated. During Labour's minority administrations in the 1970s, six MPs died after being dragged to Parliament to vote in varying degrees of ill health, according to one whip from the period. The content of legislation is of no concern. "We don't do policy, we do process" was a refrain of Nick Brown, chief whip in the government of Gordon Brown.

To get the votes, whips apply pressure in various ways. They are in charge of dishing out parliamentary quarters, and because these offices range from airy spaces with glorious views of the Thames to windowless cupboards, this can be a potent force for MPs' loyalty. Whips have over the years cultivated an air of secretive menace. One likens his role to that of an Elizabethan spy, picking up any whiff of plot or sedition-or salacious gossip-and feeding it back to the "chief". Conservative MPs fear the "black book" that whips are said to fill with details of their misbehaviour.

Yet these powers are fading. One former MP compares whips to the Wizard of Oz: pull back the curtain and, instead of the all-powerful figure of legend, you find a "confused middle-aged man". Whips themselves admit that they know less than they let on. "Like all police work, it is based to some extent on a confidence trick," admitted Stephen Dorrell, a former Tory whip, when interviewed in the 1990s. Following the sexual-harassment scandals, they may be less inclined to boast about their black books. Whips in both main parties now face questions about whether they knew about claims of harassment.

Whips have also lost some of their formal powers. They no longer select the chairmen of parliamentary select committees, who are now elected by MPs. And changing social norms have put paid to the horror stories of MPs being bullied-sometimes physically-into voting the correct way. "The dark arts of whips are less dark then they were," says Mr Wilson. "They are more grey arts."

While their weapons have been blunted, their charges have become more rebellious. In the first four post-war parliaments, more than 90% of votes passed without a dissenting vote from a government backbencher, according to research by Philip Cowley of Queen Mary University in London. During the 1950s, two parliamentary sessions saw no government backbench rebellion at all. By contrast, in the first four years of the Conservative-Lib Dem coalition of 2010-15, nearly 40% of votes featured backbenchers rebelling. Once it begins, such sedition is contagious, argues Mr Cowley: "Rebellion breeds rebellion."

The increased willingness to defy the whips is partly due to MPs' greater fear of their constituents. Websites such as TheyWorkForYou.com make it possible to find out an MP's voting record in a few clicks, rather than by wading through Hansard. A vote that angers local constituents will no longer go unnoticed. No subject has made this clearer than Brexit. In the vote in January to allow the government to trigger Article 50 and begin the process of withdrawal from the European Union, 47 Labour MPs, mainly from constituencies that had voted for Remain, rebelled against the party's instruction to back the measure.

MPs are also more able than in the past to build their profile without the help of their party. Central offices provide enthusiastic door-knockers at election time and co-ordinate coverage in the national media-and may threaten to withdraw both if MPs misbehave. But social media have helped to short-circuit this system, allowing MPs to show off about their achievements and run their own campaigns via Twitter and Facebook.

At a time when they are weakened, whips' work is more important than ever. Both the main parties have been fractured by Brexit and must be whipped into voting for or against the mountains of Brexit-related legislation due in this parliament. The finely balanced state of the Commons means that every vote counts. The deal with the Democratic Unionist Party that keeps Mrs May in Downing Street was signed by her then chief whip. Rupert Harrison, a former Tory adviser, declared at the time: "In a minority government it's the chief whip who is really in charge."

This article appeared in the Britain section of the print edition under the headline "Parliament's whips have lost their edge, just as their role becomes vital"

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Parliament's whips have lost their edge, just as their role becomes vital

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GIVEN the departure of two cabinet ministers within a week, a growing sexual-harassment scandal and the general air of pandemonium that permeates the party, it is easy to forget that the Conservatives still have a country to run. Yet the wheels of government have to turn.

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A 59-WORD plan to crack down on non-residents selling property in Britain was only a small move by the chancellor in the budget on November 22nd. But it marked a big victory for Stella Creasy. The backbench Labour MP had for weeks demanded that the government close a loophole through which foreign property-owners could avoid capital-gains tax when selling up. Now they will have to cough up £470m ($630m) over the next six years.

It capped off a legislative hat-trick for the MP for Walthamstow, who has a knack for turning campaigns into law. This summer Ms Creasy led a successful push to provide free abortions for women from Northern Ireland on the British mainland. In the previous parliament, she hounded the government into clamping down on payday lenders. All three cases demonstrate the impact a single MP can have, even when in opposition.

Yet enterprising politicians such as Ms Creasy are thin on the ground. Part of the problem is systemic. Whereas American congressmen make names for themselves by proposing bills on an individual basis, Britain's system "does not encourage this sort of behaviour", says Philip Cowley of Queen Mary University in London.

First, there are few avenues for backbenchers to turn pet projects into law. Private members' bills, the main route available, are easily squished by filibustering. There have been high-profile successes: in the 1960s bans on abortion and homosexuality were lifted, and the death penalty abolished, thanks to private members' bills. But these pieces of legislation succeeded thanks to a home secretary who was willing to give them time and support.

Second, MPs keen on advancing their own careers will usually avoid trampling on the toes of their party's leadership by proposing their own amendments. British MPs are more dependent on their parties for promotion and funding than are their American counterparts. That makes them more obedient. MPs seeking a quiet life are content to spend their career as "lobby fodder", wandering whichever way the whips in charge of corralling MPs tell them, adds Mr Cowley.

But now the balance is tipping in favour of backbenchers. Current parliamentary arithmetic gives them clout: only seven Tory MPs have to rebel before the Conservative government stares at defeat. Rebelling against your party can still hinder a career, but often the government will blink first and alter course rather than face a parliamentary rout. In any case, former rebels can still rise to the top. Jeremy Corbyn, who now leads the Labour Party, voted against it a sixth of the time when he was a backbencher and the party was in power. Partly for that reason, many of his own MPs do not much fear the Labour whip.

The ranks of the backbenchers have also been reinforced. Both Labour and the Tories have overhauled their cabinets in the past two years-the Tories after the Brexit vote, Labour following the rise of Mr Corbyn-casting experienced MPs to the backbenches. Hilary Benn, a former shadow foreign secretary sacked by Mr Corbyn last year, has hailed the current session as a "backbenchers' parliament".

Lastly, backbenchers have a bit more institutional power than they did. A Backbench Business Committee, set up in 2010, helps MPs organise votes on personal topics. Online petitions and social media enable them to create a stink. When coupled with an unstable government, the conditions are ripe for backbench MPs to take the initiative. Somebody has to.

This article appeared in the Britain section of the print edition under the headline "Chaos in the government helps enterprising backbenchers"

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Chaos in the government helps enterprising backbenchers

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A 59-WORD plan to crack down on non-residents selling property in Britain was only a small move by the chancellor in the budget on November 22nd. But it marked a big victory for Stella Creasy. The backbench Labour MP had for weeks demanded that the government close a loophole through which foreign property-owners could avoid capital-gains tax when selling up.

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"Taking back control" has become the chameleon of political slogans. Once the catchphrase of the Leave campaign, pledging to wrestle back power for Britain from the EU, it has been seized on by Remainers to indicate parliament taking control from the government ever since Theresa May's defeat on a key Brexit vote.

And it isn't just about Brexit; control appears to be seeping from the front bench towards the opposition and back benches. With no working majority in the House of Commons, May's governing party is rarely taking chances. Damaging opposition motions are being passed in parliament without a fight, desperate discussions over controversial amendments are being held with rebels behind closed doors, and plans for ambitious domestic legislation are being dropped to make way for more backbench-led debates.

Yet, although exaggerated by the hung parliament, this power shift is no new phenomenon. BuzzFeed News has analysed parliamentary data to examine how the balance of power in the House of Commons has changed in recent years, and looked at what more can be done to give those outside the government a bigger voice. From the soaring numbers of urgent questions to the increasing impact of select committees, this is how backbenchers are taking back control.

John Bercow was first elected Commons Speaker in 2009 after pledging to give backbenchers more opportunity to hold the government to account. Few can say he has not lived up to his word. Almost immediately, he started granting urgent questions (UQs) far more frequently - allowing MPs to summon ministers to the despatch box to answer questions on an urgent matter the same day, rather than waiting for the government to deliver a statement on their own terms.

Analysis of annual parliamentary records by BuzzFeed News shows how the number of UQs has soared over the past decade. There were 73 UQs granted in 2016-17 (equivalent to 43 hours), compared to just nine (totalling six hours) in 2006-07, when Michael Martin was Speaker.

Daniel Leal-olivas / AFP / Getty Images

Bercow's "influence has been significant", say experts.

Despite the rise in UQs, the number of government statements has remained fairly steady over the years, showing that minsters are now being challenged more often than the government is making parliamentary statements. Indeed, Bercow believes this has changed the way ministers operate, saying earlier this year that "the revival of the UQ has led to ministers volunteering statements they might otherwise have sought to avoid because of the inconvenience".

Hannah White from the Institute of Government think tank says Bercow's influence in building backbenchers' power cannot be overestimated. "John Bercow has allowed more urgent questions both to make parliament more topical and to hold ministers to account," she says.

"He wants parliament to be discussing the issue of the day because he has an eye on public perceptions. You could have had a Speaker who decided to stick to the status quo, but this has been a determined effort to shake things up."

And it's not just UQs. Prime Minister's Questions has become notably longer in recent years; while the weekly session lasted a strict half an hour during Martin's tenure, it regularly runs to 45 minutes now under Bercow to allow more backbenchers to get their questions in.

Philip Cowley, a politics professor at Queen Mary University of London, agrees that Bercow's "influence has been significant, and he goes out of his way to rebalance power".

But he believes the shift in parliamentary power had in fact been going on for decades before Bercow's arrival. "It's definitely true that recent changes have enhanced the power of the back benches, but in reality this has been going for a long time," he says. "Parliament was relatively weak in the immediate postwar period but since the '70s has become increasingly more assertive."

Assertive backbenchers are just what May could do without as she struggles to get vital legislation passed on Brexit. The EU withdrawal bill, which aims to put EU law into British law before exit day, suffered long delays in reaching its detailed committee stage in the Commons.

That's because the minority government couldn't risk dealing with so many controversial amendments on the floor of the House - Conservative whips needed to try to talk round pro-European Tory rebels in advance to avoid any humiliating defeats.

Even when the committee stage did finally reach the Commons, the government was still climbing down on certain plans - such as the extent of so-called Henry VIII powers - to avoid a rebellion. In the end, its tiny working majority with the Democratic Unionist Party was no match for a group of Tory backbenchers determined to give parliament a "meaningful vote" on Brexit and put it into law.

In fact, apart from the EU withdrawal bill and measures from November's Budget, there has been very little actual legislation going though parliament since the June snap election. The PM was forced to abandon some of her key pledges - including an overhaul of social care and new grammar schools - after falling short of a majority, which has seen much of the Commons timetable fall into the hands of the opposition and backbenchers.

John Thys / AFP / Getty Images

Prime Minister's Questions has become notably longer in recent years.

"Since the general election, the government has looked to us to fill parliamentary time," says Labour MP Ian Mearns. He is chair of the backbench business committee, which was set up in 2010 to allow MPs to table their own topics for debate in both the Commons chamber and Westminster Hall.

"It just seems as though the government know they've got a legislative programme they can't escape from - EU and finance - but it looks like we'll have a parliamentary session very light on anything else," he says.

Mearns, who has been MP for Gateshead since 2010, reckons there has been a noticeable shift in power in recent years. "I wouldn't go over the top here, the executive still has control over the legislature, but I think there's been a shift in terms of the power of backbenchers to hold ministers to account," he says.

It wasn't supposed to be like this: May called a snap election when the Tories were riding high in the polls and was expected to win dozens more seats. Instead, her lacklustre campaign and a surge in support for Labour's Jeremy Corbyn saw the Tories lose their majority and subsequently appeal to the Democratic Unionists to back them in confidence votes and in the budget.

It means the government no longer has the numbers to ensure it can win other votes, such as opposition day motions. These have long been used by nongovernment parties to hold ministers to account; they aren't binding, so they don't change policy in themselves, but they are usually highly critical of government.

There are 20 for debate each parliamentary session - 17 for Labour and three for the SNP - and they have ranged from calling on government to give NHS workers a pay rise to demanding a pause in the rollout of universal credit.

In the past, opposition day debates have invariably led to a vote, which means each MP's stance is recorded in Hansard. But without a formal vote, it is impossible for Labour to point to all the Tories who have, for example, opposed a pay rise for nurses. This is just how the Conservative whips like it.

Then Labour started playing the government at its own game. If the Tories could be relied upon to roll over and allow opposition motions to pass, Labour needed to figure out a way to force them to deal with the consequences.

In a stroke of ingenuity, the party's whips and shadow Brexit secretary Keir Starmer deployed an arcane parliamentary procedure known as a "humble address" during an opposition day debate in November to force the government to release what they hoped would be assessments into the likely impact of Brexit on the UK economy.

Rarely used, this procedure allows parliament to petition the monarch, and by extension the government, to order certain documents to be produced. It soon dawned on the government whips that they weren't going to be able to shrug off that opposition day motion quite so easily.

Hannah Mckay / Reuters

Keir Starmer deployed an arcane parliamentary procedure known as a "humble address".

One Tory MP desperately approached Starmer during the debate, urging him to drop it, according to insiders in the chamber. But the motion went ahead, the Commons agreed it without a vote as expected, and that kickstarted a chain of events that did indeed end up delivering the papers to opposition MPs - embarrassing the government in the process.

For many MPs, the government's shift in attitude towards opposition day motions has revealed just how feeble its position in parliament has become. Tory MPs are now routinely under a three-line whip to abstain - effectively ordered to sit on their hands - allowing the motions to be approved without a vote.

But this has caused serious consternation; some Tories are privately furious at the message it sends out, about the weakness of the government to stand up to the opposition on matters of principle. Others warn that the government is making a mockery of parliament.

"It's bizarre, it's unprecedented," says Mearns. "I think they [the government] will live to regret it, I really do think so. We're taught all of our lives to respect the integrity of parliament."

Cowley has long studied the balance of power in Westminster. An academic paper he cowrote with Meg Russell from University College London in 2015 describes a clear "trend toward increasing independence" among backbenchers.

In the first four postwar parliaments, just 10% of divisions (votes in which MPs are divided into ayes and noes) saw government backbenchers vote against the whip - "and during two sessions in the 1950s, not even one such revolt occurred".

Rebellions increased during the 1970s, dropped slightly during the Tory premierships of Margaret Thatcher and John Major, then rose "significantly" after the 1997 election of Labour's Tony Blair. There were government rebellions in 28% of divisions in 2005-2010, and in 39% of divisions under the Tory-Liberal Democrat coalition between 2010-2014.

"There is no one thing driving this change," Cowley says. "Some people get obsessed about social media - which has certainly increased the visibility of MPs - but the direction of travel was already clear way before anyone anyone knew what Twitter was. You have seen a more assertive, less compliant type of MP being elected for multiple elections now."

Indeed, actions by an assertive committee of MPs led to sweeping changes to parliament in 2010. These "Wright reforms" - led by then Labour MP Tony Wright - reflected growing concern about the unbalanced relationship between government and parliament after more than a decade of Labour in power, and fears that executives with large majorities were simply railroading legislation through the Commons.

The backbench business committee is one product of these reforms, allowing MPs for the first time to schedule their own backbench debates. The other key reform is the election, by secret ballot, of select committee chairs. In the past, party whips were able to influence these appointments behind the scenes - undermining the committees' role to scrutinise government policy and hold ministers to account.

There is no doubt the authority and public prominence of select committees has increased as a result, with some MPs choosing to run as chair of the most influential committees rather than seeking ministerial office. And while recommendations from committees can - and do - lead to changes in the law, it is their influence behind the scenes that is arguably more important. One government official told Cowley that when considering policy in the first place, "you've always got to think, how would I explain that to the committee?"

Another key Wright reform was ensuring that official government petitions (quaintly known as e-petitions) securing more than 100,000 signatures would be eligible for debate by MPs. That doesn't mean a change in policy, but it does mean that a minister has to stand up and answer questions about a topic that many voters feel strongly about. In December, for example, MPs debated the slave auctioning of African migrants in Libya, after a petition calling on the UK government to put pressure on Libya was signed by over 265,000 people.

But there are still some proposed reforms that are yet to be implemented, thanks to the stubbornness of party managers on both sides. Wright's group recommended a new House business committee that would give backbenchers a far bigger say in the Commons timetable, including when debates are held and - crucially - how long parliament is given to debate key legislation.

The move would see the backbench business committee join with representatives of government and the opposition to come up with a draft agenda for the week ahead. That agenda would then need to be agreed in a vote by MPs.

In a major speech in October, Bercow lamented the failure of parliament to set this up. "Especially in the context of a House with no single party majority, the notion of a House business committee is entirely reasonable," he told the Hansard Society. "It would be open, democratic and transparent - features which, with the best will in the world, cannot be claimed for the underworld that is the 'usual channels'."

It is these "usual channels" that are blocking the way, however. The government doesn't want to give up its power in timetabling bills, and the opposition is hoping to replace it in power soon so doesn't fancy it either. White says: "No government wants to have to decide its agenda in the House by consultation."

Bercow also called for MPs to decide when parliament needed to be recalled during recess for emergency debates. At the moment that is in the hands of the government, but Bercow suggested that parliament itself should make that decision. As with UQs, he believes that if the threat is there that MPs can force ministers back to the House in mid-August, the government might just "jump before it was pushed" and offer a recall itself.

Private members' bills (PMBs) also face a shake-up, to make sure parliament can occasionally generate laws of its own and not just scrutinise the government's plans. These bills allow MPs and peers to come up with their own proposals - but there is such limited time for them on Fridays that it is very rare for any to become law. In fact many are "talked out" by filibustering MPs, never to be seen again.

The Commons procedure committee, chaired by Tory MP Charles Walker, has come up with some ambitious proposals for reform. PMBs would be renamed "backbench bills" and several would be selected by the backbench business committee as priority for debate. To cut down on filibustering, for the first seven sitting Fridays of a session, a debate on a bill that has lasted the whole day would end with a vote.

So far, though, MPs have been reluctant to put this into practice. Cowley says: "An overhaul of private members' bills would be a big move. At the moment it's very difficult for MPs to make new laws, as opposed just to responding to what government proposes - increasing their ability to to make legislation would significantly alter the balance of power."

Whatever is decided for the future, the balance between parliament and government has never been so exposed as it is during the Brexit process, as tensions run high as to whether the executive or backbenchers should have a bigger say in the most divisive issue facing the nation. "Taking back control" has never been so relevant.

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This Is How Backbenchers Are Taking Back Control In Parliament

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"Taking back control" has become the chameleon of political slogans. Once the catchphrase of the Leave campaign, pledging to wrestle back power for Britain from the EU, it has been seized on by Remainers to indicate parliament taking control from the government ever since Theresa May's defeat on a key Brexit vote.

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General elections are like a mirror in which a society's values are reflected. On certain occasions, the outcome of an election shows that a society has decided to change direction. The election alters the course of political life. This series of lectures considers six post-war elections, five of which were landmarks. The sixth lecture will be on the next election, which will probably be held on 7th May 2015. While it is impossible to predict the outcome, it is reasonable to predict that it will have profound consequences.

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General elections are like a mirror in which a society's values are reflected. On certain occasions, the outcome of an election shows that a society has decided to change direction. The election alters the course of political life. This series of lectures considers six post-war elections, five of which were landmarks.

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The problems with referendums are well known: they reduce often complex questions to a binary choice; they are a demagogue's dream, allowing populists free rein to fan fears, distort realities and appeal to emotions; voters can see them as a chance to voice their unhappiness about something else entirely.

And yet referendums are on the rise. In June, the EU referendum for Britain; last week, in Hungary, a referendum concerning refugees and migrants; in Colombia, one about a peace deal to end the country's 50-year armed rebellion; and this December Italians will be given a vote on constitutional reforms.
Why Colombians voted against peace with the Farc | Isabel Hilton
As often as not referendums do not produce the result the politicians intend. So what explains their popularity?

A sharp increase in referendums is typical in periods of change and political uncertainty, according to Matt Qvortrup, professor of applied political science at Coventry University and author of Referendums Around the World. He estimates that, from roughly 10 a year worldwide in the 1960s, 70s and 80s, the rate is now "approaching 50 a year".

Referendums were much in vogue after the French and Russian revolutions, in the aftermath of the second world war, and after the fall of communism, he said: "We see referendums when the political party system is in flux, when politicians feel unsure of who their supporters are and what they think."

For politicians a referendum is "a way of kicking an issue into the grass", a fairly safe means of resolving a problem that, in an election, might prove a major vote loser.

A lost referendum is rarely fatal. Before David Cameron stepped down in the wake of the UK's Brexit vote, the last European prime minister to resign after ending up on the wrong side of a plebiscite was in Norway, in 1972.

From the 70s to the 90s, Qvortrup said, politicians largely felt confident about who was voting for them and why. Large, mainstream parties of the centre left and right dominated the political scene and most voters trusted them to make decisions. In many countries that is no longer so; politics are becoming increasingly fragmented, and voters sceptical and disaffected.

Research by SörenHolmberg, a Swedish academic, had shown that voters in the 1970s agreed with up to 90% of their chosen party's platform, Qvortrup said, whereas today that figure was 60%. Moreover, referendums are often confidence votes and statistics show the longer a party has been in power the less support it can expect in a plebiscite.

Most voters do not want too much of a good thing. Having "hired" politicians in much the same way as they hire an estate agency, Qvortrup suggested, the public expects their houses to be sold for them at the right price, without being constantly quizzed about the details.
'The question was stupid': Hungarians on the refugee referendum
But the recent return of the referendum may also fit with a move away from the "package deal", he added. People, he said, were now more individualist than before: "We expect to be able to compile our own playlists, in politics too."

All these factors help explain the disruptive votes in several recent referendums: in Britain and Colombia, where governments lost; and in Hungary, where although those who did vote overwhelmingly supported the government not enough voters turned out to make the referendum valid.

Referendums should, Qvortrup said, be confined to really big questions, "irreversible decisions that will really impact people's lives", and be held only in rare and exceptional circumstances.

Otherwise, politicians should simply be bolder, present their really significant policies at elections, and accept the outcome as a mandate or a rejection. Referendums were "kind of the chicken option", he said.
Topics

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Why referendums are problematic - yet more popular than ever

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The problems with referendums are well known: they reduce often complex questions to a binary choice; they are a demagogue's dream, allowing populists free rein to fan fears, distort realities and appeal to emotions; voters can see them as a chance to voice their unhappiness about something else entirely.

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The Government's response to the House of Commons Political and Constitutional Reform Committee's (PCRC) report Do we need a constitutional convention for the UK? is in many ways a rather unremarkable document (Cm 8749, November 2013). The PCRC's report (Fourth Report of Session 2012-13, HC 371) was published on 28 th March 2013, and concluded that there was 'a need to consider both how the increasingly devolved parts of the Union interact with each other, and what we, as residents of the UK, want the Union to look like going forward'. As a result the PCRC suggested that the Government 'consider, among other options, preparations for a UK-wide constitutional convention, including decisions about its form and organisation, and the process of calling for evidence', which would be held in the aftermath, and regardless of the result, of the Scottish independence referendum in September 2014.

The qualified nature of this suggestion stemmed from the fact that there were 'a range of very different opinions' as to the necessity and/or desirability of holding a constitutional convention for the UK among the witnesses who provided evidence to the PCRC's inquiry, and the absence of unanimity among Committee members about the recommendations which ought to be made to the Government. Yet it is most unlikely that even had the PCRC offered a resounding and unreserved endorsement of a need for a constitutional convention urgently to be convened that an alternative response from the Government would have been prompted from that which was actually received. For the Government concluded that there was not a strong case to hold a constitutional convention at this time (para 4.3) as there was a lack of public demand (para 2.2), and it had alternative pressing priorities; in particular, the need to focus on ensuring the recovery of the UK economy (para 1.3).

So far, so unsurprising - lack of public interest and scarcity of resources being used to justify (politely) a government declining to engage in a potentially elaborate exercise in constitutional reform.

What is of interest, then, in the Government's response? Two things might be considered worthy of note. First, the Government does not reject the argument that a constitutional convention should be held in principle. It does not, in other words, argue that a constitutional convention is not a potentially useful mechanism through which constitutional reform could be pursued in (or to) the UK. The Government accepts that 'there may be situations in which a constitutional convention is needed' (para 4.1), and while declining to comment specifically on the possible composition of such a convention, the important principle that the public should be the 'driving force' in such an undertaking is accepted (para 2.1).

Of course, future governments will not necessarily be bound by the position taken by the Coalition. But the response of the Government, taken together with the assessment of the matter carried out by the PCRC, does seem to recognise that future significant constitutional reform to or within the UK may need to be the result of a process that is more inclusive and reflective than might have been experienced previously. This is not to say that some (perhaps much?) constitutional reform cannot still be government-led - as the Government's response indicates, 'context is crucial' (para 1.4). Instead, it is to acknowledge the availability of the constitutional convention as a tool of constitutional reform in the UK, and thus the possibility of broader engagement with the future shape and substance of the constitution than a model in which it is (broadly, albeit with input from other actors and groups) for the UK Government to determine, and the UK Parliament to implement, the quantity and quality of modifications to the existing settlement.

The second matter of interest in the Government's response to the PCRC report is not about the process of constitutional reform, but the attitude to reform which is evident in the document. Constitutional reform is explicitly said to be 'important' (para 4.1), and much more time is spent in the response detailing the programme of constitutional reform that the Coalition Government has engaged in during its time in office than actually addressing the need (or lack thereof) for a constitutional convention.

The central motif for this programme of reform is presented as 'decentralisation', something understood to accommodate both further devolution of power to Northern Ireland (the transfer of policing and justice functions in 2010, with the prospect of additional fiscal powers being devolved currently under consideration), Wales (the 2011 referendum leading to the devolution of 'full law-making powers' in the subject areas originally covered by the Welsh settlement, with the commitment to accept many of the Silk Commission's recommendations on future financial powers for Wales) and Scotland (the extensive devolution of fiscal power under the Scotland Act 2012, and the prospect of further devolution if Scotland remains a part of the UK after 2014), in addition to shifting power away from Westminster to local government in England.

Whether it is right to describe this redistribution of power to local government as a 'historic shift' (para 3.24), or whether all the examples cited can really be understood to form part of a programme of constitutional reform (for example, 'creation of enterprise zones in 24 cities and wider Local Enterprise Partnership areas that provide significant tax breaks'?) can be debated elsewhere. What is clear is that the Government wants to present itself as having a pursued an extensive, but also coherent, reform agenda. Examples of constitutional change which do not fit into the overarching decentralisation narrative are either sidelined (the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Act 2011 and Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011 are mentioned in passing in para 3.11, despite the significance of the latter, and the intentions - if not the results - of the former) or left out ( European Union Act 2011? Succession to the Crown Act 2013? Crime and Courts Act 2013?). Perhaps it would be too much to expect the failed attempts to reform the House of Lords to be acknowledged, but the result is that a full impression of the (significant) reforming aspirations of the Coalition is not achieved by attempting to organise its programme around the notion of decentralisation.

Is this of great importance? Is it not the prerogative of each government to try to make what it has achieved as consistent and rational as possible? And the notion of decentralisation has not been freshly invoked for the purposes of this response - indeed, the Coalition agreement Our Programme for Government of May 2010 spoke of 'a determination to oversee a radical redistribution of power away from Westminster and Whitehall to councils, communities and homes across the nation' in the foreword, in addition to highlighting the importance of decentralisation itself in section 4 on Communities and Local Government (although interestingly the principle is not mentioned in section 24 on Political Reform).

Yet it can be seen to tell us something important about the attitude of the Government to reform. That governments have been interested in pro-actively engaging in constitutional reform has been clear since the New Labour Government which first took office in 1997. As Rodney Brazier has demonstrated, prior to this attempts at constitutional reform were generally ad-hoc and reactive (see Constitutional Reform, 2008, 3 rd ed. OUP). However, successive New Labour administrations engaged in reform not because it was required by extenuating circumstances, but because it was seen to be desirable in its own right. The Coalition Government has continued to seek pro-actively to reform the constitution in a range of areas, but the attempts made to explain and justify what has been done in the response to the PCRC also seem to go further. They appear to be presenting a range of reforms as part of a systematic plan, with decentralisation of power the overriding objective. Constitutional reform is here presented as being pro-active and systematic, taking us further than ever before from the pre-New Labour paradigm. Whether this programme of reform is systematic, or is simply being represented as such with a particular purpose in mind, is not something that needs to be conclusively determined here. What matters is that the Government is seeking to portray it as such.

It would be to read too much into a relatively straightforward response to a Select Committee inquiry to view this as some kind of dramatic step forward. But the attitude to constitutional reform which underpins this response is, in my view, important. It shows that the shift in approach to constitutional change initiated by New Labour has not only continued under the Coalition, but arguably developed further. Reform should not just be pro-active, but will also ideally be coherent, and justified by reference to common underlying principles. Gordon Brown's The Governance of Britain (Cm 7170, July 2007) may have been a more dramatic statement of such intent, but ultimately disappointed. The present Government's representation of its efforts to reform the UK constitution in response to the PCRC seems to confirm that this attitude has taken root (although disappointments still remain). Ultimately, we may then hope that trying to talk about constitutional reform in a more coherent and systematic way will eventually lead us to practice constitutional reform in a more coherent and systematic way too.

The Government's response to the PCRC may therefore be unremarkable on the face of it. Yet those who are interested in changing methods and attitudes to reform of the UK constitution may find that, beneath the surface, there is some evidence of progress.
Dr Mike Gordon is Lecturer in Public Law at Liverpool Law School, University of Liverpool.
Suggested citation: M. Gordon, 'Constitutional Reform under the Coalition Government' UK Const. L. Blog (18th December 2013) (available at http://ukconstitutionallaw.org )

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Mike Gordon: Constitutional Reform under the Coalition Government

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The Government's response to the House of Commons Political and Constitutional Reform Committee's (PCRC) report Do we need a constitutional convention for the UK? is in many ways a rather unremarkable document (Cm 8749, November 2013). The PCRC's report (Fourth Report of Session 2012-13, HC 371) was published on 28th March 2013, and concluded that...

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Home secretary pledges 'new and radical programme of social reform' while saying party needs to represent modern Britain

Theresa May has sought to cast herself as a "one nation" Tory figure who can unite the UK and her party amid divisions in the wake of last week's Brexit vote as she set out her pitch for the Conservative party leadership.

As well as portraying herself as unifier, the home secretary's opening salvo in the contest saw her portray herself as a "proven leader" with a vision of a country "that works not for the privileged but for everyone".

May's initial prospectus, set out in an article for the Times as she launches her campaign on Thursday, includes a pledge to argue for a "new and radical programme of social reform" as she sought to neutralise criticism that she lacked a clear overarching vision.

"This programme - true to my party's proud philosophical tradition of one nation - will include big change to the way we think about our economy, our society and our democracy," she wrote.

While she said she believed in capitalism and free markets, May said she committed to reform where they were losing public support and where there were "gross abuses of power".

Other sections of the piece appeared to have been penned with a view to landing some early blows against Boris Johnson, her closest rival for the job.

After a section in which she highlighted a range of inequalities in modern Britain along lines including race and class, she added: "Frankly, not everybody in Westminster understands what it's like to live like this.

"And some need to be told that what the government does isn't a game, it's a serious business, that has real consequences for people's lives."

While not specifically citing her often-repeated 2002 warning that the Tories had become the "nasty party," May wrote that, as chairman of the party, she was the first to say that it needed to change and to become more representative of modern Britain.

Turning to her record as home secretary, she said she had overseen a fall in crime to its lowest recorded level and had made it her mission to tackle injustice, citing her involvement in the Stephen Lawrence case, Hillsborough and the tackling of police corruption.

May also said she had blocked the extradition of the hacker Gary McKinnon "under huge pressure from the United States" and mentioned how she had flown to Jordan to pave the way for the extradition of Abu Qatada.

She concluded her pitch by seeking to re-emphasise her one-nation credentials, adding: "We will put ourselves at the service of ordinary, working people and we will strive to make Britain a country that works for everyone, regardless of who they are and regardless of where they're from."
Topics

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Theresa May sets out 'one-nation Conservative' pitch for leadership

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Home secretary pledges 'new and radical programme of social reform' while saying party needs to represent modern Britain Theresa May has sought to cast herself as a "one nation" Tory figure who can unite the UK and her party amid divisions in the wake of last week's Brexit vote as she set out her pitch for the Conservative party leadership.

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Pol Review - May a One nation conservative.docx

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Boris Johnson wants to banish the "B word" from British politics at 11pm on Friday. From that point onwards Mr Johnson, the architect of the UK's departure from the EU, hopes the Brexit trauma of the past four years can be replaced by a new unifying national mission: "levelling up" a country whose jagged contours of inequality were exposed in the 2016 EU referendum.

While Brexit supporters prepare for a festival of Union Jack-waving in London's Trafalgar Square on Friday, Mr Johnson will convene a cabinet meeting at an undisclosed venue in the north of England - a region previously regarded as terra incognita to many Conservatives, but which now looks to the new prime minister to build a fairer, more prosperous post-Brexit Britain.

The symbolism is clear. Mr Johnson recognises that the Brexit vote was for many people in what has been dubbed "left behind Britain" not so much a shout of defiance against the EU as a cry for help. The day after he won an 80-seat House of Commons majority, Mr Johnson said: "What is this new government going to do? We are going to unite and level up, bringing together this incredible United Kingdom."

When the prime minister sets out his plans in a speech early in February, the focus will be on the need to secure new trade deals - including one with the EU - and the push to spread growth across the country. "Brexit will not be mentioned, unless you count saying that we don't want to talk about Brexit any more," says one Johnson aide.

Mr Johnson is attempting to redefine his Conservative party and the country it governs. The party of Margaret Thatcher - whose 1980s reforms put rocket boosters under London and the financial services sector and spawned a global wave of privatisations that stretched from Latin America to Russia - is seen by many in the north, the midlands and Wales as ruthlessly in love with the free market but callous about its consequences.

Mr Johnson is trying to use Brexit to change that image by questioning the core ideas about state intervention in the economy and regional development which have been the party's orthodoxy since the Thatcher years. He is promising to shift civil servants out of London, change Treasury rules to favour investment in the north, a £100bn boost to infrastructure and a nimbler state aid policy to help failing strategic industries. On Wednesday his government nationalised the Northern rail franchise after public anger over its poor performance.

But will it be enough? And will a party which still has its centre of gravity in the prosperous south be willing to accept the tough choices - and pick up the bill - so that the prime minister can make good on his promises?

Mr Johnson was propelled back to Downing Street on December 12 by voters in seats long held by the opposition Labour party such as Burnley, Stoke-on-Trent and Dudley, towns cut adrift from globalisation, crushed by market forces and ravaged by a decade of austerity. They voted for Brexit and, as Mr Johnson acknowledged, they "lent" their votes to the Conservatives. Now they expect payback.

Tory Eurosceptics have long argued that Brexit would be a great opportunity to "reboot" the British economy, but they have not always agreed how. Some argued that leaving the EU would help drive forward the Thatcher revolution, sweeping away Brussels' regulations on everything from laws limiting working hours and some environmental rules.

In 2017 Mr Johnson and Michael Gove, a fellow Brexiter, used their positions in Theresa May's cabinet to urge the then prime minister to pursue a robust Brexit, in which Britain could adopt "pro-competitive regulation" and tax "simplification". Some Conservatives cited Singapore as the kind of free market idyll they envisaged after Brexit.

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But Mr Johnson has always been ideologically nimble or, as the former Tory deputy prime minister Michael Heseltine calls him, "the most flexible politician in modern times". Realising that his new voters have little enthusiasm for a small state and aggressive deregulation, the One Nation vision Mr Johnson now offers is one in which the state actively intervenes to promote economic recovery. He is offering higher spending, particularly on infrastructure, and has dropped a previous commitment to cut taxes for higher earners.

Although Mr Johnson insists on the "right to diverge" from EU regulations, his ministers say they will "not diverge for the sake of it". Indeed, the prime minister argues that he wants the right to set tougher regulations on workers' rights and the environment than those agreed at a European level.

Brexit itself is only a relatively small part of Mr Johnson's "levelling up" agenda. He wants to attract investment into about 10 free ports - zones outside normal tax and customs rules - in depressed parts of Britain, but most of his policy ideas have little or nothing to do with the act of leaving the EU. Indeed, free ports already exist in the EU.

Nick Timothy, chief of staff under Mrs May and author of the book Remaking One Nation, says the real significance of the 2016 Brexit vote was that it forced politicians to confront the fact that something had gone badly wrong.

"It made politicians realise they had to do something differently," he says, acknowledging that the May government did not do enough. But, he says, Mr Johnson will have to be bold: "People say this is a one-off chance, but this public policy challenge has existed for quite a long time."

He notes that Labour governments between 1997 and 2010 tried to revive the regions outside the booming south-east, rebuilding the country's social infrastructure and devolving power to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, but failed to stop the riptide of globalisation draining life out of former industrial towns. "It's hard," Mr Timothy says, "it will require innovation and experimentation."

Many economists say Brexit will make Mr Johnson's task harder. Sajid Javid, chancellor, is keeping a tight grip on current public spending and aims to run a balanced budget on day-to-day spending by 2023. Yet the government's own leaked analysis in 2018 suggested the Canada-style trade deal with the EU sought by Mr Johnson would cut Britain's economic growth by up to 5 per cent over 15 years.

Leaving the EU single market will create friction and costs at the border for manufacturers with intricate supply chains - notably aerospace, automotive, chemicals and pharmaceuticals - which are largely based in the industrial areas Mr Johnson has wooed.

The prime minister has promised a £100bn increase in infrastructure spending over five years, funded by cheap borrowing, while the National Health Service, police and science are being prioritised for additional day-to-day cash. Other parts of the public realm, which have lost out during austerity, will continue to feel the squeeze.

Mary Creagh, a former Labour MP who lost her seat in Wakefield, West Yorkshire, to the Tories in December, says Mr Johnson is "throwing out chaff" - for example his aides have hinted at moving the House of Lords to the northern city of York - to disguise the fact that the government will not have the cash to transform the regions. "Brexit will make the country poorer forever and that means less money for infrastructure and other areas of public spending," she says.

How far Mr Johnson will move away from the rigorous free market policies pursued by successive British governments, more or less continuously, since Thatcher came to power in 1979 remains unclear. She ended subsidies for struggling industries, such as steel and coal mining, and millions lost their jobs. Many towns, which grew up around a single industry, lost their main source of income and identity.

Successive Labour governments tried to stem the tide with public spending on new schools, hospitals and community centres but had little success in attracting private sector investment to smaller towns. Economic activity in a globalised world favoured big, well connected hubs with access to skilled workers in the south of the country such as London, Reading and Cambridge.

Mr Johnson is a full-throated champion of free enterprise, unlike Mrs May, who kept business at arm's length during her three years in Downing Street. Some, like Tim Bale, a professor of politics at London's Queen Mary University, question whether the prime minister can persuade his largely southern party to accept an agenda of higher public spending - and probably higher taxes.

"I'm pretty sceptical," he says. "We have heard this from three Conservative governments under David Cameron, Theresa May and now Boris Johnson. This is basically a small state, low tax, low regulation party which will find it quite difficult to do serious stuff about the structural problems in this country."

Patrick Minford, however, one of Thatcher's favourite economists and a prominent Brexit supporter, says it is time for a change. The government should borrow not just to build infrastructure but for day-to-day spending. Pushing growth up to Mr Javid's ambitious target of 2.8 per cent would also allow room for tax cuts. "Monetary policy has run out of road," he says. "We need fiscal policy."

Prof Minford, of Cardiff Business School, says it is "common sense" for Mr Johnson's government to rescue Flybe - a regional airline and early beneficiary of the new administration's commitment to the country's regions - because air travel between provincial cities is important but demand not strong enough to deliver commercially. "Regional airlines have gone bust. But it is vital infrastructure."

Jim O'Neill, the former Goldman Sachs economist and Treasury minister who helped devise the Northern Powerhouse strategy under the Cameron government, also backed a new approach. "Economic liberalism is supposed to be the best way to deliver productivity gains and in the last decade it has not done that. Across the G7 countries since the financial crisis it has not worked."

He believes the Treasury should loosen the straitjacket. Mr Javid is rewriting rules, the so-called Green Book, that currently discourage state investment in poorer places. Existing rules mean that areas such as London receive more money because they are more productive. Mr Javid told the FT in January that the rules "entrench" inequality.

Lord O'Neill argues that the government's new cost/benefit analysis should take into account one-off transformational gains that fundamentally improve the potential of an economy. But he fears that the new politics favour investing in towns - some now represented for the first time by Tory MPs - as opposed to big cities in the north. Older, less racially diverse and pro-Brexit, these towns backed the Tories heavily even in areas devastated by industrial decline in the 1980s and austerity in the 2010s.

He argues that the economics suggest that building up cities such as Manchester and Leeds as alternative business locations to London will have the biggest impact, with improved public transport allowing peripheral towns to feed off the success of local centres.

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Diane Coyle, Bennett Professor of Public Policy at the University of Cambridge, also warns against spreading "the worst kind of jam too thinly". She questions whether the government has the necessary commitment to close a north-south divide that on some measures was as wide as the one between the old East and West Germany.

She says Mr Javid's £100bn infrastructure fund is too small. "It will take hundreds of billions," she says. "We have not done this since the Victorian age." Some could be borrowed but "we will have to pay more tax", she adds.

Like the riots that ripped apart England's inner cities in the early 1980s, the 2016 Brexit vote forced politicians to reappraise what is happening in their own country. The big test for Mr Johnson remains making good on his "levelling up" slogan.

He models his economic style on Lord Heseltine, who combined support for the free market with a belief that the state can help reverse decline. His role in reviving Liverpool's redundant inner city docks after the 1981 riots in nearby Toxteth is still seen as a model for regeneration. But the peer says the prime minister has some way to go.

"He calls himself a Brexity Hezza," Lord Heseltine says. "We shall see."

The passionate pro-European, now 86, has urged the prime minister to accelerate efforts to push more power and money out to regional mayors to allow local communities to help themselves. "It's a mistake to say they just have to regenerate the north," Lord Heseltine says. "They have to regenerate the whole economy."

The north:
from 'managed decline' to election victory

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Brexit: will Boris Johnson reverse Thatcherism?

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Boris Johnson wants to banish the "B word" from British politics at 11pm on Friday. From that point onwards Mr Johnson, the architect of the UK's departure from the EU, hopes the Brexit trauma of the past four years can be replaced by a new unifying national mission: "levelling up" a country whose jagged contours of inequality were exposed in the 2016 EU referendum.

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Edexcel Component 1.2: Conservatism: core ideas and principles; differing views and tensions within conservatism. Background: what you need to know
This article discusses a concept which is central to the debate about what Conservatism stands for: how far conservatives should accept social inequality. Make sure that you understand the relevant ideas and principles of Conservatism as outlined in the specification: the notion of a hierarchical society in which inequality is a natural feature.
Click to read the article below and then answer the questions:
Using the article

The article accepts that social equality is not natural territory for thinkers of the right. However, it argues that it is in the true interests of Conservatism to seek to narrow the gap between rich and poor. What arguments does it put forward in support of this ambition? What policies does it recommend as a means of reducing inequality?

Question in the style of AQA Politics Paper 3

Explain and analyse three ways that social inequality is significant to conservative thinkers. [9 marks]

Question in the style of Edexcel Politics Paper 1

To what extent do different conservatives agree on the nature of society?

You must use appropriate thinkers you have studied to support your answer. [24 marks]

TIP: The article refers to one of the key conservative thinkers identified by the examination boards: Edmund Burke. Ensure that you refer to his ideas together with those of at least one of the other specified thinkers: Thomas Hobbes, Michael Oakeshott, Ayn Rand, Robert Nozick.

Graham Goodlad, St John's College

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School politics: The Conservative Party should care about inequality

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Edexcel Component 1.2: Conservatism: core ideas and principles; differing views and tensions within conservatism. Background: what you need to know This article discusses a concept which is central to the debate about what Conservatism stands for: how far conservatives should accept social inequality.

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A huge source of division within the Conservative party is the European Union. While the stance of the government is negotiating a successful Brexit deal it has not been forgotten that Theresa May was herself in favour of remaining during the Cameron government, which opposes the views of other important MPs, such as Boris Johnson and Michael Gove who were strictly leave. Divisions within the Conservative Party have arisen over matters such as the Irish border and staying in the single market and are creating discord within the Party currently. This is evident from the hard Brexit letter sent to Theresa May listing Brexit demands before an important meeting, which was signed by more than 60 backbench MPs. Those more in favour of a 'soft brexit' opposed this demanding letter, Nicky Morgan claiming it was more like a "ransom note". As such the current cabinet has been dubbed the "Brexit War cabinet", demonstrating the division, which is prevalent in May's Party. Therefore, it is evident that the question of Brexit is causing division in the conservative party.

The issue of grammar schools has also caused some division. Some Conservative politicians believe that grammar schools are unhelpful in closing the class gap between children at school and therefore promoting equal chance of success. However, other MPs, such as Theresa May believe grammar schools to create opportunities for those who cannot afford the top private schooling. In 2017, May uncovered plans to set aside £320 million for the budget on grammar schools, believing them to aid intelligent children. However, some MPs have opposed this decision, claiming grammar schools to perpetuate elitism and oppose One Nation meritocracy, which May claims to abide by. Former MP, Nicky Morgan spoke out about the plans claiming them "weird". May's plans were abandoned due to backlash from MPs, demonstrating the high level of opposition in her party. Therefore, it is evident that May's policy to expand grammar schools has caused division within the Party, although this is largely overshadowed by the current Brexit negotiations.

Division is also clear on the agenda of scraping the Human Rights Act. So-called Runneymead Conservatives, such as former MP Damien Green, support the Human Rights Act claiming it is central to the protection of our civil liberties and power over Parliament. Meanwhile, other MPs feel the Human Rights Act actually infringes on sovereignty, Theresa May once claiming it was a bigger infringement on independence than the EU. Some Tories have claimed the Human Rights Act is flawed because foreign nationals who have committed crimes are unable to use the act to justify remaining in the UK and therefore it should be replaced with a Bill of Rights. However, May has recently shelved the plans to leave the European Convention on Human Rights till after Brexit negotiations.

Georgina Trott

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Current divisions within the Conservative Party

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A huge source of division within the Conservative party is the European Union. While the stance of the government is negotiating a successful Brexit deal it has not been forgotten that Theresa May was herself in favour of remaining during the Cameron government, which opposes the views of other important MPs, such as Boris Johnson and Michael Gove who were strictly leave.

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Jeremy Corbyn has called for a "war powers act" to force prime ministers to ask parliament's approval before taking military action.

As Theresa May weighs up whether to call a vote in the Commons on Britain's strikes against the Assad regime in Syria, the Labour leader insisted that the bombing raids launched early yesterday morning were illegal.

"I think parliament should have a say in this, and the prime minister could quite easily have done that," Corbyn told the BBC's Andrew Marr Show. "What we need in this country is something more robust, like a war powers act, so that governments do get held to account by parliament for what they do in our name."

His comments came as Boris Johnson, the foreign secretary, declared...

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Jeremy Corbyn calls for 'war powers act' to give parliament vote on military strikes

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Jeremy Corbyn has called for a "war powers act" to force prime ministers to ask parliament's approval before taking military action.

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We've just flicked the switch on moving all our digital resources to instant digital download - via our new subject stores.

For every subject you can now access each digital resource as soon as it is ordered. This will always be the latest edition of each resource too (and we'll update you automatically if there is an upgraded version to use).

Simply add the required resources to your cart, checkout using the usual options and your resources will be available to access immediately via your mytutor2u account.

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The Windrush Scandal and Ministerial Responsibility | tutor2u Politics

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We've just flicked the switch on moving all our digital resources to instant digital download - via our new subject stores. For every subject you can now access each digital resource as soon as it is ordered. This will always be the latest edition of each resource too (and we'll update you automatically if there is an upgraded version to use).

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
We've just flicked the switch on moving all our digital resources to instant digital download - via our new subject stores.

For every subject you can now access each digital resource as soon as it is ordered. This will always be the latest edition of each resource too (and we'll update you automatically if there is an upgraded version to use).

Simply add the required resources to your cart, checkout using the usual options and your resources will be available to access immediately via your mytutor2u account.

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The case for a new centrist political party in Britain | tutor2u Politics

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How realistic is it for a new centrist political party to emerge in Britain? Two leading journalists from the FT consider the likelihood of such a development - would a new political party have sufficient purpose? Is there an equivalent Macronesque personality out there to stand out as a leader of a new party in a Parliamentary democracy?

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How referendums break democracies

The Dutch parliament have just agreed to abolish advisory referendums. I don't blame them. I did not much care for the result of the latest referendum that was held in the UK, so I confess to disliking referendums with the fervour of a sore loser.

The winners no doubt feel more cheerful about the idea but even they may agree with this: the campaigning process was corrosive, and the consequences for the health of British politics have been even worse.

This scepticism might be seen as kicking democracy when it is down. The Pew Research Center found last year that 17 per cent of Americans think military rule would be a good idea, while 22 per cent favoured a strong leader "without interference from parliament or the courts". The numbers in the UK were fairly similar.

Most of us still believe in democracy, but even its staunchest supporters will admit that it has its flaws. The most obvious of these is that we voters pay little attention to the issues. Consider Jeremy Corbyn's recent shift; his opposition Labour party now advocates the UK leaving the EU but remaining in the (or "a") customs union - not to be confused with the single market. This has been roundly agreed to be a significant change in the political landscape. But the now-momentous-seeming distinction between the customs union, the EU and the European single market was obscure to all but the wonkiest of wonks until a couple of years ago (myself included). It surely remains obscure to most voters today.

I do not mean this as a criticism of the voters. Why should we pay attention? We have other things to do. A decade ago, economist Bryan Caplan's book The Myth of the Rational Voter ( UK) ( US) argued that it made sense for us to express our misconceptions, prejudices and tribal loyalties at the ballot box, since doing so was almost costless.

A voter thinking of popping to the polls and then trying out a new pizzeria would be perfectly rational in checking out TripAdvisor, rather than the party manifestos. This is because her vote will almost certainly not make any difference to her life, but her choice of restaurant almost certainly will. We vote because we see it as a civic duty, or a way of being part of something bigger than ourselves. Few people go to the polls under the illusion that they will be casting the deciding vote.

If voters are not paying close attention, then what might we expect from a referendum? The psychologist and Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman, in Thinking, Fast and Slow ( UK) ( US), writes, "When faced with a difficult question, we often answer an easier one instead, usually without noticing the substitution."

The difficult question in a referendum might be, "Should the UK remain in the EU?"; the easier substitution is, "Do I like the way this country is going?"

Another simple heuristic is this: "If one of the options was awful, they wouldn't be asking, would they?" Except that in the UK's referendum on EU membership, for reasons of short-sighted political expediency, they did ask.

Of course, any democratic system is weakened by the fact that voters are not paying close attention. But representative democracy provides a line of defence against voter ignorance, by asking us to elect someone to make considered choices on our behalf.

I can't fix a blocked drain, so I ask a plumber to do it for me. I am not sure whether that blotch on my cheekbone is malignant, so I ask a doctor. And I am, truth be told, a bit vague about the difference between the European Court of Justice and the European Court of Human Rights, which is why I elect an MP who can call on the advice of civil servants and the House of Commons library on my behalf.

I may make the same knee-jerk, tribal decision in an election as in a referendum, but at least I will be assisted by my recognition of longstanding party brands. Just as we recognise brands like Apple, Coke and HSBC, most voters know the difference between Conservative and Labour, or Republican and Democrat. We vote for people who seem to share our instincts and trust them to handle the details.

These brands have another advantage: they provide their owners some modest incentive to tell the truth and keep their promises. The shortlived campaigns that coalesce to fight referendums have no such constraints.

That points to one other disadvantage of a referendum: there is nobody to hold to account after the result. Theresa May campaigned for Remain. Three-quarters of MPs were for Remain. So if the result of the exit process goes badly, who can be blamed? Not them - and we're certainly not going to blame ourselves. The buck stops nowhere.

No voter can master every issue, and few voters try. Any democratic system must cope with that. Referendums, instead, invite us to ignore the question, give the snake-oil peddlers an edge, concentrate our ignorance into a tightly focused beam, and hold nobody accountable for results. They magnify the vulnerabilities of our democracies and diminish their defences. The Dutch are wise to avoid them.
Written for and first published in the Financial Times on 2 March 2018. My book "Messy: How To Be Creative and Resilient in a Tidy-Minded World" is now available in paperback both in the US and the UK - or through your local bookshop.

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The Dutch parliament have just agreed to abolish advisory referendums. I don't blame them. I did not much care for the result of the latest referendum that was held in the UK, so I confess to disliking referendums with the fervour of a sore loser.

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GV311: British Government (2013/14) - YouTube

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GV311 British Government is a new undergraduate course with open public access. This playlist contains the videos from academic year 2013/14.

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The content of Theresa May's defeats over the last couple of days isn't particularly meaningful, but the fact they happened at all suggests that parliament's guerrilla war against the government has started. And it seems to be winning.

We've been in a weird constitutional spot since the referendum. Usually, parliament is sovereign. The power it holds is given to it by the people in elections. But the referendum changed everything. There was suddenly now a separate source of legitimate political power - the referendum result - and the government could overrule and undermine parliament on the basis that it was representing the 'will of the people'.

This was very effective. MPs have spent the last two and a half years cowed into voting for things which they did not believe in on the basis that they had met some kind of superior form of democratic legitimacy. May used this to her full advantage. She tried to deny parliament any voice at all. She attempted to silence it on Article 50 and blocked it from having any meaningful role forming or scrutinising her negotiating posture with the EU.

Even after the election, when voters denied her a majority, she still acted like she represented the will of the people - passing all sorts of statutory instruments to sidestep parliament, failing to participate in opposition day motions, and refusing to provide parliament with the documents it demanded to see.

And then, just before Christmas, she went one step too far.

Her intention was to hold a five-day debate on her deal and then have parliament vote on it. She passed a business of the House motion, which decided the structure of how that debate and vote would take place, and then the debate began.

But even here she was fighting a rearguard defence against parliamentary scrutiny in the event of her defeat. According to the law, a defeat on her deal meant that a minister would have to come to the Commons and make a statement about what the government intended to do next within 21 calendar days, and then allow a vote on it seven sitting days after that.

But there was a trick. That vote was going to be unamendable. So she could have simply told MPs she was now pursuing no-deal and there'd have been nothing they could do about it.

Dominic Grieve wasn't having that. He attached an amendment to the business motion guaranteeing MPs a meaningful vote. They wouldn't just have to sit and take it. They could propose their own alternatives. And he won.

With that meaningful vote in place and seemingly no chance of her deal being accepted, May got cold feet. She pulled the debate and delayed it until mid-January.

This was an astonishing thing to have done. It cost the UK a whole month, when it only had four to play with. And if the actual decision wasn't bad enough, she did it in a typically irresponsible way. Instead of holding a Commons vote on the delay, she used an underhand manoeuvre to unilaterally do it by ministerial fiat.

Speaker John Bercow gave her fair warning at this stage. "Halting the debate after no fewer than 164 colleagues have taken the trouble to contribute," he told the prime minister, "will be thought by many members of this House to be deeply discourteous." If she insisted on following this course, she should at least put the delay to a vote - that would have been, "in democratic terms", an "infinitely preferable way" to go about it.

But, predictably, May refused to do so. This was her standard operating procedure: to ignore parliament, to tread roughshod over centuries of parliamentary convention and basic democratic principles. It was in the letter of the law, but certainly not the spirit.

So today, Bercow took a stand.

Grieve had tabled another amendment, this time not on the nature of the meaningful vote, but on the timing. Instead of it having it take place 21 calendar days after her deal was rejected, it would have to be after three sitting days.

Technically there is no way that amendment should have been voted on. The government had put forward the same updated business motion for the new debate on her deal as it had last year. And that motion said that only ministers could amend the motion - not parliament. But then Bercow did something extraordinary. He selected it for a vote anyway. And MPs passed it by 308 votes to 297 - a majority of 11.

You can't overstate what this means. Brexit-supporting Tory MPs in the Chamber were livid. And they were right that this was an unprecedented step. That business motion had been passed by the Commons in December. Bercow was effectively overriding the votes of MPs denying themselves power. He did not put it this way, of course. He said it hinged on an interpretation of whether an amendment is a motion. But most constitutional experts disagree.

Bercow has clearly come to a decision. If the government is going to be underhand in order to sidestep and undermine parliament, then he has to be a bit underhand himself to give MPs a voice against it.

But just because it is unprecedented, does not mean, as some of the more hysterical commentators have suggested, that Bercow has fundamentally changed the way Britain operates.

The only scenario in which the new precedent he has set would matter is if there is a minority government. Any government with a decent majority, like Tony Blair's, or Gordon Brown's, or the Coalition, or even David Cameron's, would be easily able to kick back any attempt to hold amendments like this.

That is not just a technicality. It is a moral instruction. The government is a minority government because it did not win the confidence of the public. And yet it acts like it has the support of the country. It does not. Today was a necessary corrective.

There is also an awful lot of nonsense about the idea that Bercow is abusing his impartiality as Speaker to help Remain. In actual fact, the last time Bercow went against convention so aggressively was in 2013, during the Queen's Speech, when he allowed an unprecedented third amendment about the absence of a bill for a referendum on Britain's membership of the EU. When he breaks the conventions for Brexiters, they say nothing. When it is against their interests, they scream about parliamentary procedure.

If Bercow is partial in any way it is in exactly the manner he is supposed to be: standing up for parliament against the might of an bullying executive. The MPs attacking him for it today did a disservice to their constitutional role and to Britain's political history, where greater men than they had to risk their lives to fight off the tyranny of Charles I and his descendants. If they had a scintilla of the bravery of their predecessors, they would have been ashamed to have made the arguments they made this afternoon.

Make no mistake, though: This is a constitutional war the likes of which we have not seen in our lifetime. It is happening in esoteric arguments about business motions and amendments, but in reality it is a struggle for the democratic heart of the country.

MPs look like they are finally up for the fight. Yvette Cooper's amendment on no-deal passed yesterday. Grieve's today. By this time next week, May's deal should finally be defeated. And parliament looks primed to take control.

Ian Dunt is editor of Politics.co.uk and the author of Brexit: What The Hell Happens Now?

The opinions in politics.co.uk's Comment and Analysis section are those of the author and are no reflection of the views of the website or its owners.

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Parliament is now at war with government - and it's winning

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The content of Theresa May's defeats over the last couple of days isn't particularly meaningful, but the fact they happened at all suggests that parliament's guerrilla war against the government has started. And it seems to be winning. We've been in a weird constitutional spot since the referendum. Usually, parliament is sovereign.

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Boris Johnson on Tuesday formally ruled out allowing another Scottish independence referendum, arguing it would "continue the political stagnation" the country has "seen for the past decade".

The prime minister emphatically rejected granting a rerun of the 2014 referendum, in which Scots voted 55 per cent to 45 per cent to remain in the UK.

Nicola Sturgeon, first minister and leader of the Scottish National party, called for a new plebiscite to take place this year after the SNP won 48 of the 59 Scottish seats at Westminster during the December general election.

But in a letter sent to Ms Sturgeon on Tuesday, Mr Johnson said she and her predecessor Alex Salmond had promised Scots that the 2014 referendum was a "once in a generation" vote.

"The people of Scotland voted decisively on that promise to keep our United Kingdom together, a result which both the Scottish and UK governments committed to respect in the Edinburgh agreement," said Mr Johnson, referring to a 2012 accord between the UK and Scottish governments that set out the terms of the 2014 referendum.

In a thinly veiled attack on the SNP record running the Scottish government, Mr Johnson added: "Another independence referendum would continue the political stagnation that Scotland has seen for the last decade, with Scottish schools, hospitals and jobs again left behind because of a campaign to separate the UK."

SNP leaders in the run-up to the 2014 referendum described the vote as a "once in a generation opportunity".

But the SNP argues now that Brexit has created a material change in circumstances for Scotland since the 2014 independence referendum, and that the party's election victory north of the border on December 12 has reinforced its mandate for another plebiscite.

But Ms Sturgeon has consistently said she wants UK approval for a referendum, as happened in 2014.

Mr Johnson's letter therefore entrenches the constitutional stand-off between the Conservative government in London and the SNP administration in Edinburgh.

While welcomed by Scots who want to remain part of the UK, the prime minister's refusal to allow another independence referendum risks alienating moderate voters who backed staying in the UK in 2014 but also believe that Scotland should be able to decide its constitutional future.

Ms Sturgeon insisted that Mr Johnson's refusal to permit a rerun of the 2014 referendum would not be "politically sustainable".

"The problem for the UK government is that the longer they try to block a referendum, the more they demonstrate that the Westminster union is not a partnership of equals and the more support for independence will grow," she said.

While Ms Sturgeon insisted that the UK could not be "sustained without consent", Mr Johnson's 80 seat majority in the House of Commons after the December election means it is unlikely the SNP will secure another independence referendum in the short term.

However, some in the SNP believe that if the party and the smaller pro-independence Scottish Green party retain their combined majority in the Edinburgh parliament after elections next year, then Mr Johnson will be forced to accept another referendum.

Jackson Carlaw, interim leader of the Scottish Conservatives and frontrunner to take the position on a permanent basis, in November suggested UK governments should refuse to approve another such referendum until the 2050s at least.

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Boris Johnson rejects SNP call for independence referendum

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Boris Johnson on Tuesday formally ruled out allowing another Scottish independence referendum, arguing it would "continue the political stagnation" the country has "seen for the past decade". The prime minister emphatically rejected granting a rerun of the 2014 referendum, in which Scots voted 55 per cent to 45 per cent to remain in the UK.

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Component 4.2: The relationship between the executive and parliament

This article contains a useful analysis of the way that MPs voted on the Prime Minister's withdrawal agreement bill and on his timetable for debating it:
Boris Johnson's bittersweet Brexit victory Background: what you need to know
Make sure that you understand what is proposed in the government's withdrawal agreement bill. This article gives a helpful summary:
The key points in the mammoth Brexit bill Using the article
The article is very critical of Boris Johnson's approach to Parliament. In your own words, explain the main criticisms that it makes. Are these fair? Give reasons for your answer.
Click to read the article below and then answer the questions:

Question in the style of Edexcel A Level: Paper 2

Evaluate the view that Parliament is generally effective in holding the executive to account. In your answer you should draw on relevant knowledge and understanding of the study of Component 1: UK politics and core political ideas.

You must consider this view and the alternative to this view in a balanced way. [30 marks]

TIP: A relevant Component 1 topic is 4.1: Case studies of general elections. If you have studied the 2017 general election, you could refer to the way in which this contest led to the loss of the Conservative majority, which has strengthened Parliament at the expense of the government.

Graham Goodlad, St John's College

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School politics: Parliamentary reverse leaves Johnson's Brexit plan in limbo

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Component 4.2: The relationship between the executive and parliament This article contains a useful analysis of the way that MPs voted on the Prime Minister's withdrawal agreement bill and on his timetable for debating it: Boris Johnson's bittersweet Brexit victory Background: what you need to know Make sure that you understand what is proposed in the government's withdrawal agreement bill.

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On August 29 2013, the British submarine HMS Tireless was somewhere in the Mediterranean, ready to go to battle. But unusually, its commanders were watching the House of Commons.

MPs were debating whether to authorise strikes against the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad. Tracking events in parliament via the BBC website, the submarine's commanders realised, before any order came through, that they would not be firing cruise missiles after all.

The Syria debate was the first time since the American war of independence that a British government had lost a vote on military action. Mindful of how little scrutiny had been applied to Tony Blair's blueprint to invade Iraq in 2003, many MPs had wanted to avoid the same mistake. Some hadn't wished to block strikes on Syria altogether, just to force David Cameron to revise his plan. Instead they not only inadvertently stopped the UK going to war: they also caused Barack Obama to abandon the US's own plans to bomb Syria, leaving Assad's regime free to commit further atrocities.

The events of August 2013 put the current crisis in perspective. Long before Brexit, MPs had started to take back control. Long before Brexit, they had learnt it was no simple task.

So, for all the hyperbole, this week's votes to reject Theresa May's Brexit deal and extend Brexit talks beyond the March 29 deadline were arguably not the most dramatic decisions that the Commons has made in the last decade, or even the most confused. Nor have the past three years been the unhappiest time in Westminster's living memory. That prize goes to the MPs' expenses scandal of 2009-10.

What does make the Brexit crisis unique is its constitutional havoc. Never in recent times have so many parts of the British system been under so much strain for so long. The 1956 Suez crisis was over within a month; this has been two and a half years of parliamentary trench warfare.

Cabinet meetings have leaked, party discipline has disintegrated, parliamentary conventions have been rewritten. Strip away the chaos and the farce, and the Brexit process "has shown our unwritten constitution is basically broken", says Stewart Wood, a Labour peer.

But the break did not start where one might expect - between the House of Commons and the House of Lords, the executive and the legislature, or even the executive and the judiciary. It started with parliament versus the people. "When you have a referendum in a parliamentary democracy, MPs don't know what to do - they don't know what their job is," says Lord Wood.

Referendums have never had much of a place in the British constitution. They are a recognition that the legitimacy of governments and parliaments goes only so far: that some issues, of national identity or cultural norms, do not fit on the left-right scale that governs our elections.

Clement Attlee called them "alien to all of our traditions". Perhaps that reflected an idealised vision of parliament as a place where views were not merely represented, but moulded. As Edmund Burke told his electors in 1774, "Parliament is not a congress of ambassadors from different and hostile interests . . . parliament is a deliberative assembly of one nation, with one interest, that of the whole."

Whatever the reason, before Brexit only two UK-wide plebiscites had been held - one in 1975 on membership of the European Community, another in 2011 on changing the voting system for MPs. In both, MPs and voters agreed.

The Brexit referendum was the first time that Britain's electorate has voted for an outcome with which its MPs disagreed. Nearly 52 per cent of UK voters backed Leave, while nearly 75 per cent of today's MPs voted Remain. That was only half the problem. The other is that most of the 25 per cent of MPs who did vote Leave disagreed with how the government (led by former Remainers) interpreted the vote. So parliamentary democracy and direct democracy became incompatible.

One way out of this would have been to ask the people to rethink or accept revised terms. It happened in Ireland in 2008, on the Lisbon treaty, in Greece in 2015, on an EU bailout, and in Colombia in 2016, on a peace agreement with Farc guerrillas. But in June 2016, no one could become Tory leader on such a pledge (ask Jeremy Hunt: he tried). Instead, the division between parliament and the people morphed into a stalemate between parliament and the executive. Before this week's losses, May's government had already recorded the worst Commons defeat ever on her Brexit deal. In December, it also became the first ever to be found in contempt of parliament, over its initial refusal to publish a legal opinion on its Brexit deal.

You can find more spectacular stand-offs between executives and legislatures - Donald Trump and the US Congress, or Nicolás Maduro and the Venezuelan National Assembly. But Britain's parliamentary system was never meant to work like that. The executive, almost by definition, controls the lower chamber. Parliament is always sovereign in the same way the customer is always right - that is, in principle. The real power lies with the governing party.

In the most famous test of its authority - the 1642-51 English civil war - parliament came out the clear winner. This time, its reputation may have undergone lasting damage.

Death threats against MPs are now the norm. Even beyond the lunatic fringe, there is bafflement. After MPs rejected May's deal on Wednesday, the Confederation of British Industry called on parliament to "stop this circus"; the front page of the Daily Mail denounced "The House of Fools". Asked if parliament is emerging from Brexit in a good light, only 6 per cent of voters say yes. That makes the US Congress's approval ratings look healthy. Eurosceptic Tory MPs, who once championed parliamentary sovereignty, have called only half-jokingly for the Commons to be suspended to prevent a no-deal Brexit being blocked.

However the crisis ends, the verdict on parliament's performance will be "pretty damning", says Ruth Fox, director of the Hansard Society think-tank. "To some extent it's been a lack of strategic thinking, imagination and initiative."

By the time MPs voted on Wednesday to rule out a no-deal Brexit, it was 993 days since the referendum - and just 16 to the scheduled Brexit date. Why, after the Iraq and Syria debacles, has parliament taken so long to find its voice?

It could have been so much less painful. A few days after the referendum, a group of defeated Labour MPs went to see the then Cabinet Office minister Oliver Letwin. The MPs had a proposal: the government should form a cross-party group to agree a Brexit plan.

The idea was modelled on European practices, such as how Denmark's foreign affairs committee drafts a mandate for the government's international negotiations. "It would have been a sounding board for government," says one of the Labour MPs, Stephen Kinnock.

But summer 2016 was not the ideal time for European-inspired ideas in the UK, and Theresa May, the least collaborative of politicians, was never the ideal person to receive them. "Too often politicians' reaction to consultation is that it's a sign of weakness. It isn't," says Kinnock.

In normal times, MPs have to balance at least two mandates - the party line and their conscience. In late 2016, however, Conservative MPs had at least four. There was David Cameron's 2015 election manifesto, on which they had been elected. There was their conscience. There was the referendum result. And there was May's own platform as party leader - an interpretation of the Brexit vote that prioritised an end to free movement of people, and a focus on state intervention to tackle burning injustices. This scenario did not become simpler after the inconclusive 2017 election, in which the Conservatives remained the largest party but lost their majority. May's vision had neither been endorsed nor completely rejected.

Under a cross-party approach, these mandates might have been moulded into something coherent. In 2016, May had sufficient command over her party to force Eurosceptic MPs to compromise. Europhile MPs were still cowed by the referendum result: they too could have compromised. The gap between direct democracy and representative democracy might have been bridged.

Instead, the prime minister lost the opportunity to shape how parliament handled Brexit. She ploughed her own furrow, and in doing so planted the seeds of resentment and rebellion. "Theresa May seemed to think at the outset that she would be going to Brussels to negotiate, and would then present the deal to parliament on a take-it-or-leave-it basis," says Meg Russell, director of the Constitution Unit at University College London. "We're a million miles from that now."

It's the stoppable force v the moveable object. It's that scene in 'The Italian Job', where the bus hangs over a precipice

In February 2017 MPs did vote to invoke Article 50, mostly unaware that a two-year deadline would soon create the risk of a no-deal Brexit. But then the Conservative MP Dominic Grieve led a rebellion of MPs to ensure that the Commons would be given a final, "meaningful" vote. MPs used that vote to block May's deal. MPs have forced ministers to hold debates, attend select committees, hand over documents and conform to deadlines.

This represents the swinging back of the pendulum from the New Labour years, when large majorities meant MPs acted as a weak check on power. It was only after Iraq and the expenses revelations - which showed that MPs had used taxpayer money to pay, among other things, for non-existent mortgages - that the Commons pulled itself together. In 2009 the clerk for legislation Robert Rogers, now Lord Lisvane, published a list of 75 actions to revive the chamber. John Bercow, elected as speaker shortly afterwards, has implemented more than 30 of them - including calling ministers regularly to the chamber to answer urgent questions.

More than anyone, Bercow sums up Westminster's contradictions. He has reformed the Commons' procedures, while celebrating its pomposity. He has stood up for lowly backbenchers, while facing accusations (which he denies) of bullying clerks. He makes sure all MPs have their turn to speak, while ensuring that he emerges as the real star.

It helped Bercow that in the 2010 election no party won a majority and the Commons saw an influx of independent-minded, constituency-focused MPs, who knew that their voting records could be scrutinised via various websites.

But holding the government to account is one thing; setting the agenda another. The Brexit crisis has shown this. In January and February, when MPs tabled amendments that would truly empower backbenchers - by giving them control of what is debated in the Commons, or setting up voting systems for MPs to rank different Brexit options - the majority stepped back. "I think the most remarkable thing is how unsuccessful we've been in taking control," says one shadow minister. Faced with a choice of now or never, MPs generally decided it couldn't be now. Only this week did they become bolder, rejecting May's deal for a second time. In response, the government agreed to facilitate a vote on different Brexit options if they rejected it a third time.

"The last two years have thrown into sharp relief the things that parliament is good at and the things it is not good at. It is generally not good at legislating," says Lisvane. "The things that have gone really well are select committees."

Faced with a choice of now or never, MPs generally decided it couldn't be now

True, the cross-party Brexit committee of MPs has regularly exposed government incompetence. But it has only agreed unanimously on one report, which was critical of May's deal. Had a majority of MPs settled on a form of Brexit, May would have had to accept it. But it never has. The only instructions that parliament has passed to the executive have been incomplete-cum-impossible - rule out a no-deal Brexit, or "replace" the Irish backstop.

The British system used to have an escape valve: by convention, prime ministers would offer their resignation to the Queen when they were defeated on major issues. But 2011's Fixed-term Parliaments Act, intended to ensure the stability of the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition, in effect means that MPs can defeat the government's main policy without forcing a general election.

The act lays down specific conditions for an election - the backing of two-thirds of MPs, or a no-confidence motion backed by a simple majority. Thus it has robbed the government of a key weapon for party discipline - the threat that rebels will lose their seats. But the executive retains other tools, such as setting the Commons agenda. Most recently Downing Street pulled a debate on a financial services bill to stop MPs demanding tougher rules on secret company ownership. "We've learnt that the government has phenomenal power over the Commons, even if it doesn't have a majority, as long as it can win a vote of confidence," says Labour MP Chris Bryant.

The result is a stalemate: the government is too weak to govern, parliament too timid and too disorganised to assume the role. It's the stoppable force versus the moveable object. It's that scene in The Italian Job, where the bus hangs on a precipice, rocking gently forwards or backwards.

Democracies have short memories. Eight years after invading Iraq, the UK pursued regime change in Libya. After the Brexit crisis, could we have another referendum? Another EU vote, another Scottish independence referendum, even a repeat of the 1973 Northern Ireland border poll?

If we do, it will rely on MPs agitating and legislating for one. And perhaps they will consider examples of how parliamentary and direct democracy can be bound together. Ahead of Ireland's vote on abortion, the government prepared a draft piece of legislation, so the meaning of the mandate was clear.

A more immediate question is where this crisis takes Britain's political system. Will it create an appetite to reform or a desire not to reopen old wounds? At the very least, MPs could demand the right to determine the Commons agenda. Historian Vernon Bogdanor sees Brexit as a broader "constitutional moment" to correct years of tinkering such as the Fixed-term Parliaments Act.

Others think the answer is for the Commons to be less assertive. A group of Conservative lawyers recently argued that MPs should not be given a vote over future military action, as they have been since the Iraq war. Two leading candidates to succeed Bercow as speaker - the Conservative Eleanor Laing and Labour's Lindsay Hoyle - would be less reformist. Lord Lisvane argues that MPs will find they don't have the capacity to run the government. "My guess is that in a year or two's time a lot of this passion will have been spent. I think we'll go back to the default setting."

Except that a generation of MPs doesn't know where the default setting is. They see the role of a backbench MP not as an extra, but a protagonist. They have been radicalised and have already started to rebel against the party system. "The discipline has collapsed and I suspect it won't come back after Brexit," says Lord Wood.

Scarred by Iraq and the expenses scandal, empowered by Bercow and hung parliaments, encouraged by weak party leadership, the Commons is restless. But its limitations remain. It is an odd assortment of people, lacking in mechanisms for building coalitions. It is a caretaker boss who doesn't relish long-term responsibility. Perhaps we should not expect more. What the UK needs most of all now is not a stronger parliament. It is a half-decent government.
Henry Mance is an FT political correspondent Follow @FTLifeArts on Twitter to find out about our latest stories first. Subscribe to FT Life on YouTube for the latest FT Weekend videos

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On August 29 2013, the British submarine HMS Tireless was somewhere in the Mediterranean, ready to go to battle. But unusually, its commanders were watching the House of Commons. MPs were debating whether to authorise strikes against the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad.

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One of the ironies of contemporary U.S. thinking about foreign policy is the odd status of realism. On the one hand, realist theory remains a staple of college teaching on international relations (along with many other approaches), and government officials often claim that their actions are based on some sort of "realist" approach. But Washington remains for the most part a realism-free zone, with few genuine realists in positions of influence. Moreover, the realist perspective is almost entirely absent from the commanding heights of U.S. punditry. This column, and the consistently insightful writings of people such as Paul Pillar or Jacob Heilbrunn, does not make up for realism's exclusion from the New York Times, Washington Post, or Wall Street Journal.

Instead of relying on realism, both Republicans and Democrats tend to view foreign policy through the lens of liberal idealism. Rather than see world politics as an arena where security is scarce and major powers are forced to contend whether they wish to or not, America's foreign-policy mavens are quick to divide the world into virtuous allies (usually democracies) and evil adversaries (always some sort of dictatorship) and to assume that when things go badly, it is because a wicked foreign leader (Saddam Hussein, Ali Khamenei, Vladimir Putin, Muammar al-Qaddafi, etc.) is greedy, aggressive, or irrational. When friendly states object to something the (virtuous) United States is doing, U.S. leaders tend to assume that critics just don't understand their noble aims or are jealous of America's success.

I'll concede that the Trump presidency presents a particular challenge for realists. It's not easy to reconcile Donald Trump's incoherent and bumbling approach to foreign affairs with the idea that states pursue national interests in a more or less rational or strategic fashion. Trump has shown himself to be many things thus far - willful, vain, dishonest, impulsive, narcissistic, ignorant, etc. - but "rational" and "strategic" aren't words that leap to mind when contemplating his foreign policy. Realism also emphasizes external factors, such as balances of power and geography, and downplays the role of individual leaders. But the Trump presidency is an eloquent and worrisome reminder of the damage that individual leaders can do and especially when they are convinced that they are " the only one that matters."

Nonetheless, Trump's singular incompetence isn't sufficient reason to toss realism aside completely. For one thing, realism still helps us understand how Trump can get away with all this meshugas: The United States is still so powerful and secure that it can do a lot of dumb things and suffer only modest losses. More importantly, realism remains an extremely useful guide to a lot of things that have happened in the recent past or that are happening today. And as Trump is proving weekly, leaders who ignore these insights inevitably make lots of dumb mistakes.

In short, it is still highly useful to think like a realist. Let me explain why.

Realism has a long history and many variants, but its core rests on a straightforward set of ideas. As the name implies, realism tries to explain world politics as they really are, rather than describe how they ought to be. For realists, power is the centerpiece of political life: Although other factors sometimes play a role, the key to understanding politics lies in focusing on who has power and what they are doing with it. The Athenians' infamous warning to the Melians captures this perfectly: "The strong do what they can, and the weak suffer what they must." Quentin Tarantino couldn't have put it any better.

For realists, states are the key actors in the international system. There is no central authority that can protect states from one another, so each state must rely upon its own resources and strategies to survive. Security is a perennial concern - even for powerful states - and states tend to worry a lot about who is weaker or stronger and what power trends appear to be. Cooperation is far from impossible in such a world - indeed, at times cooperating with others is essential to survival - but it is always somewhat fragile. Realists maintain that states will react to threats first by trying to " pass the buck" (i.e., getting someone else to deal with the emerging danger), and if that fails, they will try to balance against the threat, either by seeking allies or by building up their own capabilities.

Realism isn't the only way to think about international affairs, of course, and there are a number of alternative perspectives and theories that can help us understand different aspects of the modern world. But if you do think like a realist - at least part of the time - many confusing aspects of world politics become easier to understand.

If you think like a realist, for example, you'll understand why China's rise is a critical event and likely to be a source of conflict with the United States (and others). In a world where states have to protect themselves, the two most powerful states will eye each other warily and compete to make sure that they don't fall behind or become dangerously vulnerable to the other. Even when war is avoided, intense security competition is likely to result.

And by the way, thinking like a realist helps you understand why China is no longer committed to Deng Xiaoping's policy of "peaceful rise." That approach made sense when China was weaker, and it fooled plenty of Westerners into thinking China could be inveigled into being a responsible stakeholder that would meekly embrace various institutions and arrangements created by others back when China was weak. But realists understand that a more powerful China would eventually want to modify any features that were not in China's interest, as Beijing has begun to do in recent years. Bottom line: Thinking like a realist is essential if you want to understand Sino-American relations.

If you think like a realist, you wouldn't be surprised that the United States has repeatedly used military force in distant lands over the past 25 years and especially after 9/11. Why? For one simple reason: Nobody could prevent it. Americans were also convinced their global role was indispensable and that they had the right, the responsibility, and the wisdom to interfere all over the world. But America's dominant position was the permissive condition that made this overweening ambition seem feasible, at least for a while. As Kenneth Waltz warned way back in 1993: "One may hope that America's internal preoccupations will produce not an isolationist policy, which has become impossible, but a forbearance that will give other countries at long last the chance to deal with their own problems and make their own mistakes. But I would not bet on it." Good realist that he was, Waltz understood that the "vice to which great powers easily succumb in a multipolar world is inattention; in a bipolar world, overreaction; in a unipolar world, overextension." And that's precisely what happened.

If you think like a realist, the crisis in Ukraine looks rather different than the typical Western version of events. Western accounts typically blame Putin for most of the trouble, but realists understand that major powers are always sensitive about their borders and are likely to react defensively if other great powers start encroaching on these regions. Ever heard of the Monroe Doctrine? In the case of Ukraine, the United States and its European allies had been expanding NATO steadily eastward ( violating pledges made to Soviet leaders when Germany reunified) and ignoring repeated warnings from Moscow. By 2013, the United States and European Union were making a concerted effort to pull Ukraine into closer alignment with the West and openly interfering in Ukraine's domestic political processes. Because the Obama administration did not think like realists, however, it was blindsided when Putin seized Crimea and derailed the EU/U.S. effort. Putin's response was neither legal nor legitimate nor admirable, but it wasn't surprising either. It is equally unsurprising that these events alarmed the Europeans and prompted NATO to shore up its defenses in Eastern Europe, precisely as a realist would expect.

Thinking like a realist can also help you understand why the EU is in trouble. The entire EU project was designed to transcend nationalism and subordinate state interests within broader supranational institutions. Its architects hoped the separate national identities and interests that had torn Europe apart repeatedly would fade over time and a broad pan-European identity would supplant them. European unity was facilitated by the Cold War because the Soviet threat gave Western Europe ample incentive to cooperate, gave the Soviets' Eastern European satellites an ideal to aspire to, and kept the " American pacifier" on the continent. But once the Cold War was over, nationalism returned with a vengeance and especially after the euro crisis hit. Suddenly, populations wanted their elected officials not to save Europe but to save them. Despite herculean efforts by a number of European leaders and EU officials, these centrifugal tendencies seem to be getting worse, as the Brexit decision, the recent elections in Italy, and the resurgent nationalism in Poland and Hungary all attest. Those who hoped that European integration would prove irreversible have trouble understanding how their noble experiment went awry, but realists don't.

If you think like a realist, you might not be quite so outraged by the support that Iran and Syria gave the anti-American insurgency in Iraq after 2003. You might not like it, but you wouldn't find their conduct surprising. Their response was classic balance of power behavior because the United States had just overthrown Saddam Hussein and the Bush administration had made it clear that Syria and Iran were next on its hit list. It made good strategic sense for Damascus and Tehran to do whatever they could to keep the United States bogged down in Iraq so that Washington couldn't reload the shotgun and come after them. Americans have every reason to be upset by what these states did, but if more U.S. officials thought like realists, they would have expected it from the get-go.

And if you think like a realist, it is obvious why North Korea has gone to enormous lengths to acquire a nuclear deterrent and obvious why a country such as Iran was interested in becoming a latent nuclear weapons state as well. These states were deeply at odds with the world's most powerful country, and prominent U.S. officials kept saying that the only solution was to topple these regimes and replace them with leaders more to their liking. Never mind that regime change rarely works as intended; the more important point is that any government facing a threat like that is going to try to protect itself. Nuclear weapons aren't good for blackmail or conquest, but they are a very effective way to deter more powerful states from trying to overthrow you with military force. And you'd think Americans would understand this, given that the U.S. government thinks it needs thousands of nuclear weapons in order to be secure, despite its favorable geographic position and overwhelming conventional superiority. If U.S. leaders think like that, is it any wonder that some weaker and more vulnerable powers conclude that having a few nukes might make them more secure? And is it so surprising that they might be reluctant to give them up in exchange for assurances or promises that might easily be reversed or withdrawn? Someone really should explain this logic to John Bolton.

Thinking like a realist also helps you understand why states with radically different political systems often act in surprisingly similar ways. To take an obvious example, the United States and Soviet Union could not have been more different in terms of their domestic orders, but their international behavior was much the same. Each led vast alliance networks, toppled governments they didn't like, assassinated a number of foreign leaders, built tens of thousand of nuclear weapons (deployed on missiles, bombers, and submarines), intervened in far-flung lands, tried to convert other societies to their preferred ideology, and did what they could to bring the other down without blowing up the world. Why did they behave in such similar fashion? Because in an anarchic world, each had little choice but to compete with the other, lest it fall behind and become vulnerable to the other's predations.

Last but not least, if you think like a realist, you're likely to be skeptical about the ambitious schemes that idealists keep dreaming up to bring an end to conflict, injustice, inequality, and other bad things. Striving to build a safer and more peaceful world is admirable, but realism reminds us that the ambitious efforts to remake world politics always create unintended consequences and rarely deliver the promised results. It also reminds that even allies fear unchecked power and will have misgivings whenever the United States tries to run the world. If you think like a realist, in short, you are more likely to act with a degree of prudence, and you'll be less likely to see opponents as purely evil (or see one's own country as wholly virtuous) and less likely to embark on open-ended moral crusades. Ironically, if more people thought like realists, the prospects for peace would go up.

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The World Wants You to Think Like a Realist

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One of the ironies of contemporary U.S. thinking about foreign policy is the odd status of realism. On the one hand, realist theory remains a staple of college teaching on international relations (along with many other approaches), and government officials often claim that their actions are based on some sort of "realist" approach.

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Trump Plans to Tear Up a 31-Year-Old Nuclear Weapons Treaty. Now What?

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President Donald Trump revealed Saturday the United States intends to withdraw from a 31-year-old nuclear weapons agreement with Russia.

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The Syrian Civil War is an ongoing civil war between the armed forces of the government, led by President Bashar al-Assad and his allies, and a broad range of opposition groups, from the moderate Free Syrian Army to the extremist Islamists in the Al-Nusra Front. Additionally ISIS (whose aim is to create an Islamic State combining Iraq and Syria) have taken advantage of the chaos in the region, taking control of ⅓ of Syria and most of the oil supplies. ISIS support neither the opposition nor the government. The war has created a humanitarian crisis- an estimated 200,000 people have died (roughly 1% of the population), and 7.6 million have been displaced. Recently many of these displaced people have been seeking refuge in Europe, causing chaos in the borderless Schengen area and thousands of deaths in the Mediterranean Sea. There are clear, liberal reasons to use military force to stop this civil war and end the suffering. Since the Syrian regime is unpleasant and undemocratic, the liberals would argue we should intervene to help the opposition and help them establish a new, democratic and secular government. From a realist perspective there are a number of drawbacks.

Firstly, as Kissinger notes here this would upset the post-Westphalia global order that demands other powers should not interfere in the internal affairs of other nations. However brutal the Civil War is, the government of Syria has not demanded intervention from anyone except Russia, and therefore it is not the US's business to intervene, so argues Kissinger. However cruel this argument may sound, Kissinger does have a point. Should the US support, with arms, every violent uprising against every non-democratic government in the world? While it may be easy to change a regime in a small country like Syria, if democrats in Moscow or Beijing began a rebellion against their respective governments, surely it would be suicidal for the US to support such rebel groups with armed force? Drawing a line at what is a legitimate uprising against a dictatorship and what is a terrorist organisation (the difference between the Free Syrian Army and ISIS for example) would be even more of a headache for US foreign policy makers.

It's this reductio ad absurdum that leads realists to favour practical over principled foreign policy. It may lead to absurd contradictions, for example hostility to the theocrats in Iran but friendship with the theocrats in Saudi Arabia, but if played right it is an effective tool for advancing the permanent interests of a nation, and not getting stuck in the quagmire of morals when contemplating foreign policy.

Secondly, Kissinger points out that while regime change may in fact advance US interests in certain key respects, a lack of knowledge as to who could take power in the vacuum means it is best to stick with the devil they know. As precedent Kissinger cites the case of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. While at the time, arming Islamists to fight the Soviets seemed like a good idea, in hindsight it led to Afghanistan being an operating space for Osama bin Laden's Al-Qaeda to operate, and with US money they were able to plan and execute the terrorist attacks of September 11th. In other words, intervention in such a fragmented civil war with several competing opposition groups, from the Seculars to the Salafists, could have unforeseen consequences and so thus it is best for the US to stay out. In fact, the very real possibility of ISIS taking control of Syria, as they have nearly done so in Iraq and Libya, could mean that regime change in Syria is a net negative to US power and influence.

A third reason for the lack of intervention is the strong support for the Assad regime on the part of Russia. Russia has recently sent "half a dozen T-90 tanks, 15 howitzers, 35 armoured personnel carriers, 200 marines and housing for as many as 1,500 personnel" according the New York Times. Going to war with Assad could well mean going to war with Russia. Since Russia has nuclear weapons, and is becoming increasingly isolated enough to consider using them, this is an outcome that would not be positive for US security and survival.

To conclude- realists should oppose US military intervention in Syria. It would destabilize the region, create uncertainty and possibly lead to war with Russia, none of which would be good for US security or US power interests. While perhaps it may mean the US loses some face, especially in light of Obama's crossed red lines, the US will emerge stronger for washing its hands of the putrid affair and keeping its eye on the bigger picture.

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Why has the US not intervened in Syria - Realist Explanations

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The Syrian Civil War is an ongoing civil war between the armed forces of the government, led by President Bashar al-Assad and his allies, and a broad range of opposition groups, from the moderate Free Syrian Army to the extremist Islamists in the Al-Nusra Front.

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Nuclear proliferation refers to the spread of nuclear weapons, either by their acquisition by more states or other actors (horizontal proliferation) or by their accumulation by established nuclear states (vertical proliferation). The proliferation of nuclear weapons has alarmed the United Nation since the end of the Cold War, as the old certainties of a 'nuclear umbrella' and 'mutually assured destruction' are being challenged by the shift towards a multipolar world order. It is argued that what really threatens peace is the return of great power competition with the return of Russia and the rise of China and most importantly - how nuclear weapons feature in this competition.

The argument that nuclear proliferation poses a substantial threat to global security derives from the massive destructive capacity of nuclear weapons. This, then enables nuclear powers to dictate to other powers. In this case, horizontal proliferation is seen to be a major threat as it inevitably creates temporary imbalances of power in nuclear capability that any one state may be willing to take advantage of at any time. After all, the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs were dropped to take advantage of precisely such a military imbalance. This has become increasingly important as concern about the withdrawal of the US or Russian nuclear umbrella was likely to encourage states to stand on their own two feet in nuclear terms. This was particularly the case where regional tensions were deepening, as in South Asia in the 1990s. In 1998, both India and Pakistan tested nuclear devices and joined the 'nuclear club', responding to increasingly bitter rivalry over Kashmir. Pakistan's Defence Minister Khawaja Asif states that "if we need to use them (nuclear weapons) for our survival we will" supports the realist school of thought that states are inherently aggressive (offensive realism) and obsessed with security (defensive realism). This aggressive build-up, however, leads to a security dilemma whereby it poses a threat on international peace.

On the other hand, neo realists like Kenneth Waltz argue that nuclear proliferation does not threaten global peace and security; all states are "power maximisers" and so the possession of nuclear weapons enables states to actually escape their "security dilemma" by creating a "delicate balance of terror". Therefore, Waltz argues that the possession by India and Pakistan of nuclear weapons has actually made the subcontinent safer. Pakistan's retaliation is argued to have dissuaded an Indian attack across the border, following the Mumbai terrorist atrocities in 2008 even though the perpetrators had been trained in Pakistan. Waltz continues to support this idea by comparing the nuclear relationship between India and Pakistan to that of US and the Soviet Union. It also can be said that Israel's possession of nuclear weapons has thus meant that since 1973 she has not been attacked by her Arab neighbours as it has been a symbol of deterrence. Furthermore, even if horizontal proliferation is a major threat, liberal cooperation has proved to be successful over the years. As the international Atomic Energy Agency contends, if not for the Non-Proliferation Treaty (1968), 35 to 40 states would have successful nuclear programs by now, and yet only 9 do. South Africa, Libya, Kazakhstan, Ukraine and Belarus have dismantled their nuclear arsenals, and most recently Iran was prevented by the P5+1. All these states were denuclearised through international cooperation after the Cold War, proving the liberal view that we can work together to maintain peace and security.

As the obstacles to horizontal proliferation have diminished, the chances of 'rogue' states or even non-state actors acquiring nuclear weapons have significantly increased. The greatest concern is therefore that nuclear weapons may fall into the hands of military-based dictatorial regimes, or even terrorist organisations, which may have fewer scruples about using them. In the post-Cold War era, US foreign policy has increasingly focused on attempts to prevent such thing, with particular concern focusing in 2002 on the states dubbed 'axis of evil' by President Bush: Iraq, Iran, Syria, Libya and North Korea. Just a year later, North Korea pulled out of the NPT treaty and since, Kim Jong-Un has pursued a nuclear program at the expense of the country's ailing economy. He approved the country's fourth nuclear test in January 2015 in defiance of UN sanctions and attempted the launch of an intermediate-range ballistic missile, also stating that his "nuclear button is on his desk at all times". What is seen as even more alarming is Trump's response as he claims his 'button' is "much bigger" and "more powerful". This is a clear example of how nuclear proliferation to rogue states has proved to be a global threat to peace and security. Yet this is not the only concern. The miniaturisation of nuclear equipment and other technological advances have facilitated the potential acquisition of nuclear weapons by terrorist groups, organised crime networks, and rebel movements. Nuclear weapons were abandoned after the fall of the Soviet Union, leaving a thriving black market in Eastern Europe. This has arguably been the most serious consequence of nuclear proliferation, as terrorist groups such as ISIS actively seek radioactive materials to produce "dirty bombs". Similarly, Abdul Qadeer Khan, the father of the Pakistani bomb, acknowledged that during the past two decades he had secretly provided North Korea, Libya and Iran with crucial nuclear know-how. As a result, nuclear proliferation is a great threat when in the hands of irresponsible and irrational hands.

However, Thomas Schelling, like Waltz a veteran proponent of nuclear weapons, believes that we unduly exaggerate the threat of nuclear material falling into the hands of terrorists. He argues that the terrorist organisation needs the highly trained scientists who can convert the fissile material into an explosive, which according to Mueller, is not realistically conceivable given the variety of substantial practical difficulties that are faced. Furthermore, as Kenneth Waltz as argued, the possession of nuclear weapons may actually encourage states to act responsibly, thereby creating more rational actors on the global stage. This can be seen as so recently, as Trump is praised for actually accelerating diplomacy and maintaining global peace. His strategy led to a meeting between North and South Korea, and a summit between Trump and Kim which reflects building hopes that Pyongyang's willingness to talk about dismantling its nuclear arsenal may be genuine. Trump statement "strength is going to keep us out of nuclear war" in his speech supports Pompeo in Brussels who argues "we would not be where we are today without Trump's maximum pressure campaign". This emphasises that, actually, boasting about the size of his nuclear button as well as coining of sanctions has forced realist rationality on a rogue state actor like North Korea. Critical theorists such as Chomsky, on the other hand, suggest that North Korea is only copying the West, and that this instability is because the West want a monopoly on violence.

Above all, some argue that real threat is the great power competition and vertical proliferation. Although the deterrent effect of nuclear weapons worked during the bipolar 'first nuclear age', it is far less reliable in the less stable, multipolar circumstances of the 'second nuclear age'. Such examples include US, despite the Prague declaration 2009 by Obama, has increased spending to $1 trillion to upgrade its nuclear arms. Nuclear Orientalism suggests, as Gusterson (1999) notes: the type of binary Western discourse which seeks to represent 'their' weapons as a threat in contrast to 'ours' which are not. Therefore, while the elites of nuclear weapons states may therefore privilege possession as an acceptable risk in a Hobbesian international system, a world security perspective suggests otherwise. Even worse, developments in recent years have focused increasingly on the production of nuclear weapons that have a more precise and contained impact, making them usable, for example China and its development of supersonic missiles. These 'tactical' or 'battlefield' nuclear weapons are no longer of symbolic importance. This has led to the theory of nuclear utilisation target selection (NUTS), which rejects the logic of MAD. A nuclear exchange between the USA and Russia - and involving just one-fifth of their current arsenals - has been estimated to produce 770 million direct casualties, with indirect effects via ozone depletion. This, surely, is an existential threat of the first order for world society, and it is one which - in both an objective and subjective sense - states in possession of nuclear weapons continuously hold over us all.

However, one cannot completely disregard 'MAD' and the defensive realist thought of a "delicate balance of terror". For instance, Waltz indeed proposed that 'the world would be safer if Iran did get the bomb.', as this would have created a balance of power in the Middle East which currently does not exist as only Israel has a nuclear deterrent. The absence of a balance of power gives way to more liberal thinking as it focuses on finding alternatives and more effective mechanisms for ensuring peace and security. The principal liberal solution is the construction of international organisations such as UN. This happens, in part, because whereas the balance of power fosters private agreement amongst states, international organisations foster public agreements that cover most if not all states, so making possible a system of collective security. Also, it can be said that Russia is not a real threat and Putin's aggression is only to be seen as a 'great power', along with China does not actually want war but just regional dominance. Therefore, vertical proliferation is not in reality a substantial threat to global peace and security.

Overall, the likes of Waltz and other realist-orientated security traditionalists obviously advocate proliferation - whether horizontal or vertical, managed of unlimited - as the answer to enduring insecurity. However, if as 'Welsh School' Critical Security Studies argues we should see theory as being constitutive of reality and believe emancipatory change to be possible, then - while the security dilemma and threats emanating from it may be a structural condition - there remains distinct scope for agency in potentially transcending the security dilemma. The question is how one moves from a condition of fear, to one of achieving cooperation, and then finally building trust; this is the underling problematic of nuclear proliferation.

Sena Ickin

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Does nuclear proliferation threaten peace and security?

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Nuclear proliferation refers to the spread of nuclear weapons, either by their acquisition by more states or other actors (horizontal proliferation) or by their accumulation by established nuclear states (vertical proliferation).

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Barack Obama is in the homestretch of his presidency, and it is only human for him to care about how he will be judged after he leaves office. That impulse probably explains his decision to participate in a series of interviews with the Atlantic in which he defends his approach to foreign policy and explains why he has been reluctant to use American power as widely as his critics would have liked.

Not surprisingly, this story has rekindled the recurring question of whether Obama has been running a "realist" foreign policy for the past seven-plus years - or at least one heavily informed by realist thinking. (One of our country's sillier pundits once suggested I was the secret George Kennan guiding his actions; anyone who reads this column regularly knows that U.S. foreign policy would have been markedly different if that were in fact the case.)

I understand why many people regard Obama as some sort of realist, but from where I sit, the nonrealist dimensions of his presidency are as prominent and important as any realist elements. And it is those nonrealist features that account for his most obvious foreign-policy failures.

But first, what will Obama's legacy likely be? My view, for what it's worth, is that future historians will rate Obama highly. He will be remembered for being America's first nonwhite president, of course, and for conducting his office with dignity, grace, and diligence. His administration was blissfully scandal-free, and he didn't make a lot of hasty decisions that turned out badly. He was admirably thick-skinned and charitable toward most of his critics, despite the abuse and thinly veiled racism he faced from some of them. And no matter who wins in November, he is likely to look mighty good by comparison.

As we look back, Obama will get credit for health care reform, for rescuing the country from the brink of another Great Depression, and for promoting greater tolerance toward minorities through legalization of gay marriage. When one remembers how scary things looked when he took office in 2009, this is no small set of achievements. And Obama did these things while facing a Republican opposition so toxic and extreme it kept devouring its own leaders and repeatedly threatening to shut down the entire federal government. That's GOP-style "patriotism" for you.

But these elements of his legacy are all domestic achievements, and his record in foreign affairs is at best a mixed bag. Still, Obama can claim some clear successes: The U.S. image in most of the world is higher than when he took office; relations with China have been mostly tranquil despite the U.S. "pivot" to Asia; and the nuclear deal with Iran is a qualified success so far. I'd also give Obama props for ending America's long and counterproductive effort to ostracize Cuba and for making progress on global nuclear security and climate change (though more needs to be done on both fronts).

Unfortunately, Obama's foreign-policy record also contains a sizable number of depressing failures, beginning with Afghanistan. Obama agonized over this issue during his first year in office and ultimately sent nearly 60,000 additional troops there. He promised this temporary "surge" would turn the tide against the Taliban and enable the United States to get out with honor. It is now 2016, the Taliban control more territory than at any time since 2001, and the United States is still fighting there with no end in sight. As some of us warned at the time, this policy was destined to fail and fail it did.

Similarly, Obama's well-intentioned efforts to achieve peace between Israelis and Palestinians were a series of humiliations: Israeli settlements kept expanding, Gaza kept getting pummeled, moderate Palestinians were discredited, Hamas grew stronger, and the two-state solution that Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Obama all favored is now dead (if not quite buried). Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry wasted a lot of time and energy on this problem and got bupkis.

Obama's response to the "Arab Spring" was no more successful. The United States helped push Hosni Mubarak out in Egypt and backed the newly elected government of Mohamed Morsi, only to reverse course and turn a blind eye when a military coup ousted Morsi and imposed another thuggish dictatorship. U.S. air power helped topple Muammar al-Qaddafi in Libya (a decision Obama now regrets), and the result is a failed state where the Islamic State is active. Obama declared "Assad must go" in Syria, despite there being no good way to ensure his departure and no good candidates to replace him, and then United States helped block the initial U.N. efforts to reach a cease-fire to end the fighting. Today, Syria is in ruins, and Assad still rules the country's key areas. Obama and his team were also blindsided by the emergence of the Islamic State and by the Houthi rebellion in Yemen. It pains me to say so, but the Middle East will be in even worse shape when he leaves office than it was when he arrived. The United States is not solely responsible for this unfortunate trend, but our repeated meddling sowed additional chaos and alienated both friends and foes alike.

To be sure, dealing with simultaneous uprisings in several different countries would have been challenging for any president, and it is easy to imagine responses that would have been even worse than what the United States actually did. Even so, Obama and his team never seem to have figured out what they wanted to accomplish in the region (apart from stopping Iran's progress toward a nuclear bomb), and the end result was a series of incoherent improvisations.

Lastly, Obama deserves low marks for his handling of Russia. I'm no fan of Vladimir Putin, but U.S. officials erred by openly siding with the demonstrators seeking to oust former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych and by failing to anticipate how Russia was likely to respond. The result was a tragedy for the Ukrainian people, an embarrassment for the United States, and a more precarious situation in Europe, which hardly needed another problem on its agenda.

Does this record reveal the shortcomings of a supposedly "realist" foreign policy, as some of Obama's liberal critics now contend? On the one hand, Obama does have certain instincts that are consistent with a realist outlook. He recognizes that U.S. power is not unlimited and that military power is a crude instrument that cannot solve every problem. Like most contemporary realists, he thinks the United States is extremely secure and that nuclear terrorism and climate change are the only existential threats it faces for the foreseeable future. His belief that Asia is of rising strategic importance shows an appreciation for the key role that economic and military capability - that is, hard power - play in shaping world politics. Indeed, his emphasis on " nation building at home " reflects an acute awareness that domestic strength is the bedrock of national security and international influence. And like most realists, he thinks the idea that the United States needs to fight foolish wars in order to keep its "credibility" intact is dangerous nonsense.

But on the other hand, the Atlantic story shows that Obama never fully embraced a realist worldview either. He thinks there are four main strategic alternatives for the United States: realism, liberal interventionism, internationalism, and isolationism. He rejects the latter completely and believes foreign-policy making involves picking and choosing from among the first three. And though he offers some tart criticisms of the interventionist "D.C. playbook," Obama believes (along with most of the foreign-policy establishment) that the United States is an "exceptional" power and that American leadership is still "indispensable." At bottom, he wants to have it both ways: to acknowledge there are limits to U.S. power and some problems it can safely ignore, but to still stand ready to intervene when vital interests are at risk or when U.S. power can produce positive results.

But after seven-plus years in office, this most articulate of presidents never articulated a clear and coherent framework identifying what those vital interests are and why and spelling out how the United States could advance broader political ideals at acceptable cost and risk. To be specific: What regions of the world were worth significant commitments of American blood and treasure? Why were these regions more important than others? Under what conditions is it advisable to put U.S. citizens in harm's way in order to keep the rest of us safe? When will the costs and risks of action outweigh the potential benefits? And don't forget the flip side: What regions or issues are of little or no importance to the United States and can safely be left to others?

The Atlantic story suggests that Obama has asked himself these questions more than once and is comfortable with the answers he has come up with for each. He is said to believe the Middle East is of declining importance, for example, and that Asia is rising. But Obama never shared his overarching vision with the rest of us, and he never openly stated that some parts of the world lay outside the sphere of vital U.S. interests and were therefore not worth sending Americans to fight and die for. Instead of laying out a hierarchy of interests and explaining the logic behind his thinking, Obama's public utterances mostly echoed and reinforced the familiar tropes of U.S. liberal hegemony.

In his 2009 speech accepting the Nobel Peace Prize, he defended the need for military power and told the world that the United States has "helped underwrite global security for more than six decades with the blood of our citizens and the strength of our arms." And he showed he meant it by ramping up the use of drones, targeted assassinations, and special operations activities. Obama may have used military power in smaller increments and to achieve more modest goals than Bush did, but he used it in a lot more places. But how he decided where to act and where to hold back remains something of a mystery, even to those of us who have been paying attention.

His failure to define U.S. interests clearly and his tendency to recite the familiar rhetoric of liberal hegemony had several unfortunate consequences. First, it meant Obama faced constant pressure to "do something" whenever trouble beckoned in some distant corner of the world, but he had no overarching argument or principle with which to deflect the pressure (save for the correct but unhelpful dictum to avoid "stupid shit"). The danger, as the Libya debacle shows clearly, is that advocates of intervention will sometimes manage to override more sensible instincts and convince even a reluctant president to act, even though vital U.S. interests are not at stake and Washington has no idea what it is doing. In the absence of a clear strategy, stupid shit sometimes happens anyway.

Second, because Obama kept saying U.S. leadership was indispensable, he was vulnerable to hard-line criticism whenever he tried to end a failed policy or avoid some new quagmire. Getting out of Afghanistan and Iraq and staying out of Ukraine and Syria were the right calls, because vital U.S. interests were not at stake in any of these countries or their problems. But Obama never presented a convincing explanation for why this was the case (and in Afghanistan, in fact, he said the opposite). Thus, what he should have presented as difficult but hardheaded strategic judgments were seen as symptoms of war-weary and woolly-headed weakness.

This same ambivalence marred relations with U.S. allies. Free-riding and "reckless driving" by U.S. allies clearly bothers Obama, yet he spent considerable time and effort trying to convince many of these same allies they could count on Uncle Sam no matter what happened or what they did. What was the predictable result? U.S. allies continued to misbehave in various ways while getting angry and upset because Washington wasn't doing everything they wanted. Foreign governments might have been equally disappointed had Obama told them why they had to do more to defend themselves, but at least they would have known where they stood (and so would the American taxpayer).

Most importantly, because Obama never publicly embraced an unvarnished realist outlook or tried to explain this view to the American people, he never disrupted the "D.C. playbook" that he now disparages. During his first presidential campaign, he said he didn't want to just end the Iraq War; he also wanted to "end the mindset that got us into war in the first place." The American people are in some ways already there, but the foreign-policy establishment hasn't gotten the memo. The Atlantic story describes Obama as openly dismissive of the D.C. "think-tank complex," but he appointed plenty of its members to prominent positions and embraced many of its shibboleths - most notably the indispensability of "U.S. leadership" - throughout his presidency.

Altering a well-entrenched mindset is not easy, and the president is just one voice (albeit an unusually influential one). Changing the current consensus would have required Obama to take on these entrenched interests and intellectual fiefdoms directly and to appoint a different sort of person to at least a few important government positions. He would have had to articulate a different grand strategy over the course of his presidency and not just in a couple of quickly forgotten speeches. No, changing a consensus requires making the case with the same persistence and focus that he showed in selling the Iran deal. And while he was doing that, he would still have had to run the government and deal with each week's surprises. That's a lot to ask of any president and especially one who took office with the economy on the brink and without a lot of prior experience in Washington.

In short, Obama did not in fact run a "realist" foreign policy, because he doesn't fully embrace a realist worldview, didn't appoint many (any?) realists to key positions, and never really tried to dismantle the bipartisan consensus behind the grand strategy of liberal hegemony. As I've noted before, a genuinely "realist" foreign policy would have left Afghanistan promptly in 2009, converted our "special relationships" in the Middle East to normal ones, explicitly rejected further NATO expansion, eschewed "regime change" and other forms of social engineering in foreign countries such as Libya or Syria, and returned to the broad strategy of restrained " offshore balancing " that served the United States so well in the past.

Of course, even if Obama had explained the logic behind this strategy carefully and followed it consistently, he might still have failed to transform the foreign-policy establishment's interventionist mindset. After all, that worldview is supported by plenty of wealthy individuals, powerful corporations, influential think tanks, and well-connected lobbies. A more ambitious effort to change how Americans think about foreign policy might not have succeeded. But as his presidency approaches its close, I still wish he had tried.

Photo credit: KEVIN DIETSCH-POOL/Getty Images

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If he had been, he might have avoided some of his biggest foreign-policy mistakes.

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The United States, Henry Kissinger once observed, is "probablythe only country in which the term 'realist' can be used as a pejorative epithet."

It's true-the term realpolitik, which is intimately associated with 19th-century authoritarian statesmen such as Klemens von Metternich and Otto von Bismarck, has always carried an unsavory whiff in America. Despite George Washington's warnings about the dangers of entangling alliances, there were always more than a few of his brethren who wanted the United States to become a crusader nation, carrying on our revolutionary heritage abroad. The isolationists finally made a comeback in the 1930s-only to see the attack on Pearl Harbor and American entry into World War II snuff out their dreams of a Fortress America. After the collapse of the Soviet empire, the belief that it was Washington's solemn duty to battle tyranny abroad became even more entrenched among the foreign policy elite.

Story Continued Below

But is Donald Trump changing that? Is he converting the land of the free and the home of the brave into something entirely different-a balance-of-power nation that dispenses with traditional morality as so much sentimental piffle?

In its purest distillation, realism depicts states as operating in a nasty and brutish Hobbesian world that prompts them to vie for power and influence at the expense of other nations. This very struggle, however, helps to promote a balance of power that rests on coalitions of states emerging to thwart any attempts at hegemony. The result is an equilibrium in which states subordinate moral concerns to respecting one another's spheres of influence.

During the 2016 presidential campaign, Trump appeared to embrace glimmerings of realism 101. We were told, among other things, that the era of America as Mr. Big, intervening to set wrong aright abroad, was over. Free trade and human rights, Trump suggested, were bunk. Raw national interest was in. Regime change and nation-building were out. Just take the oil, "bomb the shit out of" the bad guys, and be done with it. For good measure, wave goodbye to the namby-pamby milksops at the State Department, the United Nations and elsewhere. "The nation-state," Trump declared, "remains the true foundation for happiness and harmony."

Since then, Trump has taken some symbolic steps to signal his contempt for the world order of yesteryear, whether it's withdrawing from the Paris climate accords or considering whether to efface the call for a "just and democratic world" from the State Department's mission statement. And the White House is sounding realist notes. Chief strategist Steve Bannon has been pushing his colleagues to dive into Thucydides, considered the founder of realism in foreign affairs. Writing in the Wall Street Journal, two of Trump's other top aides, national security adviser H.R. McMaster and Gary Cohn, director of the National Economic Council, raised liberal eyebrows by dismissing the idea that a "global community" exists. The world is "an arena where nations, non-governmental actors, and businesses engage and compete for advantage," they wrote. "Rather than deny this elemental nature of international affairs, we endorse it."

After Trump went on his second overseas trip to Poland and the G-20 summit conference in Hamburg, the duo chimed in again in the New York Times to laud their boss. But this time they were less truculent: "Perhaps most important," McMaster and Cohn wrote, "President Trump affirmed on this trip that America First is grounded in American values-values that not only strengthen America, but also drive progress throughout the world."

The nation-state," Trump declared, "remains the true foundation for happiness and harmony."

In trying to split the difference between globalism and an America First nationalism, though, McMaster and Cohn inadvertently revealed the contradictions besetting any attempt to forge, or at least espouse, a coherent and consistent Trump doctrine. One difficulty, of course, is the underlying and bogus pretense that past presidents have dispensed with defending and advancing America's interests. The truth is that the institutions that Trump likes to deride-NATO, the World Bank and so forth-were championed after World War II by arch-realists such as Dean Acheson and George C. Marshall. With Europe and Asia in shambles, their aim was to consolidate a preponderance of American power. It worked. But the biggest defect in the attempt to depict coherence where there is none revolves, of course, around Trump himself. Realists like to talk about prudence and caution, invoking prescient moves like George H. W. Bush's refusal to march to Baghdad during the first Iraq War. No one, however, would accuse Trump of possessing these traits.

He has essentially prostrated himself before the ultimate realist, Russian President Vladimir Putin. Trump said North Korea's leader, Kim Jong Un, was a "smart cookie"; now he talks about unleashing "fire and fury." One week he refuses to endorse NATO's Article V; another he avows his fealty to it. Meanwhile, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson says that Iran must "go home" from Syria-a prospect that appears about as likely as the Washington Redskins signing quarterback Kirk Cousins to a multiyear contract. This is why the chances of Washington becoming mired in a war with Iran or North Korea, or maybe even both, over the next year are so alarmingly high. It would be no small irony if Trump ended up replicating on an even grander scale the imperial follies that brought America and the George W. Bush administration to grief.

So, yes, it's important to study realist precepts to understand the outlines of the Trump presidency. But the more you dig into it, the more you understand that Trump has no grand philosophy at all-he's just making it up as he goes along, about what you would expect from a lifelong brand salesman who's now trying to peddle more moonshine from the Oval Office.

Jacob Heilbrunn is editor of the National Interest and author of They Knew They Were Right: The Rise of the Neocons.

This article tagged under:

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The United States, Henry Kissinger once observed, is "probablythe only country in which the term 'realist' can be used as a pejorative epithet." It's true-the term realpolitik, which is intimately associated with 19th-century authoritarian statesmen such as Klemens von Metternich and Otto von Bismarck, has always carried an unsavory whiff in America.

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Environmental issues have become a more prominent part of global politics over the years, largely due to them being a by-product of the rapid industrialisation of the world. As a global concern, states have recognised that they must take a liberal approach in coming together and developing solutions with mutual goals so that they can tackle problems such as climate change. The Paris Agreement of 2015 followed two previous agreements by the UNFCCC, in an attempt to deal with greenhouse gas emission mitigations. While its existence demonstrates progress in the right direction, the critical question is whether or not it can be deemed a success.

As of today, 195 states have signed the agreement implying a success as it demonstrates a global consensus which is vital in tackling climate change. Due to the problem affecting the whole world, it is imperative that the solution involves the cooperation of all countries and so this is significant because with all states committed to reducing their carbon emissions, progress is inevitable. While the Kyoto Protocol in 1997 was ratified by 192 states, in due course, many countries dropped out after failing to meet their targets and it neglected to take into account how developing countries would go on to become major polluters such as China, and so, emissions have drastically increased since and co2 emissions went up by 61percent. The Copenhagen Accord that followed in 2009 did not have the scale of commitment that the Paris Agreement has and quickly fell apart due to lack of structure. Considering the theory of The Tragedy of the Commons, it can be understood that having a global agreement is a key success because the global management of greenhouse gas emissions involves controlling open access aspects and this can be done through open communication between all states and through the understanding that what is good for all of us is good for each of us.

However, this consensus quickly falls apart as states can leave the agreement and act on their own self interests. At the summit, former President Obama said, "the world has committed to a low carbon future", yet with the US under new leadership, President Trump has decided to leave the agreement by 2020 which reflects that it was not a success because the critical aspect is cooperation and with a major power and major polluter leaving, the world becomes at a disadvantage. According to Machiavelli's core principles of realism, self interest if a driving force of individuals and Trump, more interested in winning his core electoral base, acts on America's national interest which breaks down the fundamental requirements in achieving the collective goals. In addition, there is the matter of inequality in that states have different timelines for beginning their carbon cuts. Developing countries such as China should reach their peak in carbon emissions by 2030 before reducing their emissions whereas Britain has had to do so right away. This can be seen as certain countries having a free pass. This reflects the 'free rider' concept of Hardin, rendering the agreement ineffective.

Unlike the Copenhagen Accord, the Paris Climate Change Summit had clear structure and specific goals. This illustrates that the agreement is a success because states agreed on a commitment of not allowing global warming to increase above 2˚C showing clear targets that make for solutions. All states were also asked to present an action plan which were detailed and specific meaning that they were based around the individuality of each state and could therefore be more easily implemented. Alongside this there was a committee set up to monitor these plans year by year which is effective in ensuring that states are in line with their targets and are working towards their plans for emission cuts. The Alliance of Small Islands States (AOSIS) are most vulnerable to the effects of climate change and so despite being much smaller actors, they took on a leadership role and became strong advocates for developing ambitious targets which shows the level of commitment to resolving the problem. Samoa's ambassador said "It just goes to show that if we put our minds collectively to anything as a global family we can do it" which establishes some of the core liberal beliefs in that cooperation is they key to success and Paris has succeeded in bringing about this cooperation.

Radical ecologists on the other hand, would argue that this is not enough, and the efforts have been insufficient. Naomi Klein, an eco-social activist has claimed that temperatures are on the way to rise by 4-6˚C despite the Paris Agreement wanting to cap at 2˚C which is a dangerous tipping point. Emissions since Kyoto have gone up by 61% even though it was an attempt to reduce them and many argue that this will be the same for the Paris Agreement because the plans are not enough to match the rate of climate change with 14 of the 15 hottest years on record having occurred between 2001 and 2016. The Low-Lying Coalition have also criticised the 2˚C maximum being too high because they are more vulnerable to the effects of climate change such as flooding they want 1,.5%. The agreement only comes into effect in 2020 which gives 5 years in between for conditions to become worse which could result in irreversible damage; and for developing countries such as India and China, their emissions are still set to peak until 2030 and from the perspective of deep ecologists such as Arne Naess who are concerned with the intrinsic value of nature, fundamentally, this does not reflect the best interests of the planet.

Success of the agreement can be seen through kick starting innovation of green technologies in recent years. China who was considered one of the largest polluters has excelled and become a world leader in green technologies after signing on to the Paris Agreement. They are the world's largest exporter of solar panels and are rapidly developing wind power with one turbine going up every hour. This has showed significant progress considering in 2012 they did not have any of these turbines and were also apprehensive about signing any climate change agreements. Al-Gore has described climate change as the number one problem in the global economy but the events since the agreement have shown that states have recognised this and are using renewable energy as the way forward in developing their economies. While from a realist perspective states will continue to serve their national interest, if it is recognised that renewables are the way forward, countries will compete to excel in this market which will encourage the use of eco-friendly developments. With the stimulated growth in green technologies, with China aiming to create two global brands in the field by 2020 and the development of green alternatives by large existing brands such as Tesla who have developed electric cars that grown in popularity, the Paris Climate Change Summit can be considered successful as it was able to encourage this. On the side-lines of the summit, a new coalition called the Break-through coalition was established by Bill Gates and a number of 'Green Capitalists'. They promised to invest $1 bn in startup companies that found innovative solutions to climate change. In this view, entrepreneurism and innovation, hallmarks of capitalism, will solve the problem.

Although, some would claim, that this is simply capitalism continuing to take course and feeding a consumerist society. The concept of green capitalism is controversial in that ecologists would state that capitalism and being eco-friendly are mutually exclusive. Naomi Klein argues that society has not done the things necessary to tackle climate change precisely because of deregulated capitalism. The development of green technologies is, as such, a response to climate change that breeds materialism and grows national markets rather than strategically tackling the problem. This is because the motives behind the innovations are unclear meaning that they could be to serve the self-interests of countries; China's rise in this field may be due to them wanting to promote themselves as a global leader and to defend themselves from the US who could cut of their non-renewable energy supply - oil, via the Malaga Strait. The significance of this argument is that once states have reaped the benefits of this market, they may abandon it and adapt to what can continue to build their economy. In addition, the current development of green technologies continues to use a vast deal of resources and materials which defeats the goal. Hence, the summit was unsuccessful as the actual measures needed to fight climate change are not being acknowledged.

In conclusion, it is evident that while the summit is the most significant step seen so far in solving climate change, the efforts are insufficient. This is largely due to capitalism being a priority over the environment and states are more concerned with short term success rather than focusing on long-term problems that may arise. While developments in green technology have proved effective, until this is accepted by a global majority, sufficient progress cannot be made.

Shrayah Patel

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Was the Paris Climate Change Summit too little too late?

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Environmental issues have become a more prominent part of global politics over the years, largely due to them being a by-product of the rapid industrialisation of the world. As a global concern, states have recognised that they must take a liberal approach in coming together and developing solutions with mutual goals so that they can tackle problems such as climate change.

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The World Trade Organisation (WTO) is the world's primary institution for all areas relating to trade, establishing default tariff rates for its members, setting out laws for fair and equal trade regulations, and acting as a forum for trade disputes and appeals to be carried out. The Organisation is member-driven and for agreements to be made there must be a consensus reached by its around-150 strong membership, representing well over 90% of the global economy.

Despite all members having equal voting powers, the economic influence exercised by the world's wealthier states naturally provides them with an advantage. Critics of the WTO argue that it enables wealthier states/the 'Global North' to maintain tariffs and rules which provide them with an advantage at the expense of the developing world. Some of the poorest, most conflict-ridden and unstable countries in the world also not member to the WTO, such as Eritrea, North Korea and South Sudan, only worsening the problem.

The claim that the WTO favours the wealthier world is evidenced by the Doha Development Round, something which in itself has become the target of a lot of WTO-aimed criticism. The Doha Round is the currently ongoing round of negotiations in the WTO which is aimed at enabling developing countries to grow economically at a greater rate and with greater trade security. However, the round has been stalled by powerful, dynamic voting blocs (like the EU and the NAFTA countries) refusing efforts to abandon agricultural subsidisation, a policy which currently wreaks havoc on agricultural sectors across the developing world and which encourages agricultural dumping by developed states which significantly overproduce. Because of the WTO's consensus voting system, progress over development has been painstakingly slow and issues such as agricultural subsidisation are effectively at a stalemate.

Finally, the WTO is also criticised for its pursuit of free trade at the expense of the developing world. The argument, often known as the infant industry argument, states that less- and non-competitive industries in developing countries require some tariff protections. The inability to set up targeted protectionist tariffs by poorer states also greatly inhibits the ability for diversification, with extractive economies largely in the Middle East and Africa limited even more to a sector with an ever-shortening lifespan. Emerging economies are also impacted as tariffs cannot be used to favour those domestic industries which have emerged, pitting local companies against transnational corporations on a level playing field.

Etien Jasonson

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The World Trade Organisation (WTO) is the world's primary institution for all areas relating to trade, establishing default tariff rates for its members, setting out laws for fair and equal trade regulations, and acting as a forum for trade disputes and appeals to be carried out.

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Peoples Vote

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Hundreds of thousands of people turned out for a march through central London on Saturday calling for a referendum on the final Brexit deal.

Those demonstrating hope that the scale of their protest will force politicians to listen to their demands.

But how effective is mass protest? Here are some other significant demonstrations which have taken place in the UK in recent decades.
People's Vote march: In pictures
Stop the war: 15 February, 2003

As part of a worldwide weekend of protest against the Iraq War, people took to the streets of London in their masses in 2003.

Police said it was the UK's biggest ever demonstration with at least 750,000 taking part, although organisers put the figure closer to two million.

But it wasn't enough to stop Britain's involvement in the impending war with Iraq.

Just over a month later, the then prime minister Tony Blair won House of Commons backing to send UK forces into war in Iraq.

However, in 2015 Lord Falconer, one of Mr Blair's closest allies during the build-up to war, said the fact the Iraq invasion was now perceived as a mistake meant the anti-war march had changed things.

He said: "If a million people come out on the streets in the future, then what government is going to say they are wrong now?

"When the last time the public expressed their opposition in that way, history said the people on the street were right and not the people in the government."

Labour MP Diane Abbott said Mr Blair had "destroyed his own reputation" and his government's reputation had "bled to death in the sands of Iraq".

Opposition to hunting ban: 22 September, 2002

Around 400,000 people joined the "Liberty and Livelihood" march through central London in 2002 - claimed to be the largest demonstration in Britain since the 19th century.

The main focus of the protest was opposition to a ban on hunting with dogs in England and Wales.

Following months of organisation the Countryside Alliance, formed originally to oppose a ban on fox hunting, hailed the march as a huge success and it called on the government to make a "considered response".

Months of wrangling between the pro-hunting Lords and the anti-hunting Commons followed.

However, Tony Blair's Labour government went ahead and introduced the Hunting Act in 2004.

CND march: 24 October, 1983

The Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) was at the peak of its popularity and influence during the mid-1980s.

It was founded in 1958 at the height of the Cold War and began to stage annual marches attended by thousands.

CND's demonstration on the eve of Cruise missile deployment in the UK in October 1983 was one of the largest in British history.

More than 250,000 people marched through London to protest over the siting of nuclear missiles at Greenham Common in Berkshire and other UK bases.

Some observers dismissed the drive towards nuclear disarmament as naive.

But the government took seriously the influence of protesters.

Downing Street files released in 2016 show that the-then prime minister Margaret Thatcher was warned by her foreign secretary, Francis Pym, that the anti-nuclear movement could become so "widespread and powerful" that it might halt the deployment of US cruise missiles in Britain.

Membership of the CND peaked in 1985 at 110,000 and the release of files showed the extent of a sustained campaign to keep the movement out of the public eye.

The core objective of UK nuclear disarmament remains, as yet, unfulfilled.

Poll Tax: 31 March, 1990

An estimated 200,000 people attended the Poll Tax rally in central London, including some seasoned protesters but also many young people.

People came from all walks of life to show their opposition to the new Community Charge - a local tax on every adult citizen which replaced domestic rates, a longstanding tax on property.

The tax was introduced by Margaret Thatcher. It came into effect in Scotland in 1989, and in England a year later.

Many saw it as unfair to poorer communities - and the rallies against it became a focal point for those who felt alienated by 11 years of Conservative government and Thatcherism.

The rally saw some of the worst rioting in the capital in more than 100 years.

It also came to symbolise, for many, the end of Thatcherism.

In November 1990, eight months after the riots and following a leadership challenge, Mrs Thatcher resigned.

Her successor, John Major, dismantled the Poll Tax, which was later replaced by Council Tax.

Student tuition fees: 10 November, 2010

Tens of thousands of people protested in 2010 against plans to treble tuition fees and cut university funding in England.

Student leaders said about 50,000 people took part in a march through central London - before the protest turned violent after some demonstrators broke away.

They stormed the Conservative Party headquarters, smashed windows and got on to the roof.

A series of subsequent demonstrations also saw clashes with police.

However, the planned increase in tuition fees to up to £9,000 in England still went ahead in September 2012.

But for the Liberal Democrats and their leader, Nick Clegg, who promised to vote against raising tuition fees, there were lasting consequences.

They became particular targets for student anger, which famously resulted in a spoof video where Mr Clegg appeared to sing an apology about his party's U-turn.

The former deputy prime minister eventually lost his seat as an MP in Sheffield Hallam in 2017- the defeat was blamed by some on losing his student voters.

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Hundreds of thousands of people turned out for a march through central London on Saturday calling for a referendum on the final Brexit deal. Those demonstrating hope that the scale of their protest will force politicians to listen to their demands. But how effective is mass protest?

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The most influential groups you never heard of

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Politics Live goes behind the scenes to find out who funds the think tanks influencing policy in the UK.

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Intergovernmentalism and supranationalism differ in that the former is the cooperation between governments, and the latter describes action above the government level, acting with greater authority than any single member state. The EU, as a union of 28 different governments, contains some intergovernmental elements throughout the EU's various institutions. However, some EU institutions, like the CJEU, are entirely independent from the national governments and yet exercise authority over them, making them supranational.

The intergovernmental elements of the EU are most obviously illustrated by the European Council and the Council of Ministers, both of which draw their membership from national governments. The European Council's participants are all heads of state and direct the overall direction of the policy making process, making the European Council one of the most senior institutions within the EU and, more importantly, an intergovernmental one. Though it lacks a fixed membership, the Council of Ministers is comprised of national ministers on a range of issues (or equivalent) who sit when their respective sector is under discussion. Similarly to the European Council, the influential nature of the Council of Ministers and the participants' origins in a national ministerial role makes the CoM a senior and intergovernmental branch of the EU.

Contrastingly, the CJEU and (to a lesser extent) the European Commission are both examples of supranationalist elements within the EU. The CJEU is the overarching institution which houses the European General Court and the European Court of Justice, both of which are independent from any national government but can act above national courts. The European Court of Justice is the highest court of appeal amongst the member states and can overturn verdicts of any national court, making the CJEU a supranationalist EU institution. The Commission lacks such a direct and substantial power, but still carries out a legislative role whilst being independent from national governments. Though there are a number of checks in place to limit the power of the Commission and keep them subordinate to the European Parliament, they still exercise a measure of influence. As the drafters of legislation, the Commission can influence specific details of some laws and, when permitted by the European Parliament, can pass delegated legislation that amends existing, non-essential EU laws. In this sense the Commission is not as obviously a supranationalist force within the EU as the CJEU, however both act as clear evidence of the supranational capabilities of the EU despite existing within a largely intergovernmentalist system.

Etien Jasonson

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How the European Union combines Intergovernmentalism with supranationalism

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Intergovernmentalism and supranationalism differ in that the former is the cooperation between governments, and the latter describes action above the government level, acting with greater authority than any single member state. The EU, as a union of 28 different governments, contains some intergovernmental elements throughout the EU's various institutions.

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The 100th anniversary of the end of the first world war will give Emmanuel Macron a platform from which to push back against nationalism. More than 60 world leaders will gather in Paris on Sunday and the president of France wants to make sure that they go home not just with a goody bag but with a clear message.

France is using the occasion to stage an international peace conference, which it plans to turn into an annual event. The Paris Peace Forum is being launched under the slightly tepid slogan "Peace is linked with global governance".

Even this equivocal message is unlikely to sit well with Donald Trump, who is an avowed foe of global governance. The US president recently told the UN: "We will never surrender America's sovereignty to an unelected, uncontrollable global bureaucracy."

Nonetheless, the simultaneous presence of Mr Macron and Mr Trump - with their very different visions of "global governance" - is an appropriate way of remembering the end of the first world war. Together, the French and American presidents represent two traditions of thought about international relations that clashed in Paris, just after the end of hostilities a century ago. The struggle between these visions defines not just the past, but also, potentially, the future of world politics.

Mr Macron is the heir to the high-minded and ambitious internationalism represented by Woodrow Wilson, the US president who represented America at the Paris Peace Conference of 1919. It was Wilson who set out "14 points" to frame a new world order and who embraced the idea of a League of Nations as a new form of global governance to end all wars.

But Wilson's ambitious plans were shot down at home, when the Senate refused to approve American membership of the League of Nations. The opposition was led by Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, who insisted that "I must think of the United States first" and proclaimed that "internationalism . . . is to me repulsive".

One hundred years later, the US has a president who stands firmly in the tradition of Lodge, putting " America First " and denouncing "globalism". The similarities do not end there. Lodge was also a leading opponent of mass immigration to the US.

The peace efforts of 1918-19 failed. War returned to Europe within 20 years. But internationalists like Mr Macron and nationalists such as Mr Trump draw very different lessons from this failure.

The League of Nations went ahead without US participation. For nationalists like John Bolton, Mr Trump's national security adviser, the League's failure has become a byword for the futility of global governance. In the 1930s, the League was completely unable to act as an effective check on the ambitions of imperial Japan, Mussolini's Italy and Nazi Germany. The realist-nationalist view is that it was only hard power deployed by nation states - rather than global governance deployed by international institutions - that stood a chance of checking the ambitions of dictators.

The internationalist response is that the graver mistake, in the aftermath of the first world war, was made by the likes of Lodge. By retreating into isolationism, the US created the conditions for international anarchy to flourish. In the space of two generations, America was back at war in Europe - as Wilson had warned it would be, if it rejected the League. In other words, global governance did not fail between 1918 and 1939. It was never given a proper chance.

The post-1945 generation of US policymakers - the "wise men" - adopted a compromise between the internationalist and nationalist critiques of what had gone wrong between the two wars. They tended to share the view that the League of Nations was hopelessly ineffective and idealistic. But they also decided that American isolationism had been a terrible error.

As a result, the US adopted a kind of tempered Wilsonianism. America joined and indeed hosted the new United Nations. But the UN charter was written to acknowledge some of the more telling objections made by Lodge. There was no longer any suggestion that America could be compelled to go to war by a global body, over the heads of Congress. And much of America's efforts to maintain international order have rested not on the UN, but on hard power - nuclear weapons, a network of international alliances and a willingness to intervene militarily all over the world.

This hard-edged form of internationalism has governed US foreign policy - under both Republicans and Democrats - for many decades. Only with the arrival of Mr Trump in the White House has the US reverted to the nationalism of 1919.

It is Mr Macron, however, who will have the stage in Paris. But where the most powerful leaders in the audience really stand in the dispute between Macronian globalism and Trumpian nationalism is ambiguous.

Both Xi Jinping of China and Vladimir Putin of Russia have learnt to "talk globalist, but act nationalist". Unlike President Trump, they see no reason to boast of their hostility to global rules. But Russian and Chinese actions in Crimea and the South China Sea say more about their real attitudes than the polite applause they will offer to Mr Macron's speech next week.

Letter in response to this column:
Internationalism is a complex concept / From Philipp Thumfart, London W2, UK

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Emmanuel Macron, Donald Trump and the ghosts of 1918

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The 100th anniversary of the end of the first world war will give Emmanuel Macron a platform from which to push back against nationalism. More than 60 world leaders will gather in Paris on Sunday and the president of France wants to make sure that they go home not just with a goody bag but with a clear message.

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A very good Radio 4 programme on the success and otherwise of modern and historical protest movements. This is very good for key contemporary pressure group examples.
In an age when technology has made organising protest movements easier than ever before, journalist Zoe Williams asks why we aren't seeing long-term results. She looks back on the global history of activism to discover the pre-conditions needed for concrete change.

http://alevelpolitics.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Seriously-20170411-LongRoadToChange.mp3

Recent years have seen an explosion of protest movements to secure equality, protect immigrants, and demand justice. But often these movements are doomed to short-term impact. Does today's activism overlook the benefits of doing things the hard way?

By digging into the archives, Zoe looks back to the most impactful protest movements of the 20th century that permanently changed history. By analysing what key elements are needed for success, she will construct new rules of modern-day activism for future generations.

Zoe speaks to former civil rights organiser Marshall Ganz, and considers whether social media can work with traditional methods of protesting by speaking with a co-founder of UK Uncut and digital activists who studied the unprecedented success of Euromaidan in Ukraine.

Some activists believe the issue lies in how we measure the success of movements. Co-founder of the global Occupy protests, Micah White, explains how the failure of his movement showed him how activism needs to be redefined.

Finally, Zoe investigates how to overcome the obstacles that stand in the way of any protest - from radicals that disrupt non-violent marches to handling media coverage - and how government bodies may manipulate protests to their own advantage.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Android | RSS

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Audio: Pressure Groups: Long Road to Change

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A very good Radio 4 programme on the success and otherwise of modern and historical protest movements. This is very good for key contemporary pressure group examples. In an age when technology has made organising protest movements easier than ever before, journalist Zoe Williams asks why we aren't seeing long-term results.

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Backbenchers are Members of Parliament who do not have ministerial roles, be this in the Government or as part of the Shadow Cabinet. Their importance is highly debatable, with their potential for impact upon the legislative cycle being weighed up against the significant impact party politics, patronage and discipline has on mediating these powers. Ultimately, this essay shall conclude that backbenchers only have any real or significant importance beyond their constituency roles where they band together to produce certain outcomes, such as in backbench rebellions.One way in which backbenchers may be seen to be important is via their role in the policy and legislative cycles. Backbenchers can impact policymaking in numerous ways, including by introducing Private Members Bills to parliament. Examples of historically significant Private Member's Bills may include the 1967 Abortion Act. Additionally, backbenchers have the opportunity to partake in Parliamentary Committees, particularly where there is a bill in keeping with their interests or expertise. These can alter the details of legislation. Similarly, backbechers have the ability to alter the substanative content of legislation during the debates which take place at the Second Reading of a given bill. Finally, at the voting stage a backbench rebellion has the potential to overthrow a given piece of legislation - for example,

However, arguably the significance of the impact backbenchers can have upon policy is seriously limited by factors such as party discipline and patronage. The Whip system generally ensures that almost all bills which the government wants to pass through parliament will do as such, and private members bills are rarely timetabled in to debate. The significance of party discipline is likely best seen with the fact that from 1997 to 2010, only 7 government-backed bills failed to pass through parliament. This is also linked to the system of party patronage which ensures loyalty. Due to the principle of collective ministerial responsibility, no minister can be publically seen to disagree with the government. As such, "payroll votes" are created whereby the government essentially 'buys' significant support by giving backbenchers ministerial role. This is seen as, for instance, there are currently over 100 junior ministerial roles and 20 Whip or Assistant whip positions across both houses of parliamentary.

An alternative way in which backbenchers may be seen as important is via their role of government scrutiny, with the ability to hold the government to account. This role is most significant in Departmental Select Committees. 30-40% of Select Committee suggestions are ultimately taken up by the government. One example of change caused by a Select Committee was the recent resignation of Charlotte Hogg from the post of Deputy Governor of the Bank of England after the Treasury Select Committee lauded her failure to disclose a potential conflict of interest of her brother's employment at Barclays to the Bank. Other forms of scrutiny from backbenchers may include putting pressure on the government to introduce policy changes - a lack of support from backbenchers combined with their potential to stir up opposition in the media can force the government to make a U-turrn. This was the case with Phillip Hammond's 2017 Spring Budget, whereby pressure from Tory backbenchers over the fact the policy went against the party's manifesto caused him to withdraw the proposal to increase National Insurance contributions for the self-employed.

However, the ability of backbencher scrutiny to have an impact upon policy is limited. Evidenty, the vast majority of Select Committee suggestions are ignored - for instance, David Cameron directly ignored Select Committee reports on drug legislation when introducing a bill on the matter. Additionally, Select Committees lack the ability to scrutinise legislation, and election to the position of chair or selection for the role is impacted by party politics, even if it is anonymous and no longer subject to the whip. The best people are arguably not always therefore chosen, leading to a large amount of consensus politics within Committees- for instance, Ken Livingstone, despite his large amount of experience within local government, never chaired a select committee, likely due to his unpopularity with the party bosses

Ultimately, it is evident that the importance of backbenchers is largely limited by the strength of the Executive to exercise its will. Evidenlty, the idiom that legislation is passed through, rather than by, parliament appears to be true; backbenchers are rarely able to impact outcomes, and when they do this tends to be only when they can work together as a large body to provide opposition

Tracey Mwaniki

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Backbenchers are Members of Parliament who do not have ministerial roles, be this in the Government or as part of the Shadow Cabinet. Their importance is highly debatable, with their potential for impact upon the legislative cycle being weighed up against the significant impact party politics, patronage and discipline has on mediating these powers.

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We've just flicked the switch on moving all our digital resources to instant digital download - via our new subject stores.

For every subject you can now access each digital resource as soon as it is ordered. This will always be the latest edition of each resource too (and we'll update you automatically if there is an upgraded version to use).

Simply add the required resources to your cart, checkout using the usual options and your resources will be available to access immediately via your mytutor2u account.

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Ministerial Responsibility: Amber Rudd resigns | tutor2u Politics

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The Home Secretary, Amber Rudd has resigned from the government in the wake of claims that she misled the House of Commons over targets for forced deportation. Amber Rudd was once seen as a leading candidate to lead the Conservative Party and she is the fourth cabinet minister to resign in the last six months following Michael Fallon, Pritti Patel and Damian Green.

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May promises to listen after holding on in confidence vote...
"A wounded Theresa May limped home from a vote of no confidence yesterday after more than a third of Tory MPs rejected her leadership. The prime minister was forced to give up on leading the party into the next election to get over the line. Out of 317 Tory MPs, 117 voted against her, leaving a winning majority of 83. The margin was far less than No 10 had hoped for and will fail to heal the party's splits over Brexit. Mrs May said after the vote that it was time for her party to "come together in the national interest". She acknowledged at Downing Street that a significant number of her MPs had voted against her, saying: "I have listened to what they said."... Mrs May had promised Tory MPs at a private meeting that she would not seek to contest the next election. She also pledged to restore relations with the Tories' parliamentary allies, the Democratic Unionist Party, and said that she was seeking legally binding reassurances to the Irish backstop." - The Times

Mercer criticises ministers plotting to replace the Prime Minister - The Sun

'A Pyrrhic victory': how the British and European media reacted - Daily Telegraph

Briefing battle begins over interpreting the vote - The Guardian

>Today: ToryDiary: Stalemate

...and pledges to leave before the next election...

"Theresa May promised her party she would quit as Tory leader before the next election in a desperate ten-minute plea to save her job an hour before MPs decided her fate. "In my heart I would love to lead us into the next election but I know that you want a different leader, with new objectives," she told a packed meeting of the 1922 Committee. As she had outside Downing Street more than eight hours before, the prime minister spoke about her long-standing commitment to the Conservative Party and stressed her desire to rebuild the fractured relationship with the Democratic Unionist Party, her parliamentary allies. Her most important message, according to the party's deputy chairman, James Cleverly, was that now was "a very, very bad time to replace the prime minister". In the only sign of jangling nerves, she opened her address by wishing the MPs a "good morning". Mrs May spoke for about ten minutes but the hostile questioning from Conservative MPs lasted much longer." - The Times

The last-minute concessions that helped get her over the line - The Guardian

Colour:

An extraordinary 24 hours in Westminster - Daily Mail

24-hour fight for survival ends in disappointment... and more questions - Daily Telegraph

Worrying parallels with Thatcher in the 1990s - The Times

>Yesterday: ToryDiary: Westminster sketch: A carnival in which even the Prime Minister's inhibitions start to break down

...but Brussels is already set to reject her promised solution to the backstop...
"The European Union is poised to reject Theresa May's demands for "legally binding assurances" that the Irish backstop will only ever be temporary, senior EU diplomats have told The Telegraph. The EU rejection will come as another serious blow to the Prime Minister who was pinning her hopes of a legally-binding side-agreement with the EU to help convince her back-benchers to accept her Brexit deal. EU ambassadors met in Brussels on to discuss how to respond to Mrs May's pitch to leaders at Thursday's summit dinner, where she will be given 10 minutes to outline what she needs to get the deal over the line in Westminster. "Politically she can have all the warm words she wants, but it was very clear in the meeting that there is very little appetite indeed for anything legally binding," said a senior EU diplomatic source. The rebuttal came as Mrs May promised the backbench 1922 Committee that something legally binding on the backstop would be forthcoming." - Daily Telegraph

Fox warns that Cabinet won't back her deal without changes - The Sun

Brussels may offer backstop 'assurances' to help secure deal - The Times

EU chiefs give May just ten minutes - Daily Express

More:

Prime Minister looks to Europe to ease row - FT

May limps to Brussels after 'crippling' vote - The Sun

Victory will prompt relief but not concessions - The Guardian

Irish opposition rules out election over Brexit chaos - FT

>Today: Jonathan Clark in Comment: Brexit has reopened two constitutional conflicts which must be resolved

...as Foster 'hints' at support for Javid

"DUP boss Arlene Foster has hinted she could back Sajid Javid to be the next Tory leader and Prime Minister. The leader of the Northern Irish party has been meeting with the potential leadership candidates to discuss their bids to become the next PM. She said today the Home Secretary "understands" the party's concerns about the Northern Ireland backstop. But she refused to openly back him for the top job, saying "I think there are many who not only understand but support our position". Her comments come as Mrs May faces a crunch vote of no confidence tonight - and she could be out of office by Christmas if she loses. The DUP, who are currently propping up Theresa May's government with their 10 MPs, could prove crucial again in a future election. And whoever the Northern Irish party back will have a good chance of winning a leadership vote. The PM currently relies on the support of the party to ensure she has a working Government. They've said they will support her for now, but if she continues with her hated Brexit plans then they will pull her support." - The Sun

Home Secretary is 'grassroots favourite' to replace May - Daily Mail

Prime Minister 'lacks the charm' to win back the DUP - The Times

Comment:

Who will replace May when her time is up? - Andrew Pierce, Daily Mail

Crocodiles are circling and she's running out of buns - Rachel Sylvester, The Times

Editorial:

May must take their concerns seriously to survive - The Sun

>Yesterday: ToryDiary: Our snap survey. Almost two-thirds of Party members want the Prime Minister out now. Over a third back her.

European Research Group 'lost control' of effort to oust her
"While she spent the weekend at Chequers mulling over what to do, her opponents were equally undecided. Brexiteer MPs said that had Mrs May pushed ahead with Monday's Brexit vote and lost it, that would have been the right time to strike. By pulling the vote, she had bought herself more time. By now, though, the ERG had lost control. The number of letters rose and fell seemingly at random. Some of those who had publicly declared they had put in letters had not. Egos jostled for position as high-profile Brexiteers such as Mr Johnson and Mr Raab, potential beneficiaries of a move to oust the prime minister, kept their distance and left others to do the dirty work. After reports that another four letters had been submitted, Mr Baker was telling colleagues it was "total bollocks". Except on this occasion it was true. No one seemed more surprised than the MPs that had been calling for it. After prime minister's questions yesterday, Brexiteers were furious at the silence of would-be leadership candidates. A glum Mr Johnson sat with his arms crossed. Mr Davis was conspicuous by his absence, as was Mr Raab." - The Times

The day Tory MPs turned on their leader - FT

Duncan Smith voted against May 'with a heavy heart' - Daily Mail

More:

Brexiteers hunker down for 'trench warfare' - The Times

Plot may lead to break-up of the Tory Party - The Sun

Editorial:

>Today: Video: WATCH: North Korean ovation from Conservative MPs as Brady announces that May has won

>Yesterday:

Continue to all today's Newslinks

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ConservativeHome - Comprehensive, independent coverage of the UK Conservative Party

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May promises to listen after holding on in confidence vote... "A wounded Theresa May limped home from a vote of no confidence yesterday after more than a third of Tory MPs rejected her leadership. The prime minister was forced to give up on leading the party into the next election to get over the line.

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No pictures, please. It is not often that a British prime minister plays hide-and-seek with a US president. Custom demands they doff their caps in deference to the prized "special relationship". Boris Johnson, though, faces an election. He knows his American soulmate Donald Trump, in Britain for the Nato summit, is unloved by voters. Mr Trump was uncharacteristically forgiving as his host darted to and fro to avoid the cameras.

This tableau was, in its way, a metaphor for this week's grand Nato gathering. Marking its 70th anniversary, the 29-nation alliance might have worked on a vision for the future. The founding plan - to keep the Americans in, the Soviets out and the Germans down - could do with updating.

Instead, the event was scripted as an exercise in diplomatic damage limitation. Atlanticism is said to be in crisis, caught between a capricious US and miserly Europeans. And a public spat between Mr Trump and French President Emmanuel Macron dispelled the notion of an alliance advancing as one.

It is hard keeping up with Mr Trump. He used to excoriate Nato as an expensive irrelevance and an unfair burden foisted on American taxpayers. Now he has decided it "serves a great purpose". Europeans have upped their defence spending and Mr Trump wants the credit. By contrast, Mr Macron now describes the alliance as "brain-dead", and wants fellow Europeans to find another way to defend themselves.

It does not help that what bills itself as a club of liberal democracies includes Turkey's autocratic president Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Mr Erdogan, who has been cuddling up to Russia's Vladimir Putin, refuses to recognise that membership carries responsibilities. He is testing a new Russian-supplied anti-aircraft system.

By waging war on the Kurds of northern Syria - the west's allies against Islamist terrorists - he has also handed a victory to the Syrian regime and blunted the fight against the remnants of Isis. Mr Macron is right in claiming Mr Erdogan has forfeited his place at the table. That said, Turkey sits on Nato's eastern flank. It is prudent to keep Mr Erdogan within the tent.

After listening this week to the rambling fantasies and non-sequiturs that comprise Mr Trump's worldview, it seems reasonable to say things may well look even worse if he wins a second term in 2020. I am still struggling with the logic that says US interests would be well served by a policy of sanctions on its European allies alongside a tripartite trade deal with Russia and China. To be fair, the president did apply a caveat: it may not happen.

And yet. Amid the cacophony, and some real differences, no one should think that the game is up for Nato. Sure, it is an alliance designed for the cold war. If it did not exist, it is doubtful anyone would now invent it. But why, at a moment of geopolitical upheaval that has left western democracies challenged by a risen China and a revisionist Russia, would anyone - even Mr Trump - seek to dismantle their collective defence?

Europe does need to build up its own capabilities. It has made a small start in Africa but will need to take on a lot more responsibility for the security, and prosperity, of its near neighbours. But realism is also required. The continent has a long way to go before it can properly defend itself against, say, an expansionist regime in Moscow.

The French president is correct to say that it makes sense for the west to engage with Russia, as it did during the cold war. The many nuclear arms agreements concluded during the communist era should serve as model for a relationship that identifies areas of mutual interest. We must presume that Mr Macron, however, is not talking about redividing Europe into western and Russian spheres of influence. Those days have passed. Dialogue with Mr Putin will be useful only if the west starts from a position of strength.

The future of Nato, of course, ultimately depends on America's commitment. And here, often overlooked, lies the assurance that the organisation has a secure future. The argument about Washington's disproportionately large military commitment has been going on for so long that many have come to see it as an act of altruism. In truth, America has paid for Nato because it has served US national interests. It still does.

A lazy view of those national interests says the focus has changed with the rise of China. The challenge to US primacy from Beijing means the Pacific now counts for more than the Atlantic. Russian revisionism is no longer a direct threat to the US.

This analysis rests on the fundamental misjudgment that competition between America and China will be confined to the Pacific. Beijing's most important push is westwards. The Belt and Road Initiative is calculated to sideline Russia, pull Europe closer to Asia and establish China as the pre-eminent power in the world's richest, most populous region - Eurasia. Quitting Europe would see the US deliver to Beijing its most important strategic ambition.

Pulling back across the Atlantic would do more than deprive the US of the allies and the bases needed to defend its global interests. Rather, it would redefine the US as a hemispheric power, a regional rather than global player. Many Americans, I know, have tired of the global policeman role. I have not heard many suggest a retreat into isolationism. Until then, Nato is safe.
Follow Philip Stephens with myFT and on Twitter

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Crisis, what crisis? The US needs Nato as much as ever

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No pictures, please. It is not often that a British prime minister plays hide-and-seek with a US president. Custom demands they doff their caps in deference to the prized "special relationship". Boris Johnson, though, faces an election. He knows his American soulmate Donald Trump, in Britain for the Nato summit, is unloved by voters.

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Secretary of State Mike Pompeo made a flurry of phone calls over the weekend in support of President Donald Trump's call to turn the North Atlantic Treaty Organization into "NATOME," adding two letters for "the Middle East."

Trump has been a longtime critic of NATO, a Cold War-era pact that commits the United States and Canada to defend Europe from Russian aggression. He has previously complained that NATO is an unfair arrangement for the United States, and reportedly considered pulling out of the alliance several times in 2018, as he saw it as pointless. But despite his critiques, he now seems to support an expanded role for the alliance as his administration struggles to balance deteriorating relations with Iraq and the threat of war with Iran.

Fractures in the trans-Atlantic relationship, however, make a joint mission in the Middle East a tough sell.

Trump's call for a NATO with a Middle East focus during a January 8 press conference came on the heels of the U.S. assassination of Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani in Iraq, which occurred on January 3 and heightened tensions. In the aftermath of the drone-strike assassination, NATO suspended its training mission for counter-ISIS forces in Iraq, a decision that coincided with the Iraqi parliament's push to expel foreign forces. Iranian leaders promised "hard revenge" and fired over a dozen ballistic missiles at U.S. forces in Iraq on January 7, but no one was killed.

"NATO, right, and then you have ME, Middle East. They would call it NATOME," the President told reporters on January 9. "I'm good at names, right? What a beautiful name, NATOME."

The State Department rushed to turn Trump's words into action over the weekend. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg and Pompeo "agreed NATO could contribute more to regional security and the fight against international terrorism" during a January 9 phone call, according to readouts published by both the U.S. State Department and NATO headquarters.

Pompeo made seven more calls to European or NATO countries related to the Middle East and Iran, from January 9 to January 12, according to U.S. State Department statements.

He told his Canadian counterpart, Foreign Minister François‑Philippe Champagne, that "an expanded NATO force in Iraq" could be a way to "contain" the "aggressive and destabilizing" influence of Iran, according to a U.S. statement on January 10. Champagne "emphasized the need for a de-escalation in tensions," according to a Canadian statement, which did not mention the NATO proposal.

Pompeo also called the foreign ministers of Britain, the European Union, Estonia, and France to discuss Iran and Iraq that weekend.

EU High Representative and Vice President Josep Borrell talked with Pompeo about "Iran's destabilizing role" in the Middle East, according to a U.S. statement on the call, but the EU readout of the call did not mention Iran.

French Embassy press counselor Mélanie Rosselet told the National Interest that she was not aware of any public readouts published by the French side, and the British Embassy did not respond to a request for comment.

Estonia, however, seemed supportive.

"Foreign Minister Urmas Reinsalu affirmed his colleague Mike Pompeo that Estonia supported the United States, and underscored the United States had a right to self-defence according to the UN Charter," a statement by the Foreign Ministry of Estonia stated. "According to Reinsalu, it was crucial to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear power and stop the development of its missile programme. The cooperation of Atlantic allies is vital in this issue."

Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs David Hale also joined the EU Political Directors' conference on January 10 by video call "to discuss global issues, including the situation in Iraq and Iran."

Jordan's King Abdullah II bin Al-Hussein, one of America's key partners along the border of Iraq, is attending a whirlwind of meetings across Europe this week.

"Instability in our part of the world affects Europe and the rest of the globe, and so I think that a lot of our discussions will be centered on Iran, but mainly around Iraq," the king told France24 on January 13. "This trip to Europe comes at the right time, where we need to talk about how do we talk to each other with maturity and respect, as opposed to rhetoric that could create a problem that takes us to the brink."

He plans to visit NATO headquarters on January 14.

Pompeo ended the weekend with a Sunday night call to Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu and "reiterated the need for NATO to play a greater role in the region and stressed the U.S. commitment to the UN-facilitated peace process in Syria."

Turkey has the second-largest army in NATO and borders Iran and Iraq as well as Syria.

U.S. relations with Turkey have been strained over U.S. support for Kurdish-led forces in northeast Syria, which the Turkish government sees as an extension of the Kurdish separatist movement inside Turkey. Trump allowed Turkish forces to invade Syria in October 2019 as his State Department pushed for a closer relationship with Turkish-backed Islamist rebels in the country in order to counter Iranian influence.

The U.S. readout of the call did not make it clear how Turkey reacted to Pompeo's proposals, or what was discussed during Special Envoy Amb. James Jeffrey's visit to Turkey that same weekend. But a video of Jeffrey speaking on the phone while waiting in İstanbul's airport, captured by Turkish state television news reporter Adnan Nawaz, hints at a deeper Turkish involvement in U.S. policy in the Middle East.

"Across the board, they are seeing as we are much hardening [unintelligible] line on Syria," Jeffrey said. "Our situation with them in the northeast has dramatically improved. Our situation with the Russians in the northeast has dramatically disimproved."

The State Department's Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs refused to "confirm or deny purported telephone conversations in an airport," and the Turkish Embassy in Washington did not respond to a request for comment.

Trump is also asking European countries to join a U.S. campaign of "maximum pressure" against Iran-but that may be an even harder sell.

The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPoA) removes international economic sanctions on Iran in exchange for the ability to inspect and regulate the Iranian nuclear program. Iran signed the deal with six world powers in 2015, but Trump withdrew the United States and began to impose harsh sanctions on the Iranian economy in 2018.

European countries are working on a mechanism called INSTEX that would allow Iran to avoid U.S. sanctions for "humanitarian" trade. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin threatened to put "secondary sanctions" on INSTEX during a January 10 press conference.

Iran has responded by removing all "operational limits" on its nuclear program. European countries have been reluctant to exit the deal and lose access for international inspectors.

Pompeo issued a twelve-point ultimatum to Iran in May 2018 that included an end to Iranian support for militias across the region and the Iranian ballistic missile program. Stoltenberg echoed his rhetoric in a press conference this week.

"For years, all allies have expressed concern about Iran's destabilizing activities in the wider Middle East region," Stoltenberg told reporters on January 13. "We agree Iran must never acquire a nuclear weapon, we share concern about Iran's missile tests, and we are united in condemning Iran's support for a variety of different terrorist groups."

But actually leaving the nuclear deal would be a harder sell.

"The very defective JCPOA expires shortly anyway, and gives Iran a clear and quick path to nuclear breakout," Trump said on January 8. "The time has come for the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Russia, and China to recognize this reality."

The president proposed that the six world powers "all work together toward making a deal with Iran that makes the world a safer and more peaceful place."

France, Britain, and Germany disagreed. All three countries released a joint statement on January 12 reaffirming their commitment to "upholding the nuclear non-proliferation regime."

"We reserve recourse to all the provisions of the JCPoA to preserve it and to resolve the issues related to Iran's implementation of its JCPoA commitments within its framework," the statement said. "Despite increasingly difficult circumstances, we have worked hard to preserve the agreement."

French president Emmanuel Macron drove the point home the next day when he repeated France's commitment in a phone call with Russian president Vladimir Putin.

Matthew Petti is a national security reporter at the National Interest and a former Foreign Language Area Studies Fellow at Columbia University. His work has appeared in The Armenian Weekly, Reason and America Magazine.
Image: Reuters

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Trying to Turn NATO Into NATOME: A Trump Administration Adventure

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Secretary of State Mike Pompeo made a flurry of phone calls over the weekend in support of President Donald Trump's call to turn the North Atlantic Treaty Organization into "NATOME," adding two letters for "the Middle East." Trump has been a longtime critic of NATO, a Cold War-era pact that commits the United States and Canada to defend Europe from Russian aggression.

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World Bank and IMF

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The World Bank and IMF are in crisis. It's time to push a radical new vision | David Adler and Yanis Varoufakis

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The exit of Jim Yong Kim offers a chance to put the Bretton Woods institutions in the service of the many, not the few

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Global economic governance is a developing framework of coordination and management of the global economy, which includes the promotion of international trade, the creation of financial stability and the supporting of the economic development of states. It is facilitated by the Bretton Woods institutions (the IMF, WTO and World Bank), the G7/8 and increasingly the G20. There has been extensive debate regarding their effectiveness in recent years, particularly in the wake of the 2008 Financial Crash, but ultimately it can be argued while they have numerous limitations, global economic institutions have been successful to a certain extent in maintaining stability in the global system.

The success of global economic governance is apparent in the role of institutions such as the WTO, in the international system. There is substantive evidence of the successes of the IMF, World Bank and WTO in the encouragement of free trade and economic prosperity, indicating the advance of the free market Washington Consensus. Neo-liberals are predominantly in favour of economic governance, as in an economically interdependent system, it is recognised there is a mutual interest in upholding agreed norms and regulations. The WTO works well in imposing penalties on states that break the international rules of trade with a significant membership of 164 countries, and is expanding its outreach with both China and Russia joining in recent years. During the economic recession beginning in 2008, the WTO successfully discouraged states from resorting to tariffs and subsidies in order to protect their economies. The WTO has been effective to a certain extent in the settling of trade disputes, with binding rulings it can impose trade sanctions on states which disregard its rulings. An example of this would be in 2002, where the US withdrew its 30% steel tariff, after the WTO deemed it illegal and authorised the EU to respond with $2 billion worth of tariffs. The WTO is an example of an institution which helps to regulate and promote international trade and provide stability to the global financial system, showing how global economic governance has proved relatively effective in recent years.

Notwithstanding, the WTO has some limitations in providing effective global economic governance, focusing exclusively on increasing free trade, deemed by some at the expense of worker's rights, child labour and the environment. The failure of the Doha Round is a pertinent example where the WTO has failed to open developed countries' markets to agricultural products of the Global South, further reinforcing inequality and preventing growth. The WTO has been challenged for its perceived disregard for environmental protection (sustainable development). The lack of democracy is also a criticism of the WTO; decision-making is highly biased to states which have a large representation in Geneva. Additionally, the shift to isolationism and retrenchment by the Trump administration has led to the increased scepticism of the USA - the economic hegemon - towards global economic institutions and trade agreements. Trump's March 2018 decision to massively re-increase steel tariffs, has wider repercussions as a leading WTO member, as well as the plan to 'tear up' the 2016 TPP, indicating how economic institutions are being manipulated as part of wider great power politics, not for the maintaining of international trading relationships. This shows how the effectiveness of global economic governance has been reduced; in organisations with a comprehensive membership like the WTO a consensus which is beneficial to all parties is difficult and frequently slow to reach.

Alternatively, the success of global economic governance can be argued with respect to global financial stability and the IMF, G7/8 and G20. The G20 has emerged as a more influential actor in economic global governance, in that it is less exclusive than the G8 and less comprehensive than the WTO. The IMF demonstrates a success of global economic governance, with a focus on long-term development and offering states financial advice - currently encouraging fiscal reform in Jordan and recommending a diversification of the Mexican economy in line with rising oil prices. The IMF has responded to financial crises such as the 1997 Asian financial crisis and the emergency lending to Brazil (1998) and Argentina (2000). It has also worked well by providing loans to Russia and South Korea, helping to stabilise their economies. The 2009 London G20 summit showed how leading countries in the world - in spite of their differences - agreed to a large number of shared objectives to restore global confidence in the world economy in the aftermath of the 2008 Financial Crash. For instance, the G20 agreed to increase the funding to the IMF by $750 billion and not to introduce any trade barriers for the coming year. This evidence shows how intergovernmental economic forums and institutions have been successful in numerous ways, with the promotion and enforcement of economic regulation fostering international trade in recent years in a way that was not achieved before.

In spite of this, the IMF, G7/8 and G20 are flawed in certain respects. Most notably, IMF surveillance drastically failed to anticipate the 2008 Financial Crash or the subsequent Eurozone Crisis. There is a perceived growing neo-liberal agenda with organisations like the IMF consistently promoting cooperation, though only dominant, economically advanced states reap the benefits of this interdependence. For instance, the policy of 'fiscal austerity' means that the IMF only permits for countries to get loans if they cut government spending and raise domestic taxes (eg. in Argentina). This affects states which are too underdeveloped to be able to play on a global scale, unlike the dominant economies of the USA or China. Furthermore, the policies of the IMF are dictated by the US, as it is the only country with the veto power. Also, following the 2008 Eurozone Crisis, 'shock treatment' (according to Naomi Klein) which consisted of the liberalisation of Greek economy, imposition of strict austerity and the selling of state assets was widely repudiated. Additionally, the G7 has been criticised due to its lack of binding power, and avoidance of controversial issues e.g. the failure to discuss tackling ISIS or the Greek Debt Crisis at Elmau in 2015. It has been argued that the G7 shows the neo-colonial division of the world, and reinforces the Global South's peripheral status. Conversely, the G20 has been criticised for its lack of transparency and shows how increasingly global economic governance is carried out in a manner which focuses on a Realist state-centred approach to global politics. This highlights the flaws of global economic governance in the current system.

The effectiveness of global economic governance can be measured by the successes of the World Bank. Free market reforms have enabled many developing countries to drastically increase their growth rates by engaging in global trade; in 2014, the growth rates in Sub-Saharan Africa were 4.5%, with notable examples such as Ethiopia being 8.2% and Tanzania being 7.2%. The World Bank's Highly Indebted Poor Countries Initiative is an example of the effective use of economic governance for global financial stability, with the elimination of debts encouraging growth. Additionally, Structural Adjustment programmes have proved effective in states such as Burkina Faso (which has diversified away from cotton dependency) and Ghana (moving away from rice production to gold and cocoa where it has considerable advantages as an exporter). Following certain criticisms there has been a greater emphasis on World Bank projects focusing on human development rather than purely the imposition of free market reforms. With an annual budget of $9 billion the World Bank is investing in 71 countries, for example, it has helped to achieve gender equality in the primary sector in Bangladesh and is working to reduce the figure of the poorest 5 million children who still do not attend school there. This indicates how the commitment to both neo-Liberal policies, and broader social and economic targets has been successful for creating stability in the global financial system.

However, global economic governance has also received criticism in a wider sense for the promotion of inequality both within and between states, damaging human rights, the lack of transparency and democratic accountability, and for being an instrument of transnational corporations and international banking conglomerates. Critics of the World Bank like Joseph Stiglitz argue that the 15.8% share of voting rights is a clear indicator of US domination in economic supranational institutions. Moreover, neo-Marxist theorist Immanuel Wallerstein's World Systems theory outlines how the Washington Consensus promotes inequality; he claims that 'core' nations such as the US and the UK create a dependency for nations on them - these nations being 'Periphery' actors. The World Bank is frequently criticised for keeping developing countries in this peripheral status through structural adjustment programmes, which reinforce the north-south divide; it is argued that these programmes have an adverse effect by opening developing markets to neo-colonial exploitation. This indicates how global economic governance frequently proves beneficial primarily for the economically developed states and exploitative of developing states.

In conclusion, it can be argued that global economic governance is effective to a certain extent; polycentric decision making has helped to alleviate economic crises in recent years. The focus on economic growth through enhancing international trade, in addition to plans for long-term development have shown how increased communication and interconnectedness has helped the global system. Notwithstanding, over-representation of the Global North in the Bretton Woods institutions and the G7/8 and G20 has been argued to have led to the manipulation of the global financial system to be beneficial for developed states, reinforcing the north-south divide and keeping many states in a peripheral status in an exploitative way. However, despite some limitations global economic governance has proved effective and continues to provide stability through dialogue and cooperation in the global system.

Sussana Allam

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To what extent is global economic governance effective?

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Global economic governance is a developing framework of coordination and management of the global economy, which includes the promotion of international trade, the creation of financial stability and the supporting of the economic development of states. It is facilitated by the Bretton Woods institutions (the IMF, WTO and World Bank), the G7/8 and increasingly the G20.

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The constituency link is a vital part of British political life; MPs represent local areas and are directly accountable to those areas for their continued careers. If MPs misbehave their constituents have the power to boot them out, and the fear that this might happen keep MPs on the straight and narrow.

It is sometimes argued that there is something special about this link between an MP and their constituency when the MP is elected under First Past the Post (FPTP).

Yet only 22% of people surveyed in 2013 knew who their MP even was. It gets worse though - in 2015, 331 MPs out of 650 MPs lacked the support of a majority of their constituents. So even if you know who your MP is, there is a high chance that you might disagree with them on some pretty major points. Of course, after the election MPs represent their whole constituency, not just the part that voted for them, but this doesn't extend to how they vote in parliament.

In South Belfast, the SDLP candidate broke the UK record for lowest winning share of the vote, at just 24.5%. No doubt he will be fair when it comes to local casework in his constituency, but in parliament he will be mostly voting with the rest of his party, sometimes regardless of the opinions of the 75.5% of his constituents who voted against him. A constituency link established on such a feeble mandate does not look particularly strong from the voters' point of view.

In most areas of life, competition rather than monopoly is generally thought to give a better service to the consumer. Yet in the House of Commons we give a monopoly of political power for a constituency to a single MP no matter their support.

Even in seats where the MP has significantly more that 50% of the vote, the lack of competition at election time means that there are few incentives for incumbents to work hard at representing all their constituents. The fact that many do is a tribute to their diligence and integrity - and is arguably in spite of the FPTP electoral system rather than because of it.

Electing one MP to represent all the different interests of a constituency was only fully imposed on the House of Commons in 1950. Before the 1950 General Election there were constituencies that elected multiple MPs. For instance, the Single Transferable Vote (STV) was used to represent the different opinions within university seats, until the seats were abolished in 1950.

A system, such as STV, where several members represent the different opinions in an area has a number of advantages for the voter. The chance of a voter having a candidate for whom they have voted for get elected is higher, as fewer votes are wasted. In the 2007 Scottish local elections under STV, 74 per cent of voters elected their first choice candidate. This was an advance on 52 per cent in the last FPTP elections. Uniquely in STV, compared to other systems of proportional representation, every candidate is elected on the same basis and is directly accountable to their local constituents.

Under STV more people get a representative they voted for and it is far easier to hold those MPs to account - there are no taken-for-granted 'safe seats' under a fair voting system. As we've seen from Scotland's experience, the fair distribution of local representatives you get under STV strengthens the link between the MP and his constituency rather than weakening it. You pick the representative you want to go to.

A democratic voting system strengthens the link between voters and their representatives. Every vote counts, voting for someone who's not your first choice becomes a thing of the past, and MPs have to fight for every vote. We want a better constituency link - and it's achievable.

You can read our full report on PR Myths or sign up for updates from the ERS.

Sign our petition for a fair voting system

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Does Proportional Representation break the constituency link?

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The constituency link is a vital part of British political life; MPs represent local areas and are directly accountable to those areas for their continued careers. If MPs misbehave their constituents have the power to boot them out, and the fear that this might happen keep MPs on the straight and narrow.

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Growing backbench Brexit rebellion has been months in the making

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Cross-party conversations have rallied support around opposition to a no-deal Brexit. But where will it all end?

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Brexit is a constitutional, legal, and political challenge of a size the UK has not seen in decades and will have consequences that are both uncertain and long-lasting. In this post, Dominic Grieve offers his distinctive perspective on Brexit, discussing the concept of parliamentary sovereignty, the role of international courts in UK law, and the more troubling aspects of the Withdrawal Bill itself. The EU and the sovereignty of parliament
My Brexiter colleagues have in varying degrees signed up to the view that EU membership undermines the sovereignty of parliament in a manner which is damaging to our independence and our parliamentary democracy. This certainly fits in with a national (if principally English) narrative that can be traced back past the Bill of Rights 1688 to Magna Carta in 1215. This narrative has proved very enduring; it places parliament as the central bastion of our liberties.

But it can also be used merely as an assertion of power, particularly when the executive has effective control over parliament. It is with that power that parliament enacted the European Communities Act 1972, which gave primacy to EU law in our country. It was parliament that chose to allow what is now the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) to override UK statute law, so as to ensure our conformity with EU law in all areas in which it has competence.

The justification for requiring that supremacy was that without it, achieving adherence to the treaties and convergence between member states in implementing EU law would be very difficult. This was not an unreasonable argument; but it is hard to avoid concluding that the supremacy of EU law lies at the root of the feeling of powerlessness felt by sections of the electorate and reflected in the referendum result. This feeling has been encouraged by the habit of successive UK governments to hide behind decisions of the EU as a justification for being unwilling to address problems raised by its own electors. But where the lawyer and politician in me parts company with the views of my Brexiter colleagues is in the extent to which they appear oblivious to the extent to which parliamentary sovereignty is not - and never has been - unfettered.

It can be argued that in deciding to hold the UK's first nationwide referendum in 1975 on our membership of the EEC, Harold Wilson was accepting that the nature of the constitutional change required something more than just parliamentary approval, even if it also sought to accommodate Labour Party dissent. Nowadays we are told that the referendum only legitimated membership of a common market, but the constraints on parliamentary sovereignty that flowed from membership of the EEC were apparent even then.

The truth is that EU membership, although more important than any other international treaty to which we have adhered, is not exceptional. Notwithstanding our pride in our sovereignty, successive governments have sought to make the world a safer and more predictable place by encouraging international agreements governing the behaviour of states. When I was Attorney General, I asked the Foreign Office to tell me how many we had signed up to. They said they had records of over 13,200 that the UK had signed and ratified since 1834. Many thousands are still applicable and range in importance from the UN Charter to local treaties over fishing rights. Over 700 contain references to binding dispute settlement in the event of disagreements over interpretation.

As the product of an international treaty, the EU can only be effective and seen to be legitimate if its own operations are considered to respect the letter and spirit of the treaties that created it. Furthermore, the nature of the project has produced a requirement not only for the supremacy of EU law in areas of EU competence, but also the creation of parts of that law by its central bodies without the need for any domestically generated legislation at all. It is obvious that such a source of law can operate abusively. This means that rights need to be protected; hence the Charter of Fundamental Rights (the Charter), which also covers the key obligations of member states in respect of the 'four freedoms' conferred on EU citizens.

It seems rather ironic, therefore, that the Charter should have been on the receiving end of so much vilification in the UK. Criticism can be made of its use to claim rights that might be considered to fall outside the scope of the treaties. Without it, however, the risk increases that EU law could be created or applied in a way that did not respect the limits of the treaties or interfered with fundamental rights, whilst leaving individuals and legal entities without any means of redress.
The process of Brexit
Many Brexiters celebrated the referendum result as the necessary step to restoring parliamentary sovereignty and nationhood. But we were then immediately told that parliament's new-found sovereignty should not extend to legislating for or even just approving the triggering of the Article 50 process, as the people had spoken and nothing more was needed. I thought this idea to be revolutionary.

In fairness to the government, it did not seek to argue that the EU referendum itself provided the necessary authority to trigger Article 50. It sought instead to contend that it was entitled to do this under the Royal Prerogative because its action was confined to our international relations. The domestic changes that might follow UK laws enjoyed under UK statutes were described as an incidental consequence that parliament had not expressly or impliedly restricted. The High Court rejected this argument as 'flawed at a basic level' in R (Miller) v Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union . The Supreme Court was rather kinder, but still held that statutory authority was needed. I confess that I see this outcome as one small bit of silver lining to the Brexit cloud. The judgment has provided a degree of clarity on the impropriety of seeking to use executive powers to undermine and remove the benefits and rights conferred by statute.

Having just spent four months considering the EU (Withdrawal) Bill (the Bill), I don't think I have ever seen a piece of legislation that conferred such power on the executive to change the law of the land by statutory instrument (SI) and where the entire structure was so closely interwoven that the same end could often be achieved by different routes. Yet with Article 50 triggered it is also vitally necessary that it is enacted. Only an anarchist hell-bent on celebrating chaos on the morning of the 30 th March 2019 would wish to see it fail.

The principal problem is that the government did not know - and still does not know - exactly what it needs from this legislation or indeed what it wants from Brexit itself. It claimed its intention was to convert and entrench EU law into domestic law to ensure legal continuity. The complexity of what is being attempted creates uncertainty as to how the law will operate. It is not clear what weight should be given after exit to CJEU authorities by our courts, assuming an intention by the government to mirror areas of EU law to maintain compatibility. The way the Bill is drafted makes it clear that the government intends to reduce both the Charter and general principles of EU law to no more than interpretative aids to retained EU law.

As a government backbencher I have at time been torn between logic and loyalty, so I do worry that we might have done more to improve the Bill if we had been more rebellious. But politics is the art of the possible and I don't think the changes achieved in the Commons have been negligible.

Firstly, we have stopped the mischief of Clause 9, which allowed the government to start enacting SIs to take us out of the EU in furtherance of a Withdrawal Agreement before we know what it is, including changing any part of the Bill itself. I am sorry that this required me to vote against the government. It has inevitably appalled some of my colleagues and constituents, but I have no regrets on the matter. It has ensured a much needed preservation of parliament's role at the end of the Brexit process, and I am entirely unpersuaded by the suggestion that the Clause 9 powers were needed now because of time constraints.

Second, I am grateful that the government listened to the concerns expressed around the extent of the powers in Clause 7, which gave it power to make regulations to remedy deficiencies in retained EU law. It was too extensive. The new wording is a significant improvement and a safeguard against this clause being used abusively.

Next, we have achieved an important step for parliamentary scrutiny in the amendments enabling a bespoke process to be set up for the SIs that will be made under the legislation. The intervention of the Procedure Committee was key in getting this and I am very grateful for its work and that of its chair, Charles Walker.

I am disappointed that I was not able to do more to persuade the government to move further on the use of general principles of EU law to bring challenges to the operation of retained EU law. I think it would be useful until parliament and the government can consider what long term protection might be needed for rights that will be left unprotected after exit. The logical approach would be similar protection to that provided by the Human Rights Act 1998, but this Bill is probably not the place to consider this.
Going forward
Looking ahead, it is curious that the Bill may turn out to be largely redundant by the time we come to leave. Assuming a Withdrawal Agreement is reached by the autumn of this year, we will be going through another major piece of legislation in 10 months time that is in practice going to replace most of what we are now doing.

As the Stage One negotiation showed, the idea that the referendum vote is giving us sovereign autonomy is misplaced. The issue of the Irish border has at least in theory circumscribed the nature of our future relationship with the EU, unless we renege on the assurance that there would be no customs checks requiring a physical border. I find it hard to see how this will not mean staying in a customs union, making much of Liam Fox's work as International Trade Secretary seemingly redundant. I detect growing acknowledgement in government that this is the case

The Prime Minister has also recognised the importance for us as well as for the EU, of continuing to participate in areas of justice and home affairs, including the European Arrest Warrant and the Schengen Information System. Equally important are the civil law measures which include matters as diverse as high value commercial litigation and contact arrangements for children. The recast Brussels Regulations have created rules to ensure uniformity and certainty for litigating parties and have been of the greatest benefit in making the UK an attractive place to litigate.

The government has shown every intention of wanting to remain in these arrangements and it is arguably very much in the interests of the EU that we should continue to do so. But we risk in these areas ending up as observers. I see this as one of the most serious side effects of Brexit. As an example, we are enacting primary legislation to give effect to the new General Data Protection Regulation of the EU - to which we have provided input - in a Data Protection Bill. Once outside the EU, our ability to contribute to further changes will be gone, but our obligation to observe those changes in all data exchanges with EU countries will remain. I wonder how all this will play out with the public when it becomes clearer how this will work.

Finally, there is that transitional deal which is likely to be our short term destiny from March 2019. No change at all for a time, not even I now sense in the areas of agriculture and fisheries. Instead, we shall have what Boris Johnson characterises as 'vassalage'. It makes Nigel Farage's recent intervention in favour of a second referendum seem a perfectly understandable attempt to return to the purity of his vision; the cliff edge followed by untrammelled sovereignty. Going over cliff edges is not, however, without risks.
Conclusion
In the past 19 months, we have seen the development of an unparalleled political and constitutional crisis. It has precipitated the fall of one government and contributed to the failure of another to get a coherent mandate for carrying it out. It is also breaking apart the previous broad consensus between the mainstream political parties as to how the economy should continue to be managed. This can bring potentially profound change in our country's relationship with both our own and the international legal order.

'Taking back control' is a powerful idea in conditions where the decline in confidence in institutions has become such a marked phenomenon. The risk is that it is largely a mirage. It is also a uniquely disruptive form of change that precipitates the very reverse of the 'quiet government' the UK has traditionally aspired to deliver to its citizens. It should be no surprise therefore that in this atmosphere of crisis the principal change is the accrual of more power to the executive. But that makes it all the more important that MPs, including former attorneys-general, should be vigilant that we don't lose the very things which are the most valuable legacy of our forebears.
This post is an edited version of a lecture delivered to The Constitution Society. The full text of the lecture can be viewed here. The opinions and analysis expressed in this post are the personal views of the author. About the author
Dominic Grieve QC MP is the Conservative Member of Parliament for Beaconsfield and a former Attorney General of the United Kingdom.

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Brexit and the sovereignty of parliament: a backbencher's view

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Brexit is a constitutional, legal, and political challenge of a size the UK has not seen in decades and will have consequences that are both uncertain and long-lasting. In this post, Dominic Grieve offers his distinctive perspective on Brexit, discussing the concept of parliamentary sovereignty, the role of international courts in UK law, and the more troubling...

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John Bercow: Speaker unafraid to hold the government's feet to the fire

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Capable of infuriating MPs, even in his referee role as Commons Speaker, Bercow is also seen by many as the backbenchers' ally

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The Electoral Reform Society is an independent campaigning organisation working to champion the rights of voters and build a better democracy in Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

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The development relates to bloody clashes in the West African nation that claimed a reported 3,000 lives following the 2010 election in which current President Alassane Ouattara defeated Mr. Gbagbo.

In June, the Court - which has more than 15 other cases that are either ongoing or yet to commence, including against Mr. Gbagbo's wife, Simone - overturned the war crimes conviction of Jean-Pierre Bemba, former vice-President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

In a statement, the ICC said that both Mr. Gbagbo and co-defendant Charles Blé Goudé had been acquitted "from all charges of crimes against humanity allegedly committed in Côte d'Ivoire in 2010 and 2011", relating to the alleged existence of a "common plan" to keep the former premier in power.

The crimes for which they were being tried included murder, rape and persecution.

The Hague-based court added that the order to release both men could be appealed by the prosecution in a new hearing on Thursday morning.

Ahead of a full statement explaining its decision, it noted that the Prosecutor had "failed to submit sufficient evidence" showing how both men had committed crimes against civilians, "pursuant to or in furtherance of a State or organizational policy", nor the existence of "patterns of violence" indicative of a "policy to attack a civilian population".

The ICC statement also explained that the Prosecutor had been unable to show that speeches by each man "constituted ordering, soliciting or inducing the alleged crimes...accordingly, there is no need for the defence to submit further evidence".

The Trial Chamber's decision had been by majority, the ICC added, with Judges Cuno Tarfusser and Geoffrey Henderson in support of the acquittal, and Judge Herrera Carbuccia against.

The court noted that since the trial began in January 2016, some 231 days had been spent hearing the Prosecutor's evidence and 82 witnesses testified in court and through video link, while thousands of documents had been submitted into evidence, along with "hundreds of motions, requests and decisions".

After the prosecution's case was declared closed in June last year, both defendants filed motions for their immediate release, which were heard in October and November 2018.

The ICC was established by the Rome Statute of 1998 to prosecute the worst crimes against humanity, including genocide and war crimes.

The United Nations first acknowledged the need to establish such a court based on international cooperation in December 1948, with General Assembly resolution 260, which adopted the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.

After the International Law Commission was invited to study the "desirability and possibility" of setting up the court, a draft statute was drawn up in 1951, but not completed until 1998.

At this point, the General Assembly convened the UN Diplomatic Conference of Plenipotentiaries on the Establishment of an International Criminal Court, which was held in Rome, Italy, from 15 June to 17 July 1998, "to finalize and adopt a convention on the establishment of an international criminal court".

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International Criminal Court acquits former president Gbagbo of war crimes in Côte d'Ivoire

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The development relates to bloody clashes in the West African nation that claimed a reported 3,000 lives following the 2010 election in which current President Alassane Ouattara defeated Mr. Gbagbo.

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Crisis

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The plight of the Rohingya in Myanmar, hundreds of thousands of whom have fled to neighboring Bangladesh, has attracted widespread international attention. However, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) has failed to take action, hindered by Russia's and China's use of their veto powers. The UNSC's inaction has not stopped other international actors from stepping up. Recently, the International Criminal Court's Pre-Trial Chamber gave the green light for further examination into the atrocities suffered by the Rohingya, affirming the ICC's plausible basis for jurisdiction despite Myanmar not being a party to the Rome statute. The ICC Prosecutor has launched a preliminary examination, and actively invited civil society and victims to participate in the process.

The United Nations Human Rights Council (HRC) has also taken action, commissioning an independent fact-finding investigation into the Rohingya crisis that recently issued a report describing atrocious crimes against the Rohingya committed by the Myanmar military. Following this, the HRC has authorized the creation of an agency to collect and preserve evidence that could be used in future prosecutions.

The spotlight must remain on the plight of the victims. This article examines these developments and potential recourse for the Rohingya under international law.

The Rohingya are a de facto stateless people residing primarily in the Rakhine state of western Myanmar. For decades, the Rohingya have suffered from systemic oppression, including restrictions on their movement, subsistence, development, and a denial of citizenship. Recently, however, violence against the Rohingya has escalated, as Myanmar's security forces commenced "clearance operations" throughout Rakhine state, which indiscriminately targeted and terrorized the entire Rohingya population in a "brutal and grossly disproportionate" manner. Myanmar's security forces committed "human rights violations on a colossal scale," including killing more than 10,000 civilians, the systematic and coordinated rape of women, and the destruction of entire villages. As a result, an estimated 727,000 Rohingya refugees fled from Myanmar into neighboring Bangladesh, putting the total Rohingya refugee population in Bangladesh at an estimated 921,000 as of September 2018.
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In response to these atrocities, the UNSC has failed to adopt any resolutions on the Rohingya situation, hindered by China and Russia's partnership with Myanmar. The UNSC has visited Myanmar and Bangladesh, and issued a non-binding Presidential Statement, routinely used in instances where a permanent member has threatened to veto a resolution.

By contrast, the HRC has taken significant steps toward ensuring future accountability for the Rohingya, especially in the context of evidence preservation. In April 2017, the HRC adopted Resolution 34/22, under which it established an independent international fact-finding mission on Myanmar. The mission's report, which was published last September, provides gruesome accounts of murder, rape, and violence suffered by the Rohingya. The government of Myanmar has rejected the findings in the report categorically.

Following the report, China held an "informal meeting" with Myanmar and Bangladesh during the General Assembly sessions in New York, later informing the UNSC that "[a]n important three-point consensus" had been reached between the three countries, notably including Bangladesh's agreement to repatriate Rohingya refugees pursuant to further agreement regarding logistics between the States. However, Bangladesh recently indicated that no Rohingya is willing to voluntarily accept a repatriation offer, and several commentators have raised concerns that repatriation measures would violate fundamental international law principles, including the principle of non-refoulement. Nonetheless, in November 2018, Bangladesh and Myanmar signed an arrangement on the repatriation of Rohingya refugees back to Rakhine state. The repatriation arrangement is controversial at best, with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) recently stating that it "does not believe current conditions in Rakhine state are conducive to the voluntary, safe, dignified, and sustainable return of refugees." While discussions are ongoing regarding the UN's, and, in particular, the UNHCR's engagement in the repatriation process, repatriation has not yet taken place.
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Notwithstanding deadlock in the UNSC, the HRC has taken additional steps toward future accountability mechanisms. On September 27, 2018, the HRC adopted a resolution creating an agency that would prepare evidence of human rights abuses and international crimes in Myanmar for any future prosecution.

Bangladesh has led the regional response to the Rohingya crisis, establishing a national strategy involving the cooperation of 22 Bangladeshi ministries and entities as early as 2013. Bangladesh's most important contributions under that strategy are the provision of infrastructure, health, and water services to a number of large refugee camps, including the camp at Cox's Bazar, which, with an estimated 602,400 refugees, is the largest in the world.

More recently, Bangladesh, the UN, and national and international NGOs launched a Joint Response Plan (JRP), a humanitarian response plan aimed at housing, feeding, registering, and educating the Rohingya refugee population. The scope of the JRP is enormous, bringing together over 130 partners, including 12 UN agencies and 127 national and international NGOs.
Commencement of Preliminary Examination at the ICC
Given the UNSC's failure to address the situation in Myanmar, many have looked to the ICC as a potential avenue to address the atrocities suffered by the Rohingya people. However, as Myanmar is a non-signatory to the Rome Statute, the exercise of jurisdiction at the ICC is limited. While the UNSC has authority to direct the opening of an investigation concerning non-state parties, that is unlikely as China and Russia have blocked even UNSC statements expressing concern.

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On April 9, 2018, the Office of the Prosecutor requested that the Pre-Trial Chamber determine whether the ICC could exercise jurisdiction over the alleged deportation of the Rohingya people from Myanmar to Bangladesh on the basis that an element of the crime takes place on the territory of a signatory to the Rome Statute, Bangladesh. On September 6, 2018, the ICC's Pre-Trial Chamber I issued a majority decision finding that the Court could exercise jurisdiction over the alleged deportation.
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The Pre-Trial Chamber's decision delivers an important clarification regarding the jurisdictional scope of crimes falling under the Rome Statute, particularly the crime of deportation. Notably, the Pre-Trial Chamber found that the "inclusion of the inherently transboundary crime of deportation in the [Rome] Statute without limitation" evidenced that the Court could exercise jurisdiction should one element of the crime be committed on the territory of a state party. Importantly, however, the decision is not limited to the crime of deportation, as the Chamber further " emphasize[d] that the rationale of its determination as to the Court's jurisdiction in relation to the crime of deportation may apply to other crimes within the [Court's] jurisdiction" should at least one element of those crimes be committed on a state party's territory.
Regional Responses to the ICC's Actions
Following this decision, the prosecutor opened a preliminary examination regarding the deportation of the Rohingya into Bangladesh, in addition to other potential crimes under Article 7 of the Statute. Prosecutor Bensouda stated that she would examine "a number of alleged coercive acts" that led to the forced displacement of Rohingya, "including deprivation of fundamental rights, killing, sexual violence, enforced disappearance, destruction and looting." Her statement indicates that the underlying acts that led to the Rohingya population fleeing Myanmar will also be considered as a basis for opening an investigation, flagging a potentially expansive investigation. However, no statement from the ICC to date reflects a willingness to investigate allegations of genocide, by far the most egregious claims leveled against Myanmar.

With the announcement of formally opening a preliminary examination, the ICC Prosecutor appears to be entering " Phase 2" of a four-phase process used to determine if an investigation is warranted, including "taking into account the gravity of the crime, as well as the interests of victims" to determine whether there are " substantial reasons" to believe that an investigation "would not serve the interests of justice." Phase 2 will thus focus on developing the factual record with an eye toward ensuring that all concerned parties "have had the opportunity to provide the information they consider appropriate." To do so, the prosecutor will engage directly with relevant stakeholders, such as states, including Bangladesh, organs of the UN, and intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations.
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Bangladesh has already actively participated in the proceedings before the ICC, seemingly supporting the prosecutor's actions despite not referring the situation to the Court itself. On May 7, 2018, the Pre-Trial Chamber requested Bangladesh to submit its written observations regarding the prosecutor's request as amicus curiae pursuant to rule 103(1) of the Rules of Procedure and Evidence. Bangladesh submitted its views regarding the Rohingya crisis to the ICC confidentially, agreeing that the ICC had territorial jurisdiction for the crime of deportation. Myanmar was also requested to participate, but declined to do so, stating that it was "under no obligation to enter into litigation with the prosecutor," arguing that the ruling "set[s] a dangerous precedent whereby future populistic causes and complaints against non-state parties . . . may be litigated."

In addition to Bangladesh's participation, nonprofits and lawyers representing victims of the Rohingya crisis have also begun participating in proceedings. For example, Global Rights Compliance submitted written observations to the Pre-Trial Chamber in connection with their examination of the Prosecutor's request, representing the interests of 400 women affected by the crisis. Furthermore, organizations such as Guernica 37 and a coalition of Bangladeshi nongovernmental representatives have also submitted an amicus curiae brief pursuant to Rule 103 of the Rules of Procedure and Evidence.

One of the most noteworthy features of the ICC is the increased role victims are envisioned to play at all stages of proceedings - including during the preliminary examination stage - should a victim's personal interests be affected. For example, under Article 15(3) and Rule 50(1), victims have the right to make representations before a Pre-Trial Chamber in connection with a prosecutor's request for authorization to open an investigation propio motu. dditionally, given that the ICC has a Trust Fund specifically tasked with providing reparations to victims of atrocities related to court proceedings, the advancement of proceedings could lead to the forfeiture of property or money of convicted individuals in addition to independent contributions to provide future reparations to victims.
The ICJ and the Genocide Convention
Despite the positive developments at the ICC, the question remains as to whether the prosecutor will investigate the crime of genocide. Nonetheless, a genocide case is still possible. Since Myanmar is a signatory to the Genocide Convention, any contracting party that has accepted the International Court of Justice's (ICJ) jurisdiction under Article IX could bring a genocide claim against Myanmar before the ICJ.

A genocide case before the ICJ would be important for three reasons. First, the ICC will focus on individual criminal responsibility, while the ICJ could seek legal accountability at the state level. Doing so could force Myanmar to directly respond to the claims against it, which it has so far declined to do before the ICC. Second, the ICJ could issue provisional measures directing Bangladesh and Myanmar to postpone their agreement to repatriate the Rohingya. While Myanmar may not comply with those measures, Bangladesh, which has been cooperative with the ICC, may be more inclined to do so. Such relief would be vital for Rohingya refugees fearful of returning to Myanmar. Third, claims of genocide are by far the most serious allegations against Myanmar and simply cannot go unpunished, particularly in light of the inaction of the international community.
Conclusion
The ICC's opening of a preliminary examination is an important step toward justice for the Rohingya. Given the ICC's victim-oriented proceedings, there is significant space for victims and their legal representatives to participate fully in the proceedings. That, combined with parallel genocide proceedings before the ICJ, could provide an effective path to fully addressing the crimes against the Rohingya.
Viren Mascarenhas is a Partner at King & Spalding law firm. Brian Jacobi, Claire O'Connell, and Isabel San Martin are all associates at King & Spalding.

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myanmar rohingya crimes against humanity

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The Rohingyas' Plight: What Options Under International Law?

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Advertisement The plight of the Rohingya in Myanmar, hundreds of thousands of whom have fled to neighboring Bangladesh, has attracted widespread international attention. However, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) has failed to take action, hindered by Russia's and China's use of their veto powers.

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7 March 2017
Over the past two decades, the United Nations Security Council has responded more strongly to some humanitarian crises than to others. This variation in Security Council action raises the important question of what factors motivate United Nations intervention.
The United Nations (UN) selective response to humanitarian crises-as evidenced most recently by the organisation's uneven reaction to the conflicts in Libya and Syria-is arguably among the most contentious issues in international politics. Some scholars and observers heavily criticize this practice, arguing that the selectiveness of humanitarian interventions undermines their legitimacy and ultimately their success; that the uneven response to humanitarian emergencies suggests that these intervention are motivated not by humanitarian concerns but by the military and economic interests of powerful states; and that the selective enforcement of human rights norms undermines the emerging rule of law in international politics (for examples see Archibugi 2004, Chomsky 1999)

Others disagree and claim that selectivity is not only unavoidable for the UN but also desirable. The selectivity of humanitarian intervention, so the argument goes, reduces the risk of over commitment; it helps to maintain cooperation among the great powers; and it prevents the UN from becoming involved in ill-conceived operations (see Roberts and Zaum 2008)

But what explains why UN humanitarian interventions remain selective in the first place? Why is it that the UN has taken strong action to respond to some crises, like those in Northern Iraq, Somalia, Bosnia, Sierra Leone or-more recently Libya-but not to other like those in Colombia, Myanmar, Sudan, or-currently-Syria?

The scholarship on humanitarian intervention often argues that each humanitarian crisis (and the responses to them) is historically unique and therefore requires a case-by-case explanation. While I agree that attention should be paid to the specificities of each crisis, my research shows that the UN's response to them is not random but follows remarkably consistent patterns (see Binder 2015, 2017). More specifically, I argue that a combination of four factors explains whether the United Nations does or does not take strong action (sanctions, 'robust' peacekeeping operations, military action) in response to a humanitarian crisis. This explanation has been developed and tested through a systematic comparative analysis of the UN's response to more than 30 humanitarian crises after the end of the Cold War combined with several in-depth case studies of intervention decisions in the UN Security Council.

The first explanatory factor is the extent ofhuman sufferingin a crisis. In a humanitarian crisis people suffer and die while human rights norms are massively violated. This generates a morally motivated pressure to come to the rescue of threatened populations and to defend international norms.

Secondly, whether the UN intervenes depends on the extent to which a crisisspills over to neighbouring countries and regions. Humanitarian crises often affect neighbouring countries or regions in negative ways. Spill over effects include regional conflict diffusion, refugee flows, terrorism or economic downturn. Spill over effects create a material interest to intervene.

The third explanatory factor for UN intervention is theability of a target state to resist outside intervention. Militarily strong target states, or target states that have powerful allies, can raise the costs and risks of UN intervention and affect its chances of success.

Fourth and finally, UN intervention is explained by the level ofmaterial and reputational resourcesthe UN has committed to the resolution of a crisis in the past (sunk costs). To the extent that the UN have invested time, money, and diplomatic prestige in the resolution of the crisis, this creates the wish to protect these investments through continued or escalated involvement.

None of these explanatory factors is sufficient in itself to explain selective intervention. In combination, however, they provide a powerful explanation for the UN's uneven response to humanitarian crises.
When does the UN take strong action?
The UN can be expected to take strong action-coercive measures including economic sanctions, 'robust' peacekeeping operation or (the authorization of) military action-if the extent of a humanitarian crisis (in terms of victims and internally displaced persons) is large, and if the organisation has committed substantial resources to its resolution. This, however, leads to intervention only when the crisis also generates substantial negative spill over effects (e.g., refugee flows) or when the target state of an intervention is weak and therefore unable to resist to outside intervention.
Explaining limited UN action (or inaction)
A limited response of the UN to a humanitarian crisis, such as UN observer missions, humanitarian assistance, or even complete inaction of the UN, is best explained by the ability of a potential target state to resist outside intervention (e.g., through military capabilities). However, other factors must be present as well. Military capabilities must be either complemented by a low level of previous UN involvement; or by a relatively low level of human suffering and spill over effect to neighbouring countries.

A few brief examples may help to illustrate how these four factors interact to lead to strong or limited UN action.
Bosnia
UN intervention in Bosnian crisis was clearly driven by a combination of motivational factors. For one, UN members were strongly concerned by the large-scale plight of the Bosnian civilian population and the grave human rights violations committed by the parties to the conflict (ethnic cleansing, the installation of concentration camps, the siege of Sarajevo, and the massacres at Srebrenica). Second, the intervention was motivated by the wish to prevent the crisis from spilling over to Western European countries, most notably in form of refugee flows, and to stop a more generalized destabilization of the Balkan region. A third important driver of UN intervention in Bosnia was the wish of UN member states to protect the tremendous investments both material (through humanitarian assistance and peacekeeping) and reputational (diplomatic efforts) the UN had made over the course of the conflict. However, when the Bosnian Serbs took hundreds of UNPROFOR blue helmets hostage, this brought the UN to the brink of failure and put the UN's efforts in the Bosnian crisis in jeopardy. In this situation, rather than withdraw, the organisation escalated its response. Finally, outside intervention was facilitated by the inability of the Bosnian Serbs and the Serbian government to generate sufficient resistance against outside intervention by the UN (and later by NATO).
Cote d'Ivoire
Very similar motivational patterns can be observed with respect to the UN's decision to authorize military intervention in the context of post-election violence in Côte d'Ivoire in 2010. The dramatic levels of internal displacement and the fears of genocide, given the xenophobic politics of 'Ivoirité' that characterized the conflict, raised strong humanitarian concern in the UN. At the same time, UN members wished to prevent the conflict from spilling over to other Western African countries, most notably to Liberia which was slowly recovering from a long and brutal civil war. Moreover, the substantial and longstanding involvement of the UN in the country generated an additional institutional dynamic pushing towards intervention. The UN had invested heavily in the resolution of the crisis in Côte d'Ivoire-most notably through peacekeeping and peacebuilding. UN members wished to protect these investments they saw at stake, should country relapse into civil war. Finally, former President Laurent Gbagbo and his supporters were too weak to effectively resist outside intervention in in the country. By the time the UN decided to authorize military action, large parts of the country were controlled by forces loyal to Gbagbo's opponent Alassane Ouattara.
Libya
As in the crises in Bosnia and in Côte d'Ivoire, humanitarian intervention in Libya was driven by more than one factor. Muammar al Gaddafi's public announcement to commit a massacre in the town of Benghazi generated particular pressure on the part of UN members to act. Concerns to prevent spill over effects also played an important role. In addition to destabilizing effects for neighbouring Egypt and Tunisia-both of which are undergoing important political change in the wake of the 'Arab Spring'-Western UN members feared that hundreds of thousands of Libyan refugees would cross the Mediterranean towards Europe. At the same time, the Gaddafi regime was not in a strong position to resist outside intervention. Not only was there a capable opposition movement in the country, but also Tripoli had managed to alienate nearly all of its former Arab and African allies. Libya also lacked partners in the Security Council who might have opposed or blocked UN intervention. However, the Libyan case fails to provide strong support for the previous institutional involvement explanation in that the UN did not invest substantial material and immaterial resources to the resolution of the crisis prior to the intervention.
Syria
The ongoing crisis in Syria illustrates how a combination of factors prevents strong UN action. The available evidence suggests that massive human rights violations, the spiralling violence in the country as well as the severe spill over effect of the Syrian conflict for neighbouring countries, most notably Lebanon, raised strong concerns on the part of UN members. A majority of UN members have pushed for sanctions against the Assad regime in the UN Security Council. That the UN has nevertheless not taken strong action in Syria can be explained by two factors. First, unlike the cases discussed before, Syria is more able to resist outside intervention-most notably because the Assad regime enjoys the continued support of its Russian and Chinese allies, who block any coercive measures against Syria in the UN. Second, the UN has not been substantially involved in Syria in the past and has not committed substantial resources to the resolution of the crisis. As such, a complementary dynamic of escalating commitment could not unfold in the UN to push towards coercive measures.
Summary
Whether the UN intervenes or does not intervene in a humanitarian crisis cannot be explained by a single factor. Rather, a combination of conditions - the extent of human suffering, the level of spill over effects, the military strength of a target state and the extent to which the UN has been involved in a crisis before - accounts for this variation in UN action to a large extent. While the explanation I suggest here does not account for all UN responses to humanitarian crises, it covers more than 80% of the UN humanitarian interventions after the Cold War.
Martin Binder is Associate Professor in International Relations at the University of Reading. His research focuses on humanitarian intervention, the authority and legitimacy of international institutions, and rising powers. His work has been published in the Journal of Peace Research, International Studies Quarterly and International Theory, among others. His recent bookThe United Nations and the Politics of Selective Humanitarian Interventionhas been published in 2017 with Palgrave Macmillan.

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Why Does UN Humanitarian Intervention Remain Selective?

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7 March 2017 Over the past two decades, the United Nations Security Council has responded more strongly to some humanitarian crises than to others. This variation in Security Council action raises the important question of what factors motivate United Nations intervention.

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The ex-president of the Ivory Coast has been acquitted of crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court, raising further questions about the credibility and effectiveness of the Hague-based institution.

Laurent Gbagbo, who was charged in connection with violence following a disputed 2010 election that left 3,000 dead and 500,000 displaced, was the first former head of state to go on trial at the ICC.

The five-month stand-off between supporters of Gbagbo and his rival, Alassane Ouattara, saw some of the most brutal clashes in the country's history, and only came to an end after French-backed forces stormed the presidential palace.

Yet despite claims by the prosecution that Gbagbo had used "all means" to cling to power, judges ruled they had failed to demonstrate "the existence of a 'common plan' to keep Gbagbo in power" which included crimes against civilians, or a "policy to attack a civilian population".

After spending seven years in prison, "Gbagbo will follow in the footsteps of his wife Simone Gbagbo, who walked away from a 20-year jail term in Ivory Coast in August when she was granted amnesty by Ouattara after seven years in prison", reports Al Jazeera.

Inside the court, the public gallery erupted in loud cheers, while outside supporters of Gbagbo gathered with champagne. In Ivory Coast's economic capital, Abidjan, shirtless men ran through the streets toasting the former president.

But victims of the civil war who had testified against him were devastated, with some worried about reprisals and others considering leaving the country. Human rights organisations described the ruling as "disastrous".

Gbagbo's acquittal has raised serious questions about the ICC, which has failed in its attempt to build successful cases against former DR Congo Vice-President Jean-Pierre Bemba, and Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta.

Since it came into being in 2002, ICC prosecutors have won only three war crimes convictions.

"Whenever a case involving mass atrocities essentially collapses at the ICC, it does damage to the perception of the court as a credible and effective institution of international justice," Mark Kersten, author of Justice in Conflict, told the BBC.

"Many are concerned that the court is emerging as an institution where only rebels can be successfully prosecuted," he said.

The Guardian says the 17-year-old ICC "has long been criticised for disproportionately going after Africans", although the current prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, a Gambian, has worked to change that, opening investigations in Afghanistan, Iraq, Palestine and the Ukraine.

The New York Times says "some analysts have criticised the overall approach of the court - a faraway entity that targets leaders and works largely through intermediaries who fail to gain the trust of locals".

"On the other hand, the ruling demonstrates the judges' independence and impartiality and makes it harder to push the narrative, popular among those who fear the long arm of the ICC, that the court is a biased weapon of neo-colonial justice used purely to convict African leaders," the BBC's Anna Holligan says.

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Is the International Criminal Court fit for purpose?

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The ex-president of the Ivory Coast has been acquitted of crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court, raising further questions about the credibility and effectiveness of the Hague-based institution. Laurent Gbagbo, who was charged in connection with violence following a disputed 2010 election that left 3,000 dead and 500,000 displaced, was the first former head of state to go on trial at the ICC.

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In December 2015, after years of negotiations, 195 countries made a new commitment to work together to address global climate change.

This landmark agreement, signed in France's capital, Paris, and seen as a turning point for global climate policy, came into force on November 4, 2016.

As of June 2017, 195 UNFCCC (The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change) members had signed the agreement, and 148 have ratified it.

However, on Wednesday, President Donald Trump announced that the United States would withdraw from the accord and suggested he would seek a new deal, without offering any details.

"So we are getting out, but we will start to negotiate and see if we can make a deal that's fair," he said.

The withdrawal also includes the cancellation of all US contributions to the Green Climate Fund, which Trump said was "costing the US a vast fortune".

Trump's decision drew strong criticism both at home and abroad, with world leaders, leading scientists and activists calling the move "disappointing" and "regrettable".

What is the Paris climate agreement?

It is an agreement within the UNFCCC dealing with greenhouse gas emissions mitigation, adaptation and finance starting in the year 2020.

The aim is to limit global temperature rise to two degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels by 2100.

This level is considered a crucial tipping point, above which there will be serious consequences for global food production and more frequent and dangerous climate events, such as flooding and drought.

To achieve this, global greenhouse gas emissions will need to be cut by an estimated 40-70 percent by 2050, and by 2100 the planet must be carbon-neutral.

Under the Paris accord, each country must submit its own plan to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and address the impact of climate change.

The agreement as a whole is not legally binding and does not penalise nations who fail to meet their commitments.

But it does impose an obligation on countries to implement their plans and includes a review process designed to pressure them into compliance and to increase the scope of their efforts every five years.

Is the Paris climate agreement bad?

Two of Trump's primary arguments against the accord is that it is "disadvantageous to the US" and that it gives "exclusive benefits of other countries".

The US president said he could not "in good conscience support a deal that punishes the US and that poses no punishment for the world's great polluters".

The US is the world's second-largest emitter of greenhouse gases, and when the agreement was signed in 2015, it was seen as "major leap for mankind".

World leaders, leading economists, scientists, and activists at the time admitted the deal was not "perfect", while some criticised it for not going far enough. Yet many called it a "turning point" for the world's fight against climate change.

Then-US President Barack Obama said the agreement represented "the best chance we have to save the one planet that we've got".
READ MORE: World reacts to Trump's Paris climate accord withdrawal
Following Trump's decision to withdraw from the accord, the leaders of Germany, France and Italy said the agreement was "not renegotiable".

Many of the largest cities in the US pledged their support for the pact, regardless of Trump's decision.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called Washington's move "deeply disappointing", while Japan's foreign ministry said the decision was "regrettable".

Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo said Trump's move "is a mistake with dramatic consequences".

What countries are not in the Paris climate agreement?

The US would join Nicaragua and Syria as the only countries to have not signed on to the agreement.

Nicaragua declined to sign the deal in the first place, arguing that it was too weak.

How can the US withdraw from the accord?

The White House said it would stick to the UN rules for withdrawing from the agreement.

Under the provisions of the accord, the US cannot formally withdraw until 2020 because countries can only officially leave after three years of the agreement coming into effect and must give a one-year notice prior to withdrawing.
READ MORE: The Paris climate agreement and why it matters
This means that the US can only submit its paperwork for withdrawal in November 2019. The formal withdrawal would not take effect until November 2020, after the next US presidential election.

Because the accord is non-binding, however, Trump could choose to simply ignore the accord's terms.

A quicker option for the US president would be to withdraw from the 1992 UNFCCC, which has nearly universal membership. That process would take about a year to complete.

What impact will Trump's decision have on the agreement?

It remains to be seen what direct impact Trump's decision will have on the accord itself.

Environmentalists and others have long worried a US withdrawal could create a domino effect, with other high carbon-producing countries following Washington's lead.

Many of those countries, however, have reaffirmed their commitment to the deal.

Just prior to Trump's announcement, China, the world's biggest greenhouse emitter, said it would keep up its end of the accord, even if the US pulls out of the agreement.

Chinese Prime Minister Li Keqiang said it was "in our interest ... to work step by step towards sustainable development" and environmental protection together with the international community.

One of the major tenets of the Paris agreement was to create a fair environment for all countries in their efforts to combat climate change. Many have argued that developing countries should not have to bear the same financial burden as more developed countries, which are among the world's top polluters.

To address this, the Green Climate Fund was created to aid and encourage developing countries to invest in cleaner energy. A number of countries have pledged $10.3bn to fund, including the US.

The Obama administration pledged $3bn, of which only about $1bn has been delivered.

Trump said that he will end the US contributions to the fund, prompting some to worry about the direct impact such a cut might have on developing countries such as India.

"Countries like India will obviously have to do a lot more by carrying the financial and technological burden," Sunita Narain, an environmentalist with the New Delhi-based Centre for Science and Environment, told Al Jazeera.
READ MORE: The day I became an environmental activist
Others worry about the impact of the decision on US greenhouse gas emissions.

The Obama-administration had pledged to reduce greenhouse gas emission 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020 and 26 to 28 percent by 2025.

While recent analyses suggest the US may still be on track to meet its 2020 goal, scientists and consultancy groups have said the withdrawal from the agreement, along with other steps taken by Trump to roll back Obama-era climate regulations, will likely produce a negative "prolonged effect".

The Associated Press consulted with more than two dozen climate scientists and analysed a special computer model scenario designed to calculate potential effects.

Scientists said the US pullout of the agreement would worsen an already bad problem and make it far more difficult to prevent crossing a dangerous global temperature threshold.

Is climate change real?

There is wide consensus within the scientific community that climate change is fueled by man-made greenhouse gas emissions.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has said: "scientific evidence for warming of the climate system is unequivocal".

The temperature of Earth's air and the quantity of heat trapped in its oceans continue to increase, with 2016 declared the hottest year on record.
OPINION: The case for collaborating on climate change
Climate change could lead to political instability, increased societal tensions and could place new burdens on economies and governments, a report by the American Association for the Advancement of Scientists (AAAS) found. Large numbers of people will likely be displaced due to famine and drought.

A NASA-funded study said that global industrial civilisation is headed for a collapse in the coming decades, blaming unsustainable resource use and increasing wealth inequality.

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Paris climate agreement: What you need to know

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In December 2015, after years of negotiations, 195 countries made a new commitment to work together to address global climate change. This landmark agreement, signed in France's capital, Paris, and seen as a turning point for global climate policy, came into force on November 4, 2016.

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intergovernmental panel on climate change (ipcc)

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cop 21: un climate change conference | paris

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What was agreed at COP24 in Poland and why did it take so long?

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Fractious UN climate change talks ended with a deal on putting the Paris agreement into practice - but much else left unresolved

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After 1945, global order shifted from multipolarity in which multiple states vied for regional hegemony, to bipolarity, when the Soviet Union and the US emerged as the overarching global powers, with the monopoly in global affairs economically, politically, and militarily. Since the end of the Cold War in 1991, the US has been seen as the unipolar hegemon, but this has been called into question recently due to the US' apparent hubristic approach that has given room for competitors, the rise of China and the rise of other global powers.

One way in which the global order can be seen as now multipolar is due to the failings of the US, which as the 'unipolar' power, its failure creates a de facto multipolarity in global order. Since the US' self-determined 'new world order' after the Cold War, it has exhibited hubris through multiple foreign policy failures which has lessened its standing globally. Bush's 'War on Terror' has been criticised as violating international law, due to US soldiers' human rights abuses in Afghanistan and the little mandate the US had to invade Iraq, and its subsequent failure to create long-lasting peace in Iraq after the removal of Hussein. Similarly, Trump's foreign policy has drawn criticism internationally - his recent trade war with China and obtrusive method to dealing with North Korea have been denounced as reckless, and his decision to officially declare Jerusalem the capital of Israel has been seen as short-sighted and likely to worsen the Israel-Palestine conflict. In fact, 128 countries backed a UN resolution to call Trump to retract his Jerusalem statement, even though Trump threatened to cut aid to countries that agreed to this. This shows the US' lessening power over other states, as its hubris shown through foreign policy failings makes it seem like an 'empty threat'. Neo-marxist thinker Chomsky has described the US as a 'malign hegemon', who seeks to control 'strategic assets' in regions rather than work for peace. Similarly, although not as a criticism, realist thinker Niall Ferguson has described the US as an 'imperial force', calling Iraq a 'US colony'.

However, the fact that the US can and does get away with flaunting international law and convention shows that it is still a superpower, and thus the global order is not multipolar. In addition to this, the US has a disproportionate influence over global economic affairs due to its role in economic global governance institutions. The fact that Bush was never tried for decreeing that he would not follow the Geneva Convention regarding the Taliban in Afghanistan and that the US could invade Iraq on flimsy and swiftly disproved evidence shows that while the US may be criticised, it nonetheless has the 'monopoly on violence', as Chomsky put it, and is still the global hegemon. The US also has immense voting power in the IMF and the World Bank due to its large contributions to its budget, which it is able to do due to it still being the world's largest economy. Realist theory would say that regardless of the US' image, its ability to exert its military and economic power makes it unquestionably a superpower, as ethical considerations should not take place in global politics.

It is arguable that global order is not multipolar at the present but bipolar, due to the swift rise of China. As the second largest economy after the US, China is emerging as a competing superpower, and it is predicted by thinkers such as Rachman and Jacques that the world will shortly become a bipolar system again as during the Cold War. China's economy is predicted to overtake the Eurozone in 2018, and 78% of it urban population by 2022 are predicted to be middle-class. This means that due to China's large workforce and large middle class, it has both the comparative advantage over developed economies of being able to produce labour-intensive goods and a high consumption demand for capital-intensive goods, making it a desirable trading partner with mature economies. It has also asserted itself militarily recently, with 7 new naval bases being built in the South China Sea, waters which carry 1/3 of the world's maritime traffic. Its rise is predicted by offensive realist thinker Mearsheimer as being inevitably conflict-provoking from the US, due to the structure of global order - and this seems likely with Trump's recent tariffs on steel and aluminium, which he has exempted many countries from, but not China. This trade war follows the theory of the Thucydides trap, in which a ruling power is threatened by a rising one, and thus engages in conflict with the rising one. The fact that the US is evidently so threatened by China is indicative that China is becoming a bipolar power in global order.

However, China has many internal issues that could prevent it from effectively challenging the US' supremacy. Its growth has slowed in recent years, with its workforce predicted to have fallen by 17% by 2050, due to its aging population coupled with the after-effects of the One-Child policy. There is also considerable civil unrest due to the police-state nature of China's government, with civilian dissatisfaction over Xi Jin Ping's recent removal of term limits and the heavy internet censorship in mainland China. There are high suicide rates among Chinese youth and inequality is deepening between the richest and poorest citizens, especially when contrasting urban versus rural populations. These problems follow liberal thinker Fukuyama's theory that the world is now entering a 'capitalist liberal democracy', and that states can only succeed if they follow this style of governance. Due to China being a capitalist economy but a communist government, it can never properly threaten the US as the US has an ideological advantage, due to it being a liberal democracy.

Another way in which global order can be seen as entering a system of multipolarity is due to the rise of emerging global powers such as India, Russia and the EU, making global order appear more and more like a pre-WWI era, but with the effects of decolonisation, meaning more states can emerge as powers. India has the third-largest military by personnel strength, the fifth-largest defence budget and the seventh-largest economy, bypassing Canada. Trump has recently said that US-India relations have 'never looked brighter', and America is showing a vested interest in promoting India as a regional power to compete with China. Russia's show of military strength has given it considerable influence over global affairs - due to Putin's support of Assad, the Syria conflict is unable to be resolved. Russia's 2014 annexation of Crimea and recent display of vertical nuclear proliferation also shows its prominence militarily. The EU has exhibited considerable soft power, especially regarding Germany, and has managed to present itself as a 'rational' and 'compassionate' US, through Germany's acceptance of 1 million refugees.

However, while all these states have influence over global affairs, none have control over global affairs as the US does, meaning they are still 'great powers' and not 'superpowers'. All of them have internal issues and divisions that means they are unable to effectively compete with the US and create a multipolar global order. While India has a considerable military and has risen economically, 270 million civilians still live in poverty, and it is in need of major investment in its infrastructure, estimated at around $1.3 trillion by India's finance minister. It also has little say in intergovernmental institutions - it is not a member of the G7/8, and is not a permanent member of the UN Security Council. Russia's show of military strength means little if it does not have a stable economy to sustain itself, which due to the sanctions imposed on it after Russia's annexation of Crimea, which stop Russia's access to foreign markets and loans, it does not have. Russia's refusal to retreat from the Ukraine even as its economy is severely dented shows Russia's irrationality as a global actor, and means it is not a legitimate threat to US supremacy. The EU, while containing strong global powers such as Germany, due to its internal structure is also brought down by failing economies such as Italy and Greece. The EU's Eurozone means that the EU is only ever as strong as its weakest states, and due to recent financial crises and expansion to include ex-Soviet bloc states, it is unlikely to have upward growth from all states any time soon. It is also affected by a recent move towards nationalism and populism, as shown by the UK's exit from the EU, the Polish Government's semi-removal of an independent judiciary and the rise of far-right political parties in Germany and France. Defensive realist Kenneth Waltz says that the EU has pessimistic prospects due to 'structural problems and internal divisions', and that its tying together of disparate economies with the Eurozone was a 'fateful mistake'. Due to all these internal issues, none of these states are capable economically to compete with the US, and thus the world cannot be said to be multipolar.

In conclusion, global order is not multipolar, regardless of US failings and weakening of its reputation. The fact that the US still has economic, military and political supremacy, which it has enforced through economic global governance institutions, means it is structurally very difficult for rising states to compete with the US - and while China can be seen as a competing power, and thus world order can be seen as bipolar, its rise is nonetheless only predicted, and yet to be truly seen.

Ninon Lack

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Are we moving into a new multipolar world?

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After 1945, global order shifted from multipolarity in which multiple states vied for regional hegemony, to bipolarity, when the Soviet Union and the US emerged as the overarching global powers, with the monopoly in global affairs economically, politically, and militarily.

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America's empire

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The long read: The United States likes to think of itself as a republic, but it holds territories all over the world – the map you always see doesn’t tell the whole story

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On a sunny winter's afternoon in eastern China chickens scratch and scuffle on a busy market street. Men and women in flowing robes sell their wares: large straw hats and baskets, woven fans and red lanterns. Behind them stretch the mountains and red imperial wooden gates. All eyes are on Youyou, a pretty young protégée of Jackie Chan, who feigns an argument with a handsome male companion under the watchful lens of a roving camera.

Youyou is shooting a kung fu television series in Hengdian World Studios, the largest outdoor film studio in the world. Nestled in the hills of Zhejiang province, a five-hour drive south from Shanghai, Hengdian spans over 2,500 acres - more than Paramount Studios and Universal put together. Its vast life-like sets - ranging from the dusty grandeur of Beijing's Forbidden City to the lush tropical jungle of colonial-era Hong Kong - have been used to film over a thousand Chinese TV shows and films, including Hero and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.

Farmer-turned-entrepreneur Xu Wenrong first began to build Hengdian in the 1990s. Xu, now in his late 70s, converted agricultural land into elaborate sets (construction remains ongoing). His vision was prescient. China is now the second largest film market in the world, beaten only by the United States. Last year, box office returns reached 21.7 billion Renminbi ($3.6 bn), up 48 percent from 2012. Crucially, of the top ten grossing films of 2013, seven were made in China.

'Chinawood', as Hengdian is also known, is cashing in. While the sets are free for film crews, Xu makes returns on the hotels, restaurants, equipment and costumes. "Hengdian used to be this random village and then this guy with a dream was like: 'I am going to make this into the biggest movie studio in the world,'" says Jonathan Kos-Read, otherwise known by his stage name Cao Cao, an American who has acted in a hundred Chinese movies. "And he did."

It is also one of China's biggest domestic tourist attractions. Early January is low season. But, despite the cold and the high-ticket prices (access to three sets costs 480 Renminbi or $79), there is a steady trickle of visitors. They include 600 retirees who have descended on Hengdian mid-week for a two-day tour en masse. Many wear matching caps and clutch SLR cameras, as they pose with actors in period dress. (The paved streets of the Hong Kong and Guangzhou studios are also popular for wedding photographs). Shuttle buses take tourists between sets where daily performances are held. At the faux Ming and Qing dynasty palaces, Mongolian horsemen perform stunts against a backdrop of pavilions. Tourists can pay for a lap around the arena on a docile pony or buy popcorn. The entire show is executed to the dramatic tune of a famous soap opera.
Local hero
Hengdian now attracts more than 11 million tourists per year: the recreational visitors and professional film crews - have transformed the local area. In a decade this former rural backwater has ballooned, with a population riding off the back of the burgeoning film industry. Shentu Ping Ping, a wrinkled 61-year-old local, has witnessed the dramatic change. Shentu used to live in a small house with two muddy rooms that had just one bed for five people. But now she helps out in her family's restaurant and is paid to take care of the flowers in the studio opposite. "Before we were poor and had to work in the fields," says Shentu with a satisfied burp, sitting down after the lunch shift. "We didn't know where our next meal was coming from. Now we are no longer considered farmers. Now Xu Wenrong is our boss. We have food, we have money to spend. We have our own business."

Wang Xi Xie, 41, Shentu's daughter-in-law, agrees. "We have visitors eating here not only from China but from all over the world. I have even got foreign tourists in my restaurant and famous movie stars here," says the mother of three. Above all, Wang is happy that, unlike millions of rural Chinese, she does not have to migrate to the city. She explains: "The best thing is we get to stay here - we don't have to leave home to work." On the contrary, migrants have flocked to Hengdian. Many come to set up businesses or work eight-hour days as extras on film sets. Payment is only 40 Renminbi a day ($6.60) - but for many it is still better than toiling in a factory or field.

Others have come to follow a dream. Known as 'hengpiao' or 'Hengdian drifters' they are the equivalent of the waitresses and waiters hankering after hitting the big time in Hollywood. Tang Wei, 20, an extra on a kung fu television series, is in Hengdian against his parents' wishes. "Almost no parents support their kids doing this kind of thing. Half of them don't even know what they are doing − they think they are working in some factories. Parents don't think it is realistic, that it has no future," he explains.
Risky business
Gong Wen Biao, 26, has also come to Hengdian, where he has joined the actors' union hoping to get a gig in a kung fu movie. But while he wants to break into the Chinese film industry, he still believes that American films - for now − are better. "Foreign films are about the future but Chinese cinema is always about the past so the Western film industry has a lot more imagination," he says. All films shot in China must have their scripts approved by the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television, the country's censorship body. Placing movies in the present day can be more risky. With this in mind many films and television series are set during the dynasties of the past, where there is no question of criticising the ruling Chinese Communist Party.

Despite these restrictions, domestic movies are proving more popular in China as technical know-how improves. "The props are better, the cinematographers are better, everything looks better," says Kos-Read, the American actor who has worked in the Chinese film industry for 14 years, and was recently in Hengdian shooting a new telenovela alongside the Hong Kong star Gillian Chung. "The fact that Chinese people are going to Chinese films more than they used to doesn't say so much about changing tastes in China," insists Kos-Read. "It just says that domestically made films are getting better. There is a growing group of talented professionals who know how to make films for audiences. That sort of talent takes a while to grow - the American film industry had a hundred-year start."

Hengdian is not quite Hollywood yet. Stars such as Jet Li and Jackie Chan have worked here. Increasingly, the sets are being used for Hollywood co-productions, such as The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor and Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, which are hoping to get around the government's strict quotas for the import of foreign films. But accommodation and entertainment is still basic by American standards. While filmmakers can have barbecued sparrow eggs delivered to their hotel rooms at 2:00am there is still only one Western restaurant in town - a KFC.

Gong Wen Biao, the aspiring actor, is unfazed. "We will rise above Hollywood," he says in his Ming dynasty gown, gesturing his arms around the palace setting as the evening's shadows grow. "China has only been opened up for thirty years and we are already here."

Additional reporting by Kim Wu.
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On a sunny winter's afternoon in eastern China chickens scratch and scuffle on a busy market street. Men and women in flowing robes sell their wares: large straw hats and baskets, woven fans and red lanterns. Behind them stretch the mountains and red imperial wooden gates.

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Is China a superpower?

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Over the past several years, China has managed to turn itself into Latin America's largest creditor, mostly by funding large-scale infrastructure projects. In doing so, Beijing has managed to grow quite close to some of the region's capitals. Argentine President Mauricio Macri has sought to " deepen" ties with China. In Colombia, President Iván Duque hosted Chinese Transport Minister Li Xiaopeng as an honored guest at his inauguration ceremony over the summer. And the incoming Mexican president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, is considering joining China's Belt and Road Initiative, which he has said will open a new chapter in the countries' relations.

For the Trump administration, though, China's presence in the United States' backyard is worrying. Although National Security Advisor John Bolton did not mention China by name in his recent "Troika of Tyranny" speech, his thorough condemnation of two key Chinese allies in the region, Cuba and Venezuela, made the point. In February, then-Secretary of State Rex Tillerson was even more explicit when he said, "Today China is getting a foothold in Latin America. It is using economic statecraft to pull the region into its orbit; the question is at what price."

One cost has been to the environment and to indigenous communities. Infrastructure development, although necessary, has often been carried out irresponsibly, with enormous social, political, economic, and environmental consequences. Another consequence has been a significant loss of U.S. influence in Latin America. In 2017, for example, Venezuela published its oil prices in yuan for the first time. The move was welcomed by other countries, including Russia, which cheered the pushback against dollar dominance. In addition, three Latin American countries, El Salvador, Panama, and the Dominican Republic, have broken off ties with Taiwan, a longtime U.S. ally, in the last two years.

There is a way for the United States to help address both problems at once. Increased U.S. investment in the softer side of infrastructure, especially in social and environmental safeguards for new projects and in urban planning programs, can help ensure that these countries are able to upgrade their infrastructure and energy systems in a responsible and equitable manner. And if the United States, the U.S. Agency for International Development, the new U.S. International Development Finance Corporation, and multilateral organs such as the World Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) are seen as genuinely contributing to Latin American development in a way that puts the long-term interests of the region above (or at least on par with) U.S. commercial interests, Washington's reputation as a trustworthy partner will grow.

Latin American governments have long lamented their countries' patchy infrastructure. Increasingly, in recent decades, China has stepped in with a solution: roughly $150 billion loaned to Latin American countries since 2005. About 90 percent of that has gone to boosting the region's energy, infrastructure, and mining sectors.

The scale of Latin America's borrowing from China in the past decade is astounding: Venezuela has received $62 billion; Brazil, $42 billion; Argentina, $18 billion; and Ecuador, $17 billion. Those deeply in arrears to China have sometimes had to take on more loans from the superpower to stay afloat. The example of Ecuador is telling. President Rafael Correa's administration borrowed an additional $3.5 billion between 2011 and 2015 to bridge the budgetary gaps that resulted from Chinese-financed development projects.

The United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, the World Bank, and the IDB have suggested that the United States try to regain its standing in Latin America by, essentially, copying China and funding infrastructure at a large scale. That is a trap. For one, Western investors have struggled to do megaprojects well and have often passed on projects that have gone on to be funded by Chinese banks. Further, although the Latin American infrastructure gap is real, the last thing the region needs is yet another round of megaproject building driven more by foreign desires than local needs.

Hydropower is a good example. Chinese state firms are the largest financiers and builders of dams in the world, having raised over 330 in 74 countries. In Latin America, the list of countries working with China on dams includes Argentina, Belize, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guyana, Honduras, Peru, and Venezuela. These dams, and others financed by regional lenders, have displaced hundreds of thousands and have caused untold environmental harm. In all, over 400 dams have been built, are under construction, or are being planned in the Amazon basin alone, for example, and a team of international researchers writing for Nature argued that "the accumulated negative environmental effects of existing dams and proposed dams, if constructed ... [will be] severe, disruptive and characteristically irreversible."

Another result of all this construction is that the region has become overly reliant on hydropower. In fact, data from the International Hydropower Association show that nearly two-thirds of South American electricity is generated via hydropower projects. But as the hydrologist Philip Fearnside has argued, much of that doesn't even reach the people who need it most. "The amount of electricity devoted to rural electrification is miniscule compared to other uses," wrote last fall, continuing that "hydropower is already unreliable and is projected to become much more so in light of climate change and projected shifts in rainfall patterns."

Large hydropower projects are also consistently poor investments. University of Oxford economists have demonstrated that actual costs of hydropower construction average 96 percent over what initial models predicted. "Even before taking into account negative impacts on human society and the environment, on average the actual construction costs of large dams tend to be too high to yield a positive financial return on investment," the researchers said.

Yet Western lenders have long supported hydropower development in Latin America. The World Bank's online hydropower resource states that 62 percent of Latin America and the Caribbean's potential hydropower remains "unexploited." And, in fact, the IDB has made attempts to match such Chinese megaproject lending in the sector. Its most recent gambit, the Ituango Dam (commonly known as Hidroituango), was an unmitigated disaster. Co-financed by an IDB spinoff, IDB Invest, and the China Co-Financing Fund for Latin America and the Caribbean, it was Colombia's largest such project to date and was rushed to the construction phase despite vigorous local opposition. The dam ultimately burst during construction, displacing 25,000 people and threatening many more downstream.

Hidroituango highlights a key tension between the desire for rapid development and time-consuming social and environmental assessments. Chinese finance is enticing to Latin American governments precisely because it doesn't require the costly and arduous social and environmental evaluation processes that usually accompany World Bank and IDB projects.

Rather than trying to compete with China by forgoing such evaluations themselves, though, the United States and other lenders might more usefully focus on helping make environmental and social safeguards less burdensome. They could do so by footing the bill for meeting the community consultation requirements that might come with a World Bank project, for example, or by funding the environmental assessments that the IDB might want. Such aid could make Western-driven projects nimbler and also better investments for Latin America in the long run. And in theory, because China typically defers to local regulations where it does business, such a system could even help ensure the safety of Chinese projects by helping Latin American nations enforce their own rules.

Beyond footing the bill for impact assessments, the West could also do a lot of good by investing in higher education and public sector and professional development in Latin America. Urban planning education across the region is severely underfunded. Upgrades to planning programs will help Latin American officials and researchers endogenously craft better infrastructure development policies down the line.

Given the scale of Chinese lending throughout the past decade-as well as the Trump administration's inflammatory rhetoric toward Latin America-it doesn't appear that China's presence in the region will decrease anytime soon. The reality is that there is still a lot of demand on the part of national governments for additional construction.

And the slew of recent elections-in Mexico, Brazil, and Colombia-doesn't seem like it will change anything. "Latin American countries are still looking to China as a critical partner and creditor," Margaret Myers, the director of the Asia and Latin America Program at the Inter-American Dialogue, told me. "The ways countries are engaging with China might change slightly, but the fundamentals of their bilateral relations with China will withstand political changes." In Brazil, for example, President-elect Jair Bolsonaro has already walked back his negative campaign rhetoric about China and has proposed railroad construction that is intended to facilitate growth in the soy trade, Myers told me. And under López Obrador in Mexico, Eugenio Anguiano Roch, a professor at the National Autonomous University of Mexico and former Mexican ambassador to China, recently wrote, "Mexico's international business ... is currently poised for a fundamental reorientation," with China set to play a key role.

It would be a mistake, however, for the United States to approach this reality antagonistically. Staggering inequality is Latin America's defining issue, and Washington would be prudent to recognize that gearing its investments toward combating this complex set of problems will reap enormous benefits in the long term. Instead of admonishing China for its growing role in the region, the United States needs to see the opportunities present for strengthening the soft side of infrastructure development and realize that pursuing them could reap vast goodwill, solidarity, and cooperation.

At the moment, Latin America lacks the safeguards and planning capacities to ensure that megaprojects have the best possible fiscal, social, and environmental outcomes. The United States, by playing a supporting role in development, could help to lay the groundwork for increased economic connectivity, regional political integration, an approach to growth mindful of and respectful to indigenous communities and the environment, and substantial reductions in poverty and inequality across the region.

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How to Respond to Chinese Investment in Latin America

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Over the past several years, China has managed to turn itself into Latin America's largest creditor, mostly by funding large-scale infrastructure projects. In doing so, Beijing has managed to grow quite close to some of the region's capitals. Argentine President Mauricio Macri has sought to " deepen" ties with China.

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chinese investment into america plunged 83% in 2018 - cnn

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The Chinese investment boom in America is over

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The Chinese investment boom into America has almost completely vanished.

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Power transition theory - emerging powers

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Power transition theory - emerging powers

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In this article, we shall discuss power transition theory in international relations. We will discuss power transition theory in comparison to balance of power theory, discuss the main characteristics of the theory, and examine the contributions of power transition theory to understanding global issues.

What is Power Transition Theory?

Power transition theory is a theory in international relations that examines the relations between states in the international system. Power transition theory was first argued in the late 1950s by Organski. This theory focuses on the hierarchical nature of states in the international system. So, the attention is not to anarchy in international relations, but rather, how the more powerful state sets the rules of the game (In fact, power transition theory also applies this notion of power to domestic politics) (Organski & Kugler, 1989).

Power transition theorists examine the order of power in the international system, and how states are either satisfied or dissatisfied with the distribution of power. The state on top dictates the resources and conditions based on its power. Other states below it can then decide if they are satisfied or not satisfied with the power. Those satisfied do not challenge the major power. However, a rising power unsatisfied with the current rules of the game, and existing resource structures might be the conditions that could lead to conflict. If states under the major power are satisfied, then they help ensure peace and stability.

However, if states are unsatisfied, this could be a cause of conflict in international relations (Organski & Kugler, 1989). But, being dissatisfied alone is not enough for conflict. They must have the power to actually credibly challenge the major power. So, the biggest concern for a major international war is when a dissatisfied state rises in power to directly challenge the main power. The smaller the gap of power between the most powerful country and the next country (or set of countries), the more the chance of conflict arising (Organski & Kugler, 1989).

How Does Power Transition Theory Compare to Balance of Power?

In this section, we shall compare power transition theory with balance of power theory, discussing any commonalities, and also examine differences in each respective theory of international relations. Balance of power theory has been one of the most popular international relations theories with regards to explaining conflict. The discussion on what balance of power means has existed for many years (Hass, 1953; Sheehan, 1996). Waltz (1988), one of the major proponents of balance of power theory both at the system and unit level of analysis, argues at the system level that bipolarity is less likely to bring about war than multi-polarity since states are unsure of how others are to act/align in a multipolar system, thus bringing about a high level of uncertainty, "miscalculation," "diffusion of dangers, [and] confusion of responses..." that is avoided in a bipolar system (623-624).

Similarly, Mearsheimer (1990) suggests that bipolarity allows states to read each other with clarity, compared to a multipolar system where states may misread the power capabilities of one another. At the unit level, Waltz (1988) also argues that a main reason for peace during a balance of power is due to nuclear capabilities. With both two opposing powers having nuclear capabilities, Waltz (1988) argues that the costs of conflict due to nuclear weapons are greatly increased, and thus the reason why peace is more likely to occur. Similar arguments of nuclear deterrence and peace in a bi-polar system have been argued by others such as Mearsheimer (1990). Sheehan (1996) argues that it was the presence of nuclear weapons in the bi-polar system following World War II that shaped both the United States and the Soviet Union's careful actions when interacting with each other.

In order to determine how power transition functions as a rival theory to balance of power, it is imperative to work from Lakatosian criteria for establishing and comparing the "hard core" and the "protective belt" of a research program, as well as using empirical evidence to examine which research program is has more explanatory power . DiCicco and Levy (2003) set out the main hard core assumptions of the Power Transition research program as compared to the Balance of Power hard core assumptions. In comparing the two research programs' assumptions, they explain that while similarities exist, we do find fundamental differences in some of the assumptions. Similarly to balance of power and neo-realism, the power transition research program assumes that states are the main actors in the international system.

They also agree that leaders of states are rational actors. Where power transition theorists differ from the balance of power position is in their next assumption that the world is "hierarchically organized under the leadership of the dominant power" (120). This differs from the neo-realist position that states operate under anarchy, and that no one state sets the rules or structure of the international system. While neo-realists such as Waltz (1979) (in DiCicco & Levy 2003) suggest that even the anarchical state has "some semblance of order," he in no way believes that one "dominant" state has influence in setting up the system according to its interests. Thus, this notion of a "dominant state" is not possible according to the balance of power research program since of the "balancing mechanism" that is expected to form and counter the "dominant" state (DiCicco & Levy, 2003).

A second major different in the hard core assumptions of power transition and the balance of power lies in the expected actions of a state. Now while classical realism (as illustrated in Morgenthau, 1956) believed that states acted for a lust of increasing power for the sake of power, later differences that came out of a neo-realist tradition suggested that states, while concerned with power, were "minimally" concerned with the survival or security of its state (Waltz, 1979). Regardless if we view realism and neo-realism as the same or different research programs, there is a belief in the realist and neo-realist tradition of balance of power that states will always attempt to gain power either for security or for the sake of power itself.

This strongly differs in the power transition research program however, where while power is minimally necessary in order for a state to exist (DiCicco & Levy, 2003: 122-123), power transition theorists instead argue that not all states if given the opportunity would change the system if the conditions in place are "satisfying" (123). DiCicco and Levy (2003) thus explain that even though power transition theorists still maintain some of the realist assumptions such as rationality of actors, and the importance of the foreign policy of a state without examining domestic politics, because of this belief in a hierarchical structure belief of power transition theorists, along with the assumption that a satisfied rising power will not change the structure of the international system is a clear distinction from original balance of power theory, and thus deserving of its own research program (123). For power transition theory, it is not about power, but about getting the most net gains (Organski & Kugler, 1989).

Stemming from this, another difference that seems to separate power transition theory and balance of power theoretically is the logical action of the rising state given the assumptions of how states operate. Since neo-realists work from an assumption that states minimally want to preserve their survival (Waltz, 1979), then the power transition theorists must account for the fact that a rising state that risks to challenge the dominant power for a change in the status quo must do so knowing that there is a chance (albeit a small chance) that losing could entail the loss of the rising power as a state. From a neo-realist assumption, it seems that a state would not be willing to challenge the dominant power if there was a chance that losing may lead to the end of the state, since the main objective is to survive. This hard core assumption is very different from a power transition theorist who seems to have to accept that a rising state does at some point possible take that risk of survival for changing the status quo. This is not necessary an issue for the power transition position, but it does seem to suggest a further shift in the hard core assumptions, and yet another reason why power transition belongs as its own research program from balance of power.

Empirical Tests of Power Transition Theory

Having examined the differences in hard core assumptions and the protective belts of both research programs, as Bueno de Mesquita (1985) accurately stated in The War Trap, "a theory's usefulness can only be judged empirically..." (9). Therefore, in order to examine which research program seems to be more valid in explaining conflict and thus progressive, we must examine the empirical evidence set forth by scholars. One of the first empirical tests of power transition theory is Organski and Kugler's (1980) The War Ledger. Organski and Kugler, after briefly defining variables such as power and satisfaction find in their analysis that dyads are more likely to go to war with one another at around parity. Since the original work of Organski (1968) and Organski and Kugler (1980), there have been a number of empirical tests done by scholars to test the hypotheses of balance of power and power transition theory. Kugler and Lemke (2000) give an excellent summary of the evolution of the power transition literature since the original work of Organski (1968). In their overview, they explain that "[a] large body of work has been created to evaluate the empirical claims by the power transition research program. The studies are extensive, and in fact virtually all of this evidence is supportive, either partially or entirely" (Kugler and Lemke, 2000: 138).

From Organski and Kugler's work, Houweling and Siccama (1988), using different data to retest Organski and Kugler also find power transition theory to hold. Moul (1985), in his study of European states between 1815-1939 found that two states were less likely to enter into conflict when their respective power status was clearly far apart from one another, and when states were close in power, "times were dangerous" (528). Geller (1993), upon examining power relationships between 456 disputes from 1816-1986 found that states who were equal in power or approaching equality were "approximately twice as likely to be associated with war..."(173). Moul (2003), in his empirical examination of power transition, looks at the time period from 1648-1815 and also finds support for the power transition theory. Further studies have expanded the protective belt of power transition theory by expanding the generalizability of power transition.

Lemke and Werner (1996) in their analysis of power transition and balance of power, make a new contribution to the field of conflict studies that adds to the explanatory power of power transition. Since the previous work has focused on power transitions among major powers, Lemke and Werner (1996) attempt to expand power transition by examining conflict powers at regional levels that are competing for "regional superiority." They suggest that the world is not only made up of a major power hierarchy but also regional hierarchies where states vie for regional superiority. Therefore, examining the timing of conflict in South American regional hierarchies they found that in fact conflict is much more likely when parity exists between a rising regional state towards the regional power and when the rising power is increasing the size of its military-an operationalization of dissatisfaction. They warn us however to be careful of their findings since they only examined a few cases.

Later studies by Benson & Kugler (1998) also expand the theory of power transition to fighting between the government and rebel groups within a state and find that fighting is in fact more likely to occur when resources are at parity, a finding that is consistent with the power transition research program. Reed (2003), explains that since states are likely to go to war due to incomplete information, as states become closer in strength, the likelihood of conflict is increased due to higher "information asymmetries" (633) than states that are further apart in power.

Measuring Power Transition Theory

While we have seen a large amount of research supporting the power transition research program, there are also measurement issues that need to be addressed when dealing with empirical tests of power transition. For example, there has been large discussion on the issue with adequately operationalizing variables, and particularly the "power" and "status quo variable used in power transition analyses (DiCicco & Levy, 2001). We have seen various discussions of power in general (Baldwin, 1979; Guzzini, 1993) and a number of different operationalizations of the concept of power and "perception of power" (Wohlforth, 1987) in examinations of the balance of power and power transition research programs as well as other areas of international politics (Matsubara, 1989). Organski and Kugler (1980) in their empirical study began by measuring power using Gross National Product (GNP).

Later studies by Houweling and Siccama (1980) (in Soya, Oneal, & Park, 1997) use a different measure created by "Doran and Parsons (1980) based on five variables indicating national size and development (in Soya, Oneal, & Park, 1997: 515) and find larger support for power transition theory. Soya, Oneal, and Park (1997) re-test Houweling and Siccama's using other measures of power such as "the Correlates of War (COW) composite index and GDP" (510), find evidence that supports power transition, even though the relationships are less than the previous studies they reviewed due possibly due to measurement errors and case selection (526). While power is heavily discussed in international relations, and best attempted to be operationalized through a number of measures, Barnett and Duvall (2005) for example explain that different measures should not be seen as "competing," but rather should be seen as "connecting" so that we are able to use different operational measure of power to ensure findings are consistent (39). Therefore, results supporting power transition theory seem to be robust with various measurements of power.

Kugler and Lemke (2000) explain that accurately operationalizing status quo satisfaction/dissatisfaction has also been an issue in the work of power transition theory. DiCicco and Levy (1999) (also cited in Danilovic & Clare, 2008) point out that one major weakness with the power transition research program is related to the lack of sufficient operationalization of status quo satisfaction/dissatisfaction. Danilovic and Clare (2008) explain in their overview that different measurements of dissatisfaction have been used (Kim, 1991; Lemke & Reed, 1996; Lemke & Werner, 1996). Danilovic and Clare (2008) point out however that this issue is more serious than mere validity of operationalizing a status quo variable. They argue that there is a lack of clarity on a theoretical conceptualization of what would cause a rising state to be satisfied or dissatisfied with the system set forth by the dominant power.

Danilovic & Clare (2008) address this issue, offering strong theoretical insight from deterrence theory to suggest that major power rising states determine their satisfaction/dissatisfaction with the structure set forth by the dominant power based upon their satisfaction/dissatisfaction in their regional "areas of strong interest...[since] clashes of these interests can be a major source of dissatisfaction" (294). This theory seems to be consistent with work that suggests great power states do often engage in conflict over outside regions, even if they are geographically distant from the said major power state (Taliaferro, 2004). In Danilovic and Clare's (2008) empirical examination of major power states using Danilovic's (2002) dataset on a major powers' regional ties, they find that a state will be more likely to challenge "if there is a conflict of regional interests for major powers in the dyad, both in the specific area of dispute and their overall regional interests" (298).

Extensions of Power Transition Theory

Thus, not only have we seen a large amount of empirical support for power transition theory-with various robustness checks of variable measurements, but extensions of power transition theory have also shown to further progress the research program. In fact, there have been a number of extensions of power transition studies testing hypotheses in the protective belt (in Benson, 2007a). For example, Benson (2007b) argues and finds that satisfaction/dissatisfaction is important not only for a relationship between a rising challenger and the dominant power (as explained in power transition theory), but also for non-major states. She finds that satisfication/dissatisfication does play a role in conflict between non-major states and related also to issues "short of war" (1, WP).

Swaminathan (1999) also extends the application of power transition theory by using it to examine when domestic democratic transitions occur in South America, and finds that fighting is most likely to occur between the government and the opposition when they are roughly at equal strength and when the opposition is least satisfied (188). Zagare (2007) examines power transition and argues for a unification with perfect deterrence theory. Toft (2007) extends power transition to shifts in ethnic group populations within a state and finds that as a "rising power" ethnic group approaches the "dominant power" ethnic group, conflict between the two is more likely.
Conclusion
Today, there are continued conversations about the role of power transition theory in explaining international relations. Amongst other international issues, power transition theory is applied to the rising power of China, and the relationship with the United States (Morrisey, 2010; Lai, 2011). However, this is not to say that there are no critiques of power transition theory. For example, Lebow & Valentino (2009) have argued that the European and international systems almost never have been characterized by hegemony. No state has achieved a position that allowed it for any extended period to order the international system to suit its interests at the expense of the other major powers."

In addition, they go on to say that "Power transitions are remarkably rare, they seldom occur as the result of differential rates of economic growth, and have most often occurred peacefully. Power transitions are more often the results of wars, rather than the causes of them. Wars between rising and dominant powers are infrequent and are not waged by either side primarily in the effort to defend or revise the international order in their favor. Finally, we find that war rarely resolves the fundamental conflicts of interest caused by power transitions" (389). Others, writing more recently, have also suggested that power transition theory is incorrect on calling conflict after changes in power between countries (Harris, 2014).

Power Transition Theory References

Benson, M. (2007). Extending the Bounds of Power Transition Theory. International Interactions, Vol. 33, No. 3, pages 211-215.

Danilovic, V. & Clare, J. (2008). Global Power Transitions and Regional Interests. International Interactions, Vol. 33, No. 3, pages 289-304.

Harris, P. (2014). Problems with Power Transition Theory: Beyond the Vanishing Disparities Thesis. Asian Security, Vol. 10, No. 3, pages 241-259.

Kugler, J. & Organski, A.F.K (1989). Chapter 7: The Power Transition: A Retrospective and Prospective Evaluation. Handbook of War Studies. Available Online: https://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~fczagare/PSC%20346/Kugler%20and%20Organski.pdf

Lai, D. (2011). The United States and China in Power Transition. U.S. Army War College. Strategic Studies Institute. December 2011, pages 1-265. Available Online: http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pdffiles/pub1093.pdf

Lebow, R.N. & Valentino, B. (2009). Lost in Transition: A Critical Analysis of Power Transition Theory. International Relations, 23, No. 3, pages 389-410.

Morrisey, E.L. (2010). Lessons from the Past: Power Transitions and the Future of U.S.-China Relations. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences of Georgetown University. Available Online: https://repository.library.georgetown.edu/bitstream/handle/10822/553544/morriseyEvan.pdf

Swaminathan, S. (1999). Time, Power, and Democratic Transitions. The Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 43, No. 2, The Democratic Transition Process, pages 178-191.

Toft, Monica Duffy. 2007. " Population Shifts and Civil War: A Test of Power Transition Theory ".

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Power Transition Theory In this article, we shall discuss power transition theory in international relations. We will discuss power transition theory in comparison to balance of power theory, discuss the main characteristics of the theory, and examine the contributions of power transition theory to understanding global issues. What is Power Transition Theory?

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It fires missiles that travel at 2km per second and can hit targets flying twice as fast. It can target 80 different enemy aircraft, drones and cruise missiles at the same time from 400km away, and spot stealth warplanes that previously evaded detection.

But arguably the most dangerous aspect of Russia's S-400 Triumph missile defence system is the damage it has inflicted on the clout of Washington's anti-Moscow sanctions programme, and concerted efforts by the US to isolate Russia from the rest of the world.

Despite sweeping sanctions against Russia's defence industry to shut down its lucrative exports and a ban on other countries buying the S-400 specifically, Russia is doing a roaring trade in what most experts consider the world's most advanced air defence system.

Over the past year, Turkey and India have signed deals to buy S-400s, China has received its first deliveries, and Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Iraq have begun negotiations over deals to acquire the sanctioned systems.

If the west's sanctions regime, first introduced in March 2014, was designed to cut off Moscow from the rest of the world and isolate its critical industries, the truck-mounted missile launchers are a $400m-a-piece example of how that effort has failed.

"There is no question about the isolation of Russia. Nobody is even talking about it," says Andrei Frolov, editor-in-chief of Russia's Arms Export journal. "There are major breakthroughs thanks to China and India . . . the message is that Russia is still open for business."

Since 2014 and Russia's annexation of Crimea, a sanctions regime led by the US and supported by the UK, EU and other western allies has sought to isolate Moscow by curbing its access to external finance, trade and diplomatic support in an effort to force a change in political approach from President Vladimir Putin's administration.

Initially targeting Russian politicians, the country's vast energy sector and military-industrial complex, the sanctions have become ever more targeted against individuals and businesses.

Allegations against Moscow of meddling in the 2016 US election, allowing the use of chemical weapons in Syria and carrying out the attempted murder of former spy Sergei Skripal in the UK this spring have resulted in harsher restrictions.

But if the measures were designed to make Moscow an international pariah, friendless and toxic, they are falling short of achieving their goal.

An ever-closer friendship with China has provided Moscow with international finance, new trade opportunities and diplomatic heft. Moscow has also deepened its ties with a host of countries in the Middle East, from Turkey to Israel, Saudi Arabia to Iran, expanding its influence in the region at a time of American hesitation.

At the same time, a steady stream of EU leaders visiting the Kremlin, foreign direct investment from European corporates and continued demand for Russia's oil and gas exports belie the rhetoric of belligerence from Brussels.

"Isolation is impossible, that is clear," says Andrei Bystritsky, chairman of the Valdai Discussion Club, a Russian think-tank. "It was possible, 30 years ago, in the Soviet times. Then there were just two blocs. But now there are so many options."

When it comes to Russian isolation, reality has not matched rhetoric. While major defence deals like the S-400 agreements have drawn the ire of Washington, all of the EU's biggest economies have quietly continued to do business with their eastern neighbour.

Berlin, a key supporter of sanctions related to the annexation of Crimea, steadfastly supports Nord Stream 2, a Russian gas pipeline being laid under the Baltic Sea that opponents say will only increase Moscow's influence over Europe's energy supplies.

French president Emmanuel Macron was Mr Putin's special guest at the annual St Petersburg Economic Forum earlier this year, telling his host: "Dear Vladimir . . . let us play a co-operative game." Total, the French energy group, bought a 10 per cent stake in Russia's $25.5bn Arctic LNG 2 project soon after, and last month opened a new oil blending plant close to Moscow.

The UK is one of the most hawkish towards Moscow, but British energy group BP is one of Russia's biggest foreign investors through its 19.75 per cent stake in Rosneft, the Kremlin-controlled oil company subject to sanctions.

"Look at Total, piling in as much as it can. Look at BP," says a senior executive at a major international energy company. "You cannot isolate a country as big and as important as Russia. It was never going to work."

At a conference in Verona last month, Italy's deputy prime minister Matteo Salvini told Russian delegates they were "peacemakers" and urged Italian companies to find ways around EU sanctions. "In 2018 we do not need sanctions, we do not need troops. We need dialogue, we need friendship," he said. "I want to thank Italian businessmen . . . for resisting, for taking up the initiative with this."

Western diplomats in Moscow privately admit that the sanctions have failed to achieve the impact many of their governments had desired.

Some blame the staggered implementation that has largely allowed Russia's $1.6tn economy to slowly adjust. Others argue that the recovery in oil and commodity prices since 2016 has provided the Kremlin with enough cash to offset the impact. But others claim that many countries have lacked the resolve to follow through with the measures, fearing damage to their own companies.

Germany's Daimler is building a factory close to Moscow that will start producing Mercedes-Benz E-Class sedans early next year. US aerospace giant Boeing opened a production plant in central Russia this summer to manufacture titanium components. Europe is buying more gas from Russia than at any time in history.

All the activity suggests that for company executives, Russia is too large and lucrative to let politics get in the way.

"There is something vitally important in the role of businessmen and policymakers continuing a dialogue," Bob Dudley, BP's chief executive, said at the Verona conference. "More and more there is a great importance that business plays in bringing the world closer. There are a lot of forces trying to push us apart."

Since sanctions were first imposed on Rosneft in 2014, BP's stake in the company has earned Rbs90.7bn ($1.3bn) in dividends, according to information on the Russian company's website. "It is very difficult to remain in business for a long time by taking sides . . . we try to build bridges," Mr Dudley added.

Compared with 2014, Rosneft has doubled the amount of oil it produces from joint projects with foreign companies to 1.4m barrels a day, thanks to partnerships with Norwegian, Vietnamese and Indian groups.

"I am convinced that the mutually beneficial win-win ties will continue to develop, while any further escalation of sanctions will ironically set limits for the US themselves," Rosneft's chief executive Igor Sechin, who is banned from entering the US, said in Verona.

The Kremlin has pushed heavily the line that Washington's use of international sanctions against Moscow will only force third countries to distance themselves from the US.

"It is pretty clear from where we sit that by trying to isolate Russia, America is doing a good job of isolating itself," says one Asian diplomat in Moscow who declined to be named. "Even the Europeans are developing their own independent Russia policy."

As western sanctions sought to close off Mr Putin's diplomatic options, he struck out aggressively in new directions.

Moscow's 2015 intervention in Syria to swing the war in favour of Bashar al-Assad's regime, alongside a strengthened trade and diplomatic outreach to Turkey and a warming of historic ties to Israel and Iran, has made Mr Putin a powerbroker in the Middle East.

But it is Russia's relationships with China and Saudi Arabia that have seen the most dramatic, and effective, changes in the sanctions era. Built on Mr Putin's personal friendships with China's president Xi Jinping and Saudi's crown prince Mohammed bin Salman, Russia has leaned on Riyadh and Beijing for more than just S-400 sales.

Boosted by new oil supply deals, agriculture and defence shipments, trade with China accounted for 15.5 per cent of Russia's total turnover last year, up from 10.6 per cent in 2013. At the same time, the EU's share fell from 49.6 per cent to 43.8 per cent.

In September, Mr Xi visited Mr Putin in the Russian city of Vladivostok, and over shots of vodka, caviar and handmade pancakes toasted a friendship that they said would stand against US protectionism. As the two leaders talked, their armies took part in joint military exercises involving 300,000 troops, the largest in Russia since 1981.

With Saudi Arabia, too, the S-400 deal has come as part of a wider diplomatic and trade push. Moscow and Riyadh joined forces in 2016 to regulate oil production and drive up crude prices.

Saudi Aramco, the kingdom's state oil producer, is keen to follow Total's lead and buy a 30 per cent stake in the same gas project, and is also in talks to set up a petrochemicals plant with Russian company Sibur.

When western governments and executives boycotted a conference in Riyadh last month over the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, Russia publicly backed Prince Mohammed and sent a large delegation to the event. It was rewarded with a deal for the kingdom's sovereign wealth fund to join a joint Russia-China development fund.

Some analysts see Russia's new friendships as window-dressing, and question whether they are the result of long-term strategy, or a desperate rush by the Kremlin to show the west that it still has friends.

One western diplomat in Moscow says that although historical distrust between Russia and China would mean the countries could never build a full geopolitical alliance, "it is an easy way for both of them to gain some small advantages from each other and have a pop at the US."

"It is a bit of both: pragmatism and strategy," says Arkady Dvorkovich, Russia's deputy prime minister until May this year, when asked about Moscow's relationship with China. "It obviously makes sense at the moment for Russia given the western context but also in a long-term sense this is a relationship that we want to keep building for the future. They are the world's most important growth market."

The pivot away from the west does not sit well with all of Russia's elite.

Sanctions are slowly cutting off some of Russia's clique of billionaire oligarchs from access to western countries and their banks, lawyers, schools and hospitals that have become part of their lifestyles. Three sanctioned businessmen have been banned from the elite World Economic Forum in Davos next January. Replacing the cachet and glamour of London is not easy.

"The new partnerships are all well and good, but frankly the elite here are more comfortable in the south of France, not on some island in the South China Sea," says one sanctioned Russian businessman. "A new world order is obviously better than the current one. But no one here is a big fan of the Chinese life."

Regardless of their impact, western sanctions will probably continue for the medium term at least. The Democratic party's victory in the House of Representatives last week has increased the chance of passing draft legislation imposing more restrictions on Russian banks and sovereign debt.

Few expect that talks between Mr Putin and US president Donald Trump in Paris on Sunday and in Buenos Aires at the G20 summit later this month will ease the pressure on Russia. "In Soviet times, after a meeting of the two leaders the situation always got better. Today it is the opposite," says Mr Bystritsky. "In the next one or two years the situation will get worse and worse, I think."

Washington in September imposed sanctions on China's military for the S-400 purchases, prompting a fierce rebuke from Beijing. It also warned India, Saudi Arabia and Turkey that they too could face consequences for buying the systems.

Undeterred, Indian prime minister Narendra Modi welcomed Mr Putin in New Delhi last month with a hug, and the $5bn deal was signed.

"We will continue to closely follow the trends of the global arms market, and to offer our partners new flexible, convenient forms of co-operation," Mr Putin told a meeting of his commission on foreign arms sales.

He added: "This is all the more important in the current conditions, when our competitors often resort to unscrupulous methods of struggle: they try to crush and blackmail our customers, including through the use of political sanctions."

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Russian sanctions: why 'isolation is impossible'

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It fires missiles that travel at 2km per second and can hit targets flying twice as fast. It can target 80 different enemy aircraft, drones and cruise missiles at the same time from 400km away, and spot stealth warplanes that previously evaded detection.

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Theresa May's defeat on her Brexit deal - losing by 230 votes - has made history as the biggest ever government defeat on the floor of the House of Commons.

It easily beats the previous record of 166 votes, which was set in 1924 by the minority Labour government of Ramsay MacDonald, which was defeated over his decision to drop criminal proceedings against the editor of the Communist newspaper Workers Weekly.

Mr MacDonald declared the issue a matter of confidence - and, having lost the vote, obtained a dissolution of Parliament the following day. This led to a general election that his party lost.

The result of the vote on Ms May's deal, leaves the prime minister facing a vote of no confidence, also sets a new record for the largest rebellion in modern times by Conservative members of parliament.

The 118 Tory MPs who voted against the EU withdrawal agreement breaks the previous record of 95. This was the number who rebelled against John Major in 1997 and voted against gun controls introduced in response to the Dunblane shooting.

Ms May's defeat came close to breaking another record: the largest rebellion in modern British politics by MPs of a single party.

The 118 Conservatives who voted against Ms May's deal was 21 short of the largest ever revolt, which took place in March 2003 when 139 Labour MPs defied prime minister Tony Blair and voted against war in Iraq.

This remains the greatest revolt by MPs of any party since the repeal of the Corn Laws in the 1840s.

Following the minority government defeats of 1924, the next largest government defeat took place in March 1979, in the last few weeks of the Labour government led by Jim Callaghan. MPs voted by 115 to 26 on a motion to annul the fees for a firearms certificate - a defeat of 89 votes, although the number of MPs taking part in the vote was low.

Mr Callaghan's government also suffered a defeat of 86 votes on January 1978, when MPs voted by 204 to 118 on an opposition amendment to the Scotland Devolution Bill, which excluded Orkney and Shetland from the provisions of the Bill if the islands voted "no" in a referendum.

Government defeats since 1979 have tended to occur by much smaller margins, though no prime minister - even with a landslide majority in the Commons - has escaped without at least one loss.

In April 1986 the Conservative government of Margaret Thatcher suffered a rare defeat over its plans to relax laws on Sunday trading in England and Wales. On the second reading of the Shops Bill, MPs voted against by 296 to 282 - a government defeat of 14.

More recently, the Labour government of Tony Blair was defeated in November 2005 on its proposal to allow police to detain terror suspects for up to 90 days without charge.

MPs voted against by 322 votes to 291 - a government defeat of 31. It was a small defeat but a symbolic one, as it was Mr Blair's first House of Commons defeat since becoming prime minister eight years earlier in 1997.
Additional reporting by Press Association

The Independent has launched its #FinalSay campaign to demand that voters are given a voice on the final Brexit deal.

Sign our petition here

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Theresa May's Brexit defeat makes history as biggest ever government loss in Commons

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Theresa May's defeat on her Brexit deal - losing by 230 votes - has made history as the biggest ever government defeat on the floor of the House of Commons.

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John Bercow broke a tie in the House of Commons tonight on a procedural vote MPs voted 310-310 on holding more votes on Brexit alternatives on Monday Speaker ruled against the proposal as he used his casting vote for the first time No Speaker has broken a tie in the Commons since 1993 - and that was cancelled John Bercow broke a tie to rule against holding a third round of Brexit alternative votes on Monday tonight.

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In addition to their floor debates, a crucial role of legislatures is to scrutinise government law-making and policy implementation. The House of Commons looks at legislation via bill committees, and its select committees cover each of the Whitehall departments to scrutinise implementation. As part of the 2018 Audit of UK Democracy, Patrick Dunleavy and the Democratic Audit team consider how well current processes maintain parliamentary knowledge and scrutiny of the central state in the UK and England.
Picture: Parliament UK, via a (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0) licence
Figure 1: Key characteristics of the 26 select committee chairs in July 2017

What does democracy require for how the national legislature monitors, understands, publicises and questions the policies that national government develops?

The elected legislature should normally maintain full public control of government services and state operations, ensuring public and parliamentary accountability through conditionally supporting the government, and articulating reasoned opposition, via its proceedings.

The House of Commons should be a critically important focus of national political debate, articulating 'public opinion' in ways that provide useful guidance to the government in making specific and often complex policy choices.

Individually and collectively legislators should seek to uncover and publicise issues of public concern and citizens' grievances, giving effective representation both to majority and minority views, and showing a consensus regard for the public interest.

In the preparation of new laws, the legislature should supervise government consultations and help to ensure effective pre-legislative scrutiny.

In considering legislation, Parliament should undertake close scrutiny in a climate of effective deliberation, seeking to identify and maximise a national consensus where feasible.

Legislators should regularly and influentially scrutinise the current implementation of policies, and audit the efficiency and effectiveness of government services and policy delivery.

The House of Commons is one of the oldest and foremost legislatures in the world - yet in the past it was also a byword amongst political scientists for weak legislative control of government. Some recent political science work has painted a more active picture of MPs' influence. Beyond the floor debates in the main Commons chamber - and the rowdy weekly showcase of Prime Minister's Question Time - the House of Commons also does a lot of detailed work in committees holding the government to account. (The Lords have their own, smaller and much less influential group of select committees, but our focus in this article is solely on the work of the democratically elected Commons.)

Recent developments

The House of Commons' select committee system shadows the work of every civil service department and has grown in influence over time. In the past, the issue of reconstituting committees after a general election has sometimes been delayed, and until 2010 the party whips in the Commons 'fixed' who would chair which committee. Following the 'Wright' reforms made after 2009, however, committee chairs can be elected by MPs, if there are multiple candidates. Figure 1 shows that only nine contests were held for the 26 chair positions in July 2017. However, this low number reflects the fact that many influential and well-liked chairs continued unchallenged from the 2015-17 parliament.

Source: From data in HC Speaker, 2017

Figure 1 also shows that half of the chairs have ministerial experience, with nine having earlier been cabinet ministers or shadow cabinet spokespersons - showing the increasing salience of these chairing roles (which also attract a salary addition for the MPs involved). There are 18 single-department committees, five that handle internal parliamentary issues, and three cross-cutting committees, of which the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) is best known. The distribution of chairs broadly follows the proportion of MPs belonging to each party. After the 2016 EU referendum the Department for Exiting the EU Committee, chaired by Labour's Hilary Benn, was set up to scrutinise the work of the new DExEU, and similarly the International Trade Committee supervises the new Whitehall department DIT.

Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats (SWOT) analysis

Current strengths

Current weaknesses

The select committee system now provides one committee scrutinising each Whitehall department's executive actions and implementation processes in detail. Select committee members build up worthwhile expertise in that area and a more effective 'corporate' spirit than in the past. Attendance at committee sessions has increased and there is more of a premium on effective engagement by members.

Select committees only work effectively when they operate in a bipartisan manner, with MPs from different sides of the committee endorsing the same report. Creating this 'corporate' spirit is difficult and biases the topics that committee chairs investigate, because they are anxious to secure wide agreement. As a result, critical issues dividing the parties may not be examined as being 'too difficult'. Sometimes committees will take on an issue wanted by party A, but only so long party B also gets its favourite issue tackled. These cases rarely work well.

Select committee chairs are now paid a worthwhile salary increment and attract a good deal of media attention. So this role has grown in salience. It increasingly attracts serious ex-ministers and genuinely expert and less-partisan backbenchers, who can command regular engagement from their committee members.

Both departmental and bill committees mostly operate by calling 'witnesses' to give evidence, and taking written evidence from relevant or involved bodies. This is a weak and old-fashioned form of information gathering. It produces a lot of claim and counter-claim that committees do not have the staff or expertise to critically or objectively assess - except in a vague, judgement-of-plausibility manner.

Since mid-2007 select committees have had the capability to review major ministerial appointments of people to head quasi-government agencies. These pre-appointment hearings now help shape how ministers and top officials make these appointments. Out of a set of 59 hearings to 2017, appointments have divided committees or been rejected 13 times. Some very serious government jobs have been involved. MPs on the Education Committee initially rejected the government's proposed head of Ofsted (which monitors schools' quality) after a lacklustre performance at their hearing. And a candidate for Bank of England Deputy Governor resigned in 2017 after the Treasury Select Committee criticised incomplete answers that she had given them.

There is strong evidence of a past lack of diversity in who is invited to give evidence (see below), partly reflecting biases in who sits on committees. Women MPs have been severely under-represented on some committees, especially Defence and Foreign Affairs whose members were 93% male from 1979 to 2017. Women MPs are most prominent on the health and education committees.

The support staff for chairs and committee members has increased somewhat. And in response to criticisms of a lack of witness diversity, select committees staff and chairs have recently been more proactive about soliciting evidence from people who might not normally volunteer as witnesses.

Select committees' powers to compel witnesses to appear and to tell the truth seem weak and undefined. Senior civil servants have to appear before select committees, but ministers may refuse. The committees can invite outsiders to appear, and they might be in contempt of Parliament if they fail to show up. Witnesses have to answer questions but can claim not to know or have information with impunity. Some corporate sector witnesses have made plain their unwillingness to be frank, without much come-back.

The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) benefits from research by the National Audit Office's 800 professional staff in 60 'value for money' (VFM) reports per year. (NAO is the leading parliamentary agency, providing an independent check for MPs that monies votes to the government were spent for the correct purposes and in an effective manner.) PAC hearings and final reports regularly attract media attention in addition to the NAO reports themselves.

Many PAC reports currently concern only single-department subjects, and could more helpfully be processed by the relevant departmental select committees. These other committees could also benefit greatly from gaining access to the NAO staff and expertise to boost their information-generating capabilities. But at present PAC 'exclusivism' has prevented most select committees from gaining any NAO assistance, except for a few cases.

The PAC Chair is always a senior opposition figure, and plays a significant role in giving some 'parliamentary' overview of secret spending and defence areas, signing off on some key mega-projects for instance.

Funnelling all the post hoc financial scrutiny of public spending through only one committee (PAC) wastes much of the work of the National Audit Office (NAO) in scrutinising the civil service. PAC's agenda is a crammed one, so that time devoted to cross-Whitehall issues is regularly squeezed by the pressure of single department reports, sometimes quite minor in scale. PAC members are necessarily generalists in terms of processing a random stream of reports across different departments, although they do develop experience of Whitehall spending and control processes. The NAO also produces around 10-15 VFM reports per year that are never reviewed by any parliamentary committee because of capacity limits in the PAC.

Some political scientists (like Louise Thompson) have called for a re-evaluation of the dominant views of bill committees (also called legislative committees). She found that around three-fifths of bill committee members have relevant specialist expertise and she argues that some committee sessions achieve impressive levels of deliberative quality.

Many critics see scrutiny of legislation via partisan whipped bill committees (with many inexpert MPs just voting a party line) as always ritualistic, ineffective and normally of very little value. Government whips can completely dominate proceedings, with the committee majority accepting only government amendments. Many (two or more out of five) members are still just 'cannon fodder' attendees, primed to vote the party line, whatever problems emerge in discussion.

The separation of bill committees from select committees is unhelpful and reduces the ability to have legislation reviewed by genuinely expert MPs. The deliberative quality of legislative committee sessions has also been seen as low, reaching a nadir when the timetabling for bills gets under pressure (as it often does).

'Revisionists' have also defended bill committees as showing up the 'viscosity' of different measures - they alert ministers about where changes are needed, even if the changes involved are always those proposed by ministers.

Bill committees have been widely seen as ineffective in securing effective scrutiny. Only half of 1% of accepted amendments in and after the committee stage are from the opposition. Even Thompson finds that the vast bulk (84%) of changes made are still government ones. (11% are also changes to regulations or guidance for bills made by departments.)

Parliament has no separate procedures for considering major government projects in technical or expert consideration ways before money is spent on them - contributing to what critics see as the prevalence of 'policy disasters' in the UK.

All NAO and PAC scrutiny activities occur 'after the fact', and so are limited to a post hoc audit role. The NAO claims to save £9 for every £1 that it spends, but PAC plays no prospective or policy-warning role on decisions. Small amounts of NAO advice go to other select committees, for example, checking the economic growth estimates included in the Chancellor's annual public spending statements.

Future opportunities

Future threats

The return of a hung parliament in June 2017, just two years after the earlier 2010-15 period, may once more encourage MPs to be more assertive towards the executive on more issues - especially those that can command cross-party agreement on improving specific policies - as occurred in 2017-18 over a troubled social welfare reform, Universal Credit.

The Brexit process is likely to involve extensive use of statutory instruments, over which parliamentary surveillance has generally been weak.

Proposals for incremental reforms, such as allowing the NAO to advise departmental select committees more, and for MPs there to discuss more single department VFM studies in their area, could bring worthwhile improvements quickly, increasing the expertise available to select committees.

Reports on single department and smaller spending issues could be run through other select committees. The PAC could then focus more effectively on cross-departmental, inter-governmental and major spending areas. However, radical proposals such as these, or even their more moderate versions (see opposite), seem unlikely to be adopted, with select committees still locked into obsolescent and high cost ways of calling 'witnesses'.

Bill committees

During the legislative process, most bills are sent to a committee stage when a group of at least 11 MPs consider the proposed Act, clause-by-clause in detail. Of course, the ministers attending come from the department involved and are matched by the shadow cabinet frontbenchers that parallel them, and this brings a certain degree of different expertise to each discussion. But many of the remaining MPs are just those deputed by the party whips to serve on each committee. Each committee handles a varied stream of legislation in which the 'ordinary' members may have little expertise. There are generally six legislative committees operating in tandem.

Critics have historically argued that the committees have no real purpose beyond being a kind of 'mini-me' image of the Commons as whole, always dominated by a government majority and chair. Over 99% of ministerial amendments moved at the committee or report stages succeed, while the success rate for non-government amendments is below 1%. Opposition amendments almost never succeed, despite the fuss made by some authors about the greater incidence of backbench rebellions. Most MPs vote with the party line almost all the time, in committee as much as on the House floor. Partisan timetabling considerations also shape how 'line by line' any scrutiny is, with guillotines often invoked. And Berry notes that 'sometimes whole sections of bills pass through committees without scrutiny'.

Some recent authors have argued for a more optimistic picture. Russell and Cowley reported on a systematic examination of over 4,360 amendments on six bills, which at one level replicated the picture above. However:

'closer examination found that nearly three-quarters of government amendments had little policy substance - being purely technical, clarificatory, or "consequential" on other amendments. Of those government amendments with substance that actually changed any of the bills, over 60% - 117 in total - were traceable to influence from nongovernment parliamentarians, usually through prior amendments withdrawn when ministers promised to reconsider. In most cases, there was no [government] defeat involved, but some changes were substantial'.

Similarly Thompson 's 2015 study argued that:
Figure 2: There was a substantial increase in press coverage of House of Commons Committees, 2008-12 Source: Dunleavy and Muir, 2013. Analysis of Lexis-Nexis press database.

'bill committees are the perfect conduit for changes to government bills. They enable ministers to effectively be lobbied by MPs. They are both the breeding ground for amendments to legislation and a platform for allowing policy issues which have already been aired by MPs through other parliamentary tools to be tagged on to a bill, making policy change more likely.' (p.89).

These arguments suggest that the committee and report stages of legislation can increase the 'viscosity' of different measures, pointing ministers and officials towards fixing the most egregiously damaging of their initial provisions. However, this remains an exceptionally modest role, and one that falls well below the rationale of careful deliberative debate and consideration that other legislatures in Europe can claim.
Figure 3: Trends in the UK press mentions of Commons' select committees, 2008-12
The increasing salience of select committees
Notes: We searched across years in a standard grid, so committees may not exist in all years covered.
Much of government uses executive capabilities and administrative discretion to deliver services, make regulations or undertake interventions in particular ways. From its foundation in 1979, the select committee system has provided an ever more influential mechanism for 'shadowing' each department and bringing legislators' views to bear. Having MPs elect committee chairs, and paying them extra salary, has especially helped them to evolve into better independent forces for policy scrutiny. Their records of influential hearings and reports have grown their media and public profiles. Especially under the coalition government (2010-15), select committees became important venues for discussing controversial issues. Figure 2 show that press mentions of Commons committees in the UK press broadly tripled from 2008 to 2012 in terms of both total press mentions and the average (mean) for committee mentions.

Figure 3 below provides a detailed view of which committees became more salient in this period, and which did not. The pink rows show that much of the total increase in mentions in this period took place in four exceptionally prominent committees:

The Public Accounts Committee (see the SWOT analysis above). At this time it had a dynamic new chair in Margaret Hodge MP.

The Home Affairs Select Committee, already the second-most important committee in 2008. Its press mentions increased sharply in 2011 and 2013, following the summer riots in London and the Committee's inquiries into them.

The Treasury Select Committee was another already important committee in 2008 under the Conservative chair Andrew Tyrie. In 2017, the former Tory cabinet minister Nicky Morgan won election as chair, quickly assuming a pro-active approach.

The Culture, Media and Sport committee. Its prominence at this period grew greatly during the phone-hacking scandal over media behaviour. Both Rupert and James Murdoch were called to give evidence on the scandal in 2011, attracting global media coverage. This interest continued during the subsequent Leveson Inquiry process.

Source: Dunleavy and Muir, 2013. Analysis of Lexis-Nexis press database.
Figure 4: How recommendations from seven select committees were implemented by the government, or not (1997- 2010)
The green rows in Figure 3 also show that seven other Commons committees enjoyed a consistent growth of press coverage in this period. Overall, 14 committees more than doubled their press mentions between 2008 and 2012. A further four saw smaller increases, while seven committees received less coverage.

More recently select committees have moved into other controversial areas, with the Work and Pensions and the Business committees both summoning Sir Philip Green to attend a hearing in June 2016 to answer questions over the collapse of BHS with hundreds of millions of pounds apparently missing from the pensions fund.

Yet were select committees just more attractive 'talking shops' for the media? Or have their deliberations and especially their recommendations had substantial effects on policy? The grounds for thinking they have start with their selection of issues to cover, which has tended to become topical and substantial over time.

One innovative study collated many thousands of recommendations to government made by seven select committees over a long period, and then set out to chart how many of these were recommended, and how many were subsequently acted upon. Figure 4 shows the key results for implementation of a large set of over 1,330 recommendations that could be tracked. The authors concluded with a strikingly benign assessment: 'Numerous committee recommendations are implemented by government, including many for major policy change'.

Source: Computed from Benton and Russell, 2013, Table 1. The committees covered were those for BIS, Defence, Foreign Affairs, Health, Home Affairs, Public Administration (PAC) and Treasury. The period covered was the Blair and Brown governments.

However, Figure 4 shows that this is a highly 'stretched' interpretation of the actual findings. The numbers in orange cells show that one in five (20%) of the trackable committee recommendations were both 'medium' or 'large scale' in their impacts, and also implemented by government. But one in six recommendations (15%) (in the green shaded cells) were at the same scale and were clearly rejected by government (while in a further one in seven cases implementation was unclear). Large-scale changes accepted by minister in fact formed only 2% of recommendations (the dark orange cells), whereas those rejected at this scale were 3%.

Of course, our interpretation here excludes the top row in Figure 4 covering 'no change' or small change recommendations from committees. MPs and Commons officials will freely admit that there is an accepted art of writing 'chaff' committee recommendations, which suggest to ministers or officials that they should do something small that they already want to do anyway. This tactic allows the committee to look friendly and 'on the same page' as the executive. And it fosters government MPs supporting reports that make criticisms elsewhere, since ministers can agree to the easy bits. So although the top row in Figure 4 shows another 23 to 29% of minor recommendations being implemented (versus only 3% not acted on), these cases probably are 'chaff', and so ought to be set aside.
Figure 5: The main actors who gave evidence to Westminster legislative and select committee in the period 2010-11
Nevertheless, although committees' hit rate for acceptance and implementation of recommendation is perhaps far less than some over-enthusiastic accounts suggest, it is still a pretty creditable record. Select committees remain one of only two areas where the Commons is clearly contributing to detailed policy-making.
Figure 6: The organisational affiliations of oral witnesses to all select committees, 2013-14 session
Who does Parliament ask for their views?
Figure 7: The organisational affiliations of 120 expert witnesses to select committees, Source: Berry and Kippin, 2014, Figure 4. Notes: Data covers 120 expert witnesses giving oral evidence to select committees in October-November 2013. Percentages of N = 541. in two months, autumn 2013
Because Westminster relies so heavily on calling witnesses as a way of bring in outside knowledge to the scrutiny of legislation and of policy implementation it matters a lot who submits evidence. Academic research shown in Figure 5 found that most submissions came from interest groups, individuals and private companies - and that surprisingly only one in 16 submissions came from 'experts' and slightly less from think tanks.

However, witnesses who give oral evidence in person before committees, and hence can be questioned by committee members, are generally those judged more important or more knowledgeable by chairs (and their clerks). A study of all witnesses who gave evidence to select committees only in the 2013-14 session of parliament showed that civil servants and public-sector agencies were the biggest group (see Figure 6). A further one in eight witnesses were ministers or parliamentarians, so that almost half of those appearing were from Whitehall and surrounds, as one might expect. The civil society sources for witnesses were NGOs, think tanks and interest groups, and then private sector companies and trade associations, with academics from higher education third.

Notes: Data on oral and written evidence collected from the UK Parliament's website, August 1, 2010 to July 31, 2011. Percentages of N = 8431.

Source: Re-calculated from Geddes, 2018

Notes: We have moved trade associations into the 'private sector' category here, and out of the 'NGOs and think-tanks' category.

A broadly similar picture is also given by a Democratic Audit study of nearly 600 witnesses who appeared before 153 hearings in autumn 2013. That analysis also looked in depth at the make-up of 120 'expert' witnesses, whose role may be especially helpful for MPs in uncovering well-founded (rather than partisan) evidence. Figure 7 shows that academics were exceptionally prominent (accounting for nearly half of all expert witnesses in person), plus think tanks and trade associations.

A more disturbing finding of both the 2013-14 studies was that in this period around 75% of witnesses going to committees were men. Some committees like PAC heard from nine men for every woman appearing. Following on from their research in 2014, the Democratic Audit staff involved met with committee clerks, and Parliament later took some remedial actions to seek greater diversity amongst witnesses.
Patrick Dunleavy is Professor of Political Science and Public Policy at the LSE and codirector of Democratic Audit there. He is also Centenary Professor in the Institute for Governance and Policy Analysis (IGPA), University of Canberra.
Legislative supervision of UK government spending

In international terms the UK has a strong system of post hoc scrutiny of government spending achieved by the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), acting on the reports of the independent National Audit Office, the UK's 'supreme audit institution' (or SAI). The NAO is perhaps the second most powerful SAI in the liberal democratic world (after the Government Accountability Office in the USA). With a constant flow of high-quality reports to consider, the PAC is a powerful committee, and is always chaired by a leading opposition MP, usually with past ministerial experience. For permanent secretaries attending PAC hearings is a stressful experience requiring a lot of preparation.

Yet it is easy to exaggerate the PAC/NAO influence. In a recent five-year period NAO staff accounted for one-third of witnesses to the PAC, and HM Treasury personnel for another 30%. Only seven ministerial departments or major agencies had more than four witnesses a year (Health, Defence, Defra, HMRC, Education, the Home Office and DWP), and another six had over one. Eight departments had one or none per year. In this period, the NAO issued 40 VFM studies that tackled cross-government issues (like digital change in government services, or environmental issues). But the PAC held hearings on only half of these (see Figure 13 in this source). MPs preferred to devote their time to the more easily media-understandable (and more frequently scandalous) reports on single departments. Just officially detailing already well-known cost over-runs and obvious mistakes made by Whitehall (known by senior civil servants as 'bayoneting the wounded') has typically earned the PAC chair more headlines than engaging with more difficult task of fostering sustainable improvements in policy delivery systems.

More generally MPs' stress on ex post scrutiny reflects the fact that they have almost no ex ante influence over budgeting in the UK. Very strong party discipline explains some of this, but a lot stems from restrictions in the House of Commons standing orders. These prohibit any ordinary MP from proposing any amendment to adding even £1 extra on to public spending, unless they can provide the Commons clerks with a certificate signed by a minister - which of course, is never supplied. This blanket ban has spread from the UK to other Westminster system countries and to France and Ireland. It largely explains why Joachim Wehner's comparative index assigns the UK fifth to bottom place in a league table of legislatures' influence over public spending across 30 liberal democracies.

Conclusions

Where once Parliament lurked almost completely impotently on the sidelines of policy-making, recent research has 'talked up' MPs' collective influence, with some justification in recent hung parliaments. Yet the Commons is still far from having the 'full spectrum' policy influence, genuine deliberation or decisive voice that democratic criteria suggest are needed. Party loyalties greatly inhibit public criticisms and undermine evidence-based reasoning about policies. Consideration of budgets before money gets spent is largely a joke. And legacy procedural practices, plus MPs' traditionalist attachment to inefficient and ineffective ways of working (like the witness system for select committees, instead of developing proper investigative staffs), have limited the legislature's role, despite some positive recent developments.

Similar Posts

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How effective are the Commons' two committee systems at scrutinising government policy-making?

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In addition to their floor debates, a crucial role of legislatures is to scrutinise government law-making and policy implementation. The House of Commons looks at legislation via bill committees, and its select committees cover each of the Whitehall departments to scrutinise implementation.

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AQA Component 1: The structure and role of Parliament: the work of committees Background: what you need to know
Make sure you are aware of the issue which this report has investigated - alleged Russian interference in British politics, notably in the 2016 EU referendum and the 2017 general election. You also need to be familiar with the system of select committees of the UK parliament, of which the Intelligence and Security Committee is one.

Using:

Johnson accused of sitting on Russian 'interference' report

Read the article cited above.

Explain in your own words why the prime minister's decision to block publication of the Intelligence and Security Committee's Russia report generated so much anger and suspicion?

Then answer one of these questions, depending on which exam board specification you are studying:

Question in the style of Edexcel Politics A-level: Paper 2

Evaluate the view that parliamentary select committees are an effective means of holding governments to account. In your answer you should draw on relevant knowledge and understanding of the study of Component 1: UK politics and core political ideas. You must consider this view and the alternative to this view in a balanced way. [30 marks]

Question in the style of AQA Politics A-level: Paper 1

'Parliamentary select committees are an effective means of holding governments to account.' Analyse and evaluate this statement. [25 marks] TIP: You should look at the example of the Intelligence and Security Committee's Russia report, considering both its ability to investigate an important issue, taking evidence from a wide variety of sources, and the ability of the prime minister to prevent its findings being made public. You should also look for other examples of action by select committees, both effective and ineffective, and use them to illustrate a balanced argument.

Mark Rathbone

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School politics: Johnson accused of sitting on Russian interference report

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AQA Component 1: The structure and role of Parliament: the work of committees Background: what you need to know Make sure you are aware of the issue which this report has investigated - alleged Russian interference in British politics, notably in the 2016 EU referendum and the 2017 general election.

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The lack of agreement at the 2nd DPRK-US Summit in Hanoi highlights the necessity of an alternative approach; particularly one which ensures that the DPRK continues to engage the regional and international community. There is potential for ASEAN, as the key multilateral platform in post-Cold War Asia Pacific, to play a bigger role towards this end.

By Shawn Ho and Sarah Teo

With the lack of agreement between US President Donald Trump and North Korea's (DPRK) Chairman Kim Jong Un at the 2nd DPRK-US Summit in Hanoi in February this year, summit diplomacy appears to have hit a wall. Following the Hanoi Summit, many questions have been raised about the future of denuclearisation negotiations between the two countries. A related and longer term question would be whether the DPRK can eventually integrate into the regional architecture.

Such a question would, inevitably, bring ASEAN - the primary multilateral platform in the post-Cold War Asia Pacific - into the picture. Given that both President Trump and Chairman Kim seem unwilling to budge from their current public demands of each other in the denuclearisation negotiations, it would be timely to consider alternative avenues in approaching the stalemate. As an organisation that has historically prided itself on its neutrality and centrality in the region, ASEAN could utilise this opportunity to enhance its convenor profile by doing more to bring the DPRK into its regional multilateral fold.

Roadmap for ASEAN's Strategy

There are a few occasions in the near future which ASEAN could utilise. First is the ASEAN-Korea Commemorative Summit at the end of this year in Korea involving South Korea's (ROK) President Moon Jae-in and leaders of the 10 ASEAN member states. This Summit is meant to commemorate the 30th Anniversary of ASEAN-ROK Dialogue Relations. As Indonesian President Joko Widodo had suggested last November at the ASEAN-ROK Summit in Singapore, South Korea could invite Chairman Kim to this ASEAN-Korea Commemorative Summit later this year.

The hope is that this would deepen Pyongyang's participation with the regional multilateral architecture, beyond its current participation in the ASEAN Regional Forum, and convince Chairman Kim that further engagement with the international community is the path towards ensuring the DPRK's security and economic growth.

This would also tie in with President Moon's proposal for Chairman Kim to visit Seoul, in what would be a first for a DPRK leader. President Moon is committed to making sure that this visit materialises as soon as possible, as agreed upon during the previous Inter-Korean Summit in Pyongyang last year.

The ASEAN-Korea Commemorative Summit could provide further incentive for Chairman Kim to visit Seoul as he will be able to meet all 10 ASEAN leaders and President Moon in one trip. It is also worth pointing out that this would be Chairman Kim's first ever multilateral summit if he attends it.

Setting the Stage

As a lead-up to this ASEAN-Korea Commemorative Summit and to reignite the momentum for dialogue between the DPRK and the US, the upcoming Shangri-la Dialogue in Singapore in May/June and the ASEAN Regional Forum in Bangkok in July/August could provide two occasions to persuade the DPRK to continue on the path of dialogue and negotiations.

At these two high-level multilateral settings, there will be ample opportunity for various countries in the region and beyond to engage ministerial-level representatives from the DPRK should the latter decide to participate in these meetings.

Moreover, should positive circumstances for dialogue endure, a 3rd DPRK-US summit could be held in early 2020. Potential venues could be the ASEAN Secretariat in Jakarta, or again in Hanoi (given that Vietnam will be the ASEAN Chair next year).

Either of these possibilities would be beneficial to ASEAN's quest to remain central in the regional architecture and reinforce its relevance to its Dialogue Partners such as the US, China, ROK, Japan and Russia. All of these Dialogue Partners share common interests in getting the DPRK to implement its complete denuclearisation plans.

For ASEAN to play a bigger role in facilitating the DPRK's integration into the regional architecture, it could also consider reviving the "Friends of the Chair" initiative. Originally proposed in the early 2000s, the initiative calls for selected regional countries, together with the ASEAN Chair, to take the lead in addressing the Korean Peninsular challenge. This could help ensure some consistency in the region's approach, as well as across different ASEAN chairmanships, towards engaging the DPRK.

Challenges and Opportunities

There is no doubt that the regional climate today is much better than two years ago, when major conflict on the Korean Peninsula appeared imminent. However, this window of opportunity to achieve significant progress in the Korean Peninsula is narrowing. With campaigning for the next US presidential election already starting, President Trump's focus is likely to shift away from foreign policy issues to more domestic priorities.

An alternative approach is urgently required, specifically one in which the DPRK is encouraged to engage in multilateral regional summit diplomacy via the ASEAN platform. The aim is to persuade Chairman Kim that regional countries in this region stand ready to assist him in any way to help him develop his economy should he denuclearise completely.

The peace dividends from an eventual denuclearised Korean Peninsula, normalised bilateral relations between the DPRK and the US, and permanent peace on the Korean Peninsula, would be enormous not just for the East Asian region but the world.

Dialogue remains the only workable option towards resolving the multiple complex issues on the Korean Peninsula. In this regard, a multilateral summit meeting between the two Korean leaders and 10 ASEAN leaders in the ROK at the end of 2019 could go down in history as the turning point that led to the eventual resolution of one of Asia's longest standing flashpoints.
*Shawn Ho and Sarah Teo are Associate Research Fellows with the Regional Security Architecture Programme, S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Nanyang Technological University (NTU), Singapore.

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Reimagining DPRK Summit Diplomacy: Can ASEAN Play A Bigger Role? - Analysis

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The lack of agreement at the 2nd DPRK-US Summit in Hanoi highlights the necessity of an alternative approach; particularly one which ensures that the DPRK continues to engage the regional and international community. There is potential for ASEAN, as the key multilateral platform in post-Cold War Asia Pacific, to play a bigger role towards this end.

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WHEN the United States of America withdrew from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) in 2017, the remaining signatories were led steadfastly by Japan to agree on a revised TPP, the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). The CPTPP now has 11 members, including some members of Asean. The successful pact has encouraged South Korea, other members of Asean and even the United Kingdom (which is facing a "No-deal Brexit) to consider joining CPTPP.

Another major milestone was reached when the Japan-European Union Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) launched by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe came into effect on Feb 1, 2019.

The Japanese government estimates that CPTPP and Japan-European Union EPA will contribute 750,000 jobs and add US$7.8 billion and US$5.2 billion respectively to the Japanese economy. Benefits to Japanese consumers include cheaper imported beef, wine and chocolate.

Looking beyond the positive domestic economic impacts of such initiatives by Mr Abe, we argue that these new initiatives will more crucially lead to significant enhancement of Japanese soft power on the international stage.

Japanese and regional interests can be better served through Japan's contribution in at least five mutually beneficial areas. This can be done by addressing challenges on free trade, pushing for further globalisation with quality economic growth and engaging in connectivity through increasing regional economic integration.

First, Japan is poised to lead necessary and urgent reforms within the World Trade Organization (WTO). Reforms include further strengthening the existing WTO mechanisms on trade and services such as transparency, reporting obligations, dispute settlements, special differential treatment against industrial policies, addressing infringements and enforcement on violation of intellectual property rights; the last-mentioned is a concern vigorously expressed by WTO members from western economies.

Moreover, it is paramount and timely that Japan revisit overdue agendas on discriminatory measures such as tariffs, non-trade barriers, and re-examine non-discriminatory measures such as regulation standards, services and digital trade.

Second, as China continues to expand its robust economic reach to global markets, Japan - with its tradition of market economy in terms of investment and financing, better overseas track record on environmental sustainability, sound corporate governance and transparency - can foster healthy competition between herself and China.

As of 2017, European Union was the top contributor of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) to Asean (18.3 per cent or US$25 billion), followed by Japan (9.9 per cent or US$13.4 billion), China (8.4 per cent or US$11.4 billion) and USA (3.2 per cent or US$4.3 billion).

Japanese multinational corporations had a big and strong presence in Asean during the 1980s and 1990s, generating employment and providing excellent on-the-job training. Japan also used to be the top FDI contributor, but this has no longer been the case since 2000.

Japan was also Asean's top trade partner, but has since slipped to fourth position. A strategic return of Japan to Asean could reduce Japan's over-reliance on production bases and markets in mainland China.

Third, in light of increasing global protectionism and nationalism, Japan could lead CPTPP cautiously by including more participating economies, setting benchmarks for the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) under the principle of Asean centrality, helping raise standards for China-Japan-Korea Free Trade Agreement (CJK FTA) as well as promoting Japan-US Trade on Goods (TAG).

In the same vein, economies which are not members of RCEP and CPTPP but are Apec members may look forward to starting negotiations for Free Trade Agreement for the Asia-Pacific (FTAAP).

The International Monetary Fund says that, as of 2017, the top three contributors of FDI for Emerging Asia and the Pacific were Japan (US$264 billion), Singapore (US$217 billion) and USA (US$134 billion). Such enormous potential can be further harnessed if Japan and Singapore could strategically consider jointly co-investing in a third country and thus furthering the agenda for regional connectivity and integration.
EXPORT-ORIENTED STRATEGY
Fourth, Japan should renew her emphasis on an "export-oriented strategy" towards Asia and European Union. The focus on this had shifted away significantly during the rapid opening up of China two decades ago. In particular, Japan should consider returning to Asean through FDI, which had previously benefited Asean members such as Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and Indonesia.

Given the current intense US-China trade disputes, it may be timely for Japanese MNCs to also consider re-locating to Vietnam, the Philippines, Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos and Brunei, not just in terms of exporting FDI, but also to initiate the sorely needed infrastructure development for Asean.

Fifth, there have been signs of a thaw in relations between Japan and China, notably demonstrated by the meeting of the top leaders of both countries and endorsement of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), where 50 Japan-China joint infrastructure projects were initiated.

Singapore, as the third most competitive financial centre in the world since 2017 (after London and New York), has positioned herself to be the hub in Asia for infrastructure project evaluation, facilitation, arbitration, investment and financing. Japan and China could make good use of the expertise and facilities in Singapore to form alternative project assessments so as to avoid the alleged "debt-trap" accused by some BRI participating countries.

A study by the Asia Competitiveness Institute at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy over the past four decades says that the relative importance of Japan and China as an engine of growth in terms of trade and investment for Asean-5 (Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand) has declined steadily.

Japan was 3.2 times more important as a growth engine than China to the Asean-5 during the 1980-1989 period; this came down to 1.4 times during 1990 -1999. Between 2000 and 2010, Japan's contribution as a growth engine for the Asean-5 was only half as important compared to China. Japan's presence is projected to be reduced further to a fifth of China's between 2011 and 2020, unless a strategic shift in emphasis is reconsidered.

A survey conducted this year by Iseas-Yusof Ishak Institute (Iseas) among professional elites from Asean has found that Japan is considered the most honest, trustworthy and welcomed country among the major economic powers.

Asean-10 is a big market with a population of 630 million, nearly half that of China. With a rapidly expanding middle class, relatively cheaper cost of labour and abundant natural resources especially in emerging economies such as Vietnam, Myanmar, Cambodia and Laos, Asean could be the fourth largest economic entity after USA, China and European Union by 2030.

Asean is thus a very attractive market for MNCs from major economic powers including Japan, especially given the rising cost of production along the eastern coast of China.

The current rising US-China trade tensions is unlikely to be dissipated at least in the medium term. If Japan returns to Asean, it will also help to balance but not counter the dominance of China in the region among the major economic powers, and Japan will further build on her international soft power.

The writer is co-director, Asia Competitiveness Institute at Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore. Tan Yan Yi is a Singapore full-time national serviceman.

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Economic and political reasons for Japan's pivot back to Asean

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WHEN the United States of America withdrew from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) in 2017, the remaining signatories were led steadfastly by Japan to agree on a revised TPP, the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). The CPTPP now has 11 members, including some members of Asean.

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The future of US-Mexico-Canada trade relations is still uncertain. For years Trump Dave Salmonsen, senior director for congressional relations at the American Farm Bureau, a business chamber, lambasted the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) as "the worst trade deal in the history of the country." He lauded the effort to establish a new United States Mexico Canada Agreement (USMCA) as a significant achievement. On November 30 Trump tweeted that USMCA is "sooo much better than NAFTA." He has also told Congress, "I hope you can pass the USMCA into law so we can bring back our manufacturing jobs in even greater numbers, expand American agriculture, protect intellectual property, and ensure that more cars are proudly stamped with our four beautiful words: made in the U.S.A." But it's still not clear what's going to happen with NAFTA. I view the USMCA as NAFTA 2.0, an update rather than a fundamental re-write. It's telling that US farm lobbies mostly like the new agreement because it preserves the benefits they enjoy under the NAFTA framework. explained, "The most important part [of USMCA] for us was the continuity of it all." After all, Mexico imported $3.2 billion of corn from the US in 2018.

Kevin Brady, a Texas Republican who is a ranking member on the House Ways and Means Committee explained, USMCA "will allow us to sell more Made In America products to our two best customers, Canada and Mexico. It's crucial."

Brady hopes that the deal can be ratified by summer 2019.

House Democrats are less enthusiastic.

Nancy Pelosi has explained that "The concerns we have [with USMCA] center around workers' rights, center around the environment, center around prescription drug prices."

Representative Earl Blumenauer, a Democrat from Oregon who leads the Ways and Means Committee's trade subcommittee, has acknowledged that he has "some reservations about the updated deal. "There are questions about labor enforcement, questions about environmental protections. I want to find out if NAFTA 2.0 is any better [than the original deal],"he explained.

It's unclear what will happen now. Trump would obviously like to see the legislation passed as soon as possible but Democrats seem unlikely to give him an easy victory in the lead-up to the 2020 election cycle.

Trump claims that his top priority is creating and protecting jobs. Over the last three years he has used the threat of unilaterally leaving NAFTA to prod action at the negotiating table. It's hard to imagine that Trump would now try to scuttle the original deal if he is frustrated with the speed of the approval for the update his team negotiated. Sending letters notifying Canada and Mexico of his intent to withdraw from NAFTA would introduce a new level of uncertainty and invariably hurt investment and job creation in all three countries. So, right now the future of the USMCA deal is still uncertain.

As I explained in a recent essay for Mexican news outlet Horizontal although Trump likes making threats it isn't likely that he'll try to pull out of NAFTA or start a trade war with Mexico and Canada. He couldn't stand the risk of losing. At this point it seems likely that we'll either end up with NAFTA or with Trump's NAFTA 2.0. Any other outcome would involve significant job losses and economic upheaval. After years of making threats on Twitter Trump still seems unlikely to look for that kind of fight in real life.
Additional reading: see here for a recent Q&A I did with Andrew Selee about the past, present, and future of US-Mexico relations.

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The future of US-Mexico-Canada trade relations is still uncertain. For years Trump Dave Salmonsen, senior director for congressional relations at the American Farm Bureau, a business chamber, lambasted the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) as "the worst trade deal in the history of the country."

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Arab Foreign Ministers meeting at the Arab League headquarters in the Egyptian capital Cairo. AFP file photo

The upcoming meeting of Arab leaders in Tunisia, will be "the summit of difficult political challenges", the Arab League's Assistant Secretary-General for Economic Affairs Kamal Hassan Ali announced.

All options are on the table after a "US decision to forcefully grant Arab lands to others," the ambassador told Asharq Al-Awsat.

He described the meeting scheduled for Sunday as "the summit of difficult economic and political challenges" after US President Donald Trump recognized Israel's sovereignty over the Golan Heights and decided to move the US embassy to Jerusalem.

He pointed out that the summit will discuss the Arab Common Market for Electricity, a plan for housing and sustainable development, making cities safe, as well as Arab action on environmental issues and climate change.

Asked about a Saudi proposal to merge the periodic Arab and economic summits, Ali explained that there is a decision to hold the economic summit every four years along with the periodic summit.

A number of high-level preparatory meetings began in Tunis on Tuesday to set the stage for the 30th Arab League summit.

Director-General for Economic and Commercial Cooperation of the Tunisian Ministry of Trade and Industry Saeeda Hashisha chaired the meeting of the Arab League's Economic and Social Council.

She took over from Saudi Deputy Undersecretary of the Ministry of Finance for International Financial Affairs Hussein Bin Shweish al-Shawish.

Hashisha stressed the importance of cooperation with Saudi Arabia, which had chaired the previous Arab summit.

She emphasized the importance of the greater Arab trade zone, as well as adopting a number of strategies to reduce risks and disasters, in addition to combating terrorism, and eradicating poverty.

Assistant Secretary-General and Head of the Social Affairs Sector of Arab League Ambassador Haifa Abu Ghazaleh praised the efforts exerted by Saudi Arabia during its presidency and management of the previous summit.

Abu Ghazaleh said that the summit's agenda includes a number of economic and social issues, which are a priority for joint Arab action, and the results of which directly affect the lives of Arab citizens.

The Ambassador also indicated that the summit will discuss support to the Palestinian economy in the face of Israeli practices, which negatively affected the economic and social conditions in the country.

Within the framework of Arab efforts to eradicate terrorism, the summit will discuss the social and cultural reasons behind it.

In addition, the summit is scheduled to deal with the Arab strategy for the elderly, initiated by Tunisia, which will constitute a qualitative leap in joint Arab action to ensure a decent life for this age group from a human rights perspective.

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Arab League Summit to Deal with Difficult Challenges after Trump's Decision

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Arab Foreign Ministers meeting at the Arab League headquarters in the Egyptian capital Cairo. AFP file photo The upcoming meeting of Arab leaders in Tunisia, will be "the summit of difficult political challenges", the Arab League's Assistant Secretary-General for Economic Affairs Kamal Hassan Ali announced.

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Regionalism and Sovereignty

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The Regional Integration: The Impact and Implications in Member States' Sovereignty

The phenomenon of regional integration
Regional integration is a process in which neighboring states enter into an agreement in order to upgrade cooperation through common institutions and rules. Regional Integration is also known as the process by which two or more nation-states agree to cooperate and work closely together to achieve peace, stability and wealth. There are some examples of regional integration that has been established for years. Based on The Logic of Regional Integration's book written by Walter Mattli, the first major voluntary regional integration initiatives appeared in the nineteenth century. In 1828, for example, Prussia established a customs union with Hesse-Darmstadt. This was followed successively by the Bavaria Wuttemberg customs Union, and etc. Half a century later, the idea of European integration was re-invented and the process of merging European nation-states into one prosperous economy and stable polity began. The first step was taken with the creation of the European Coal and Steel Coummunity (ECSC) in 1952. In 1957, Germany, France, Italy, Belgium, Luxemburg, and the Netherlands signed the Treaty of Rome establishing the European Community (EC). Then, the enlargement of the EC occurred in 1973, with the accession of the United Kingdom, Denmark, and Ireland. Greece joined in 1981, Spaun and Portugal in 1986. Nine years later, Austria, Finland, and Sweden became the community's newest members. In the meantime, European integration has moved beyond trade. In 1979, the European Monetary System was established. By November 1993, the community had changed its name to the European Union (EU) to mark the deep level of integration attained. The integration is not an exclusively just European phenomenon, of course. In the 1960s the Latin American Free Trade Association, the Andean Pact, and the Central American Common Market were launched. In the early 1990s, more than half a dozen new integration projects were started in Latin America. In North America, a Free Trade Agreement between the United States and Canada was signed in 1989. This agreement grew into the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). In Asia itself, the most notable regional grouping is the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), formed on 8 August 1967 in Bangkok by the five original member countries: Indonesia, Malaysia, Philipines, Singapore, and Thailand. Brunei Darussalam joined on 8 January 1984, Vietnam on 28 July 1995, Laos and Myanmar on 23 July 1997, and Cambodia on 30 April 1999. In 1992, members agreed to establish gradually an ASEAN Free Trade Area. One of the most rapidly expanding groups is the Asia Pasific Economic Cooperation forum (APEC). ASEAN organization (Association of Souteast Asian Nations (ASEAN) concists 10 states: Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia, Myambar, Philipines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, and including Indonesia. This organization was created by the member states to aim or purpose, (1) accelerating the economic growth, social progress and cultural development in the region through joint endeavors in the spirit of equality and partnership in order to strengthen the foundation for a prosperous and peaceful community of Southeast Asian Nations, and (2) promoting regional peace and stability through abiding or everlasting respect for justice and the rule of law in the relationship among countries in the region. In the political cooperation, ASEAN does political and security dialogue which having the aim to promote regional peace and stability by enhancing regional resilience. Regional resilience shall be achieved by cooperating in all fields based on the principles of self-confident, self-reliance, mutual respect, cooperation, and solidarity, which shall constitute foundation for a strong and viable community of nations in Southeast Asia.
Sovereignty
In the Age of Globalization, the sovereignty of the modern state was constituted in mutually exclusive territories and the concentration of sovereignty in nations. In the developing globalization, it is important to know about the impact of Regional Integration Agreement (Regional integration) for the countries' autonomy in order to maintain their existence and authority (sovereignty). By using their power or utilizing resources they have, to compete with other countries.
Regionalism and The Impact to The Nation-State
It is stated in Maurice W. Schiff's book about Regional Integration and Development there are some reasons why a country making agreement with other country in a region.

1. Governments' wish to bind themselves to better policies, including democracy and to signal such bindings to domestic and foreign investors.

2. A desire to obtain more secure access to major markets.

3. The pressures of globalization, forcing firms and countries to seek efficiency through larger markets, increased competition, and access to foreign technologies and investment.

4. Governments' desire to maintain sovereignty by pooling it with others in areas of economic management where most nation-states are too small to act alone.

5. A desire to jog the multilateral system into faster and deeper action in selected areas.

6. A desire to help neighboring countries stabilize and prosper.

Joining a Regional Integration Agreement (RIA) necessarily requires surrendering some immediate control over policymaking and losing some political autonomy. Some regional cooperation, however, go deeper than that and create institutions for joint decisionmaking. For example, as the EU's integration has deepened, decisionmaking has increasingly moved away from national capitals to Brussels, and much of the current debate is shaped by the belief that some form of political unification must eventually follow the creation of an integrated economic unit. By pooling sovereignty, members of a Regional Integration Agreement may able to preserve and enlarge it and thus strengthen themselves by creating a united front against external pressures or by joining forces in international negotiation. Besides that, regional cooperation can strengthen the voices of all small nations. These countries often face severe disadvantages in dealing with the rest of the world because of their low bargaining power and high negotiation costs.

The regional integration also can affect the economic development or economic growth. A country with a highest economic rate will have more power and authority than other country members. Moreover, it can increase competition in tradeable goods sector. That increased competition may induce improvements in efficiency, lower markups, and a larger demand for inputs in those sectors, further increasing the relative demand for capital. Integration may also can affect the prices of capital goods. Lower tariffs and trading costs on imports of capital equipment may reduce the price of investment goods, raising the rates of return and accumulation. Increased competition from capital goods could also stimulate the domestic capital goods industry to greater efficiency.

As what has been stated before that the regional integration can affect the territorial authority, sovereignty of the nations, and also the economics development of the members. The cooperation in a region can give both positive impact and negative impact, indeed. As we know that the members of the regional integration are not only the country who having a good power of economic growth but also a country which still underdeveloped and need to be supported by the other members. One side, the cooperation among the countries can lead competition power so that each countries will give their forces being a greatest one, they will utilize all natural resources by making a better product than others to evidence their existence, authority and sovereignty of the nations. But, on the other hand, this condition also can make negative impact for poor country as a member. Eventhough they have natural resources sufficiently to be utilized, sometimes they are not ready and can not compete the richer country. This is the problem, the poor one can be ignored and less power, hence they unable to compete other countries then became increasingly backward. But, the other impact is there will be trade globalization (free trade area) among the members. So that, by creating agreement and commitment between the countries in regional integration, it can create the supranational activities such as in Asia (ASEAN), when we want to go to other countries which still in one region (Southeast Asia) we do not need visa as requirements. This would mean there is no longer borders among the members of the association.
Regional integration in Southeast Asia (ASEAN): The impact and Implication
There has been a great interest in the development of ASEAN, which currently comprises Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philipines, Singapore, and Thailand since its foundation in Bangkok in August 1967, from both regional and non-regional observes. One Of the important factors in the decisions of the countries joining ASEAN is their objective to gain greater international political credibility and legitimacy, which in turn, some assert, would promote internal stability and economic development. ASEAN membership can provide the new members a common regional identity and framework to develop and integrate into the region.

At the same time, Indonesia for example, as membership in ASEAN has been one of the most important characteristics of the New Order foreign policy. Indoneisa's size, large population, rich natural resources, and colourful cultural tradition have also given its people a strong national pride in its country and heritage. But at the same time, Indonesian leaders are very much aware about the country's inherent weakness, which can limit the government's control over its territory and population. Indonesia is still an industrially backward country with limited infrastructure and financial. That is why to keep the stability, territory power and making peace among the neighboring countries, Indonesia decide to join ASEAN, but by that decisionmaking there are some implications that can affect country massively, such as it can lead competitions, so that if we are not ready for the condition and our human recources still less qualified it would make Indonesia become increasingly backward and losing the sovereignty. Besides that, it can create free trade area (trade liberalization) among the countries, hence can make no more the borders between the country members area. That is why as a developing country, Indonesia needs to do tactical strategies also develop the knowledge and technologies, and also utilize the natural resources (doing geopolitical strategy) in order to compete others in the era of globalizations, as well.
-Mery Ana
(1 st June, 2015)
References:
Schiff, Maurice W. (2003), Regional integration and development, The World Bank, Washington, DC. Available: https://books.google.co.id/books?hl=id&lr=&id=WG0zhlzEib8C&oi=fnd&pg=PR11&dq=regional+integration+and+sovereignty&ots=CUMain6NWu&sig=3OQWyzE0opq3xYXfZ1G4op0Ne9s&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false(Accessed: 2015, May 19)

Mattli, Walter. (1999), The Logic of Regional Integration, 1st ed., Cambridge University Press, United Kingdom. Availabe: https://books.google.co.id/books?hl=id&lr=&id=_I-4em3Q8Q8C&oi=fnd&pg=PR8&dq=the+impact+of+regional+integration&ots=-UlYC-RkID&sig=38h6TSXuEIprG6HMoedE7IBunl0&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false(Accessed: 2015, May 20)

Anwar, Dewi Fortuna. (1994), Indonesia in ASEAN: Foreign Policy and Regionalism, Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore. Available: https://books.google.co.id/books?id=e2JShE3UvooC&pg=PA27&dq=the+impact+of+ASEAN+for+Indonesia&hl=id&sa=X&ei=4KpgVcPdB9eTuAT_9YGgCQ&ved=0CCkQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q&f=false(Accessed: 2015, May 20)

Mya Than, Carolyn L. (2001), ASEAN Enlargement: Impacts & Implications,Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore. Available: https://books.google.co.id/books?id=i1hT2xK2uGwC&printsec=frontcover&dq=the+impact+of+ASEAN+for+Indonesia&hl=id&sa=X&ei=4KpgVcPdB9eTuAT_9YGgCQ&ved=0CDEQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q&f=false(Accessed: 2015, May 20)

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The Regional Integration: The Impact and Implications in Member States' Sovereignty

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The Regional Integration: The Impact and Implications in Member States' Sovereignty The phenomenon of regional integration Regional integration is a process in which neighboring states enter into an agreement in order to upgrade cooperation through common institutions and rules.

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"The gap between government inaction and the disaster of the climate emergency is becoming easier to see"
Extinction Rebellion has been an incredibly successful protest group. In one year they have forced Parliament to declare a climate emergency and ensured that the climate emergency was a top issue during the General Election, with Channel 4 organising the first climate change hustings.
During the recent General Election, the SNP, Labour and the Lib Dems all presented policies that, for the first time, started to match the scale of the transformation needed to save the planet. None of the parties get it the way the Green Party does, but there is a world of difference between the vision put forward by the progressive parties and the paltry offering of the Conservatives.

Unfortunately, because of our voting system, the Conservatives won a Parliamentary majority, despite most people voting for those parties who take the climate emergency seriously. Getting 44% of the votes sounds substantial, and it is, but it leaves most of us without much of a voice.

So that leaves us in a situation where urgent action is essential, but five years of relatively little action by the UK government seems very likely.

Internationally, this gap between government inaction and the disaster of the climate emergency is becoming easier to see. As the fires raged in Brazil this summer, the President and his 'cattle baron' supporters were rightly seen as the cause of deforestation, rather than defenders of the earth's lungs.

As the bush fires of Australia bring us terrifying images of devastation, many of us are remembering the Australian Prime Minister bringing a lump of coal into Parliament and declaring that people should 'not be afraid". Our own Boris Johnson is one of those leaders who will defend the economic status quo, even as it threatens the collapse of civilisation.

"Droughts that are one in a hundred years will happen every few years"

We don't know for sure that the extreme weather events in 2020 will be worse than 2019, that isn't how it works. It is just the frequency is more likely.

Droughts that are one in a hundred years will happen every few years. Sea or river defences, designed for exceptional floods that are one in a thousand years, will suddenly be relied upon on a regular basis. Crop failures that occasionally hit one of the major food producing regions of the world, might hit two, or three at the same time.

Each set of news images will fuel the public's sense that Extinction Rebellion are right. If four of the major crop growing regions are hit at the same time, then that sense of public unease will turn into outright panic as supermarket shelves start to empty.

In the months since Extinction Rebellion was founded, the evidence that fuels their emotional appeal has grown ever stronger. So will Extinction Rebellion focus on the fossil fuel corporations involved in climate change, or the finance houses that enable those corporations? What demands will they promote now that Parliament has declared a climate emergency but failed to come up with a credible set of actions?

Will it be to move the zero-carbon date forward from 2050 to a more realistic 2030? Or to get behind the passing of the New Green Deal legislation into law? Having shifted the public debate, Extinction Rebellion now need to renew the political edge of their campaigning.

The police response to environmental protests has not been neutral or balanced. Despite austerity, the police have used hundreds of over-stretched officers to clamp down on local anti-fracking protests. The police sided with the fracking industry in trying to impose an unpopular policy onto rural communities.

"The Climate Emergency will be at the top of the political agenda and the pressure on Boris Johnson to act will be tremendous"

The government rigged the planning system to by-pass local democracy, people set up protest camps and the police tried to stop any disruption to the fracking industry. As the recent report by NetPol has shown, the police lost all sense of balance and side-lined their duty to facilitate the right to protest.

The same mistake has been made by the Metropolitan Police in dealing with the Extinction Rebellion protests. Rather than facilitating the right to protest while maintaining a healthy balance with the rights of Londoners to go about their work and leisure, the police tried to stop the rebellion taking place. I took them to court, alongside many others, and the Met Police lost, leading to hundreds of charges against protestors being dropped.

We don't know what 2020's weather will bring, but extreme weather is more likely (Picture: Haydn Blackey)

I can only hope that with the moratorium on fracking, the police are wondering whether being on the wrong side of history is a good place to be. They are already having decades of political policing slowly exposed as a result of the Public Inquiry into Spy Cops and they are losing more public support as a result of their actions against peaceful environmentalists.

"If we lose, then the planet loses and none of us can afford for that to happen"

The government are in a difficult position with the big climate change conference (COP2020) being hosted by the UK at the end of the year. This will clearly be a focus for established NGOs such as GreenPeace, as well as Extinction Rebellion activists. The Climate Emergency will be at the top of the political agenda and the pressure on Boris Johnson to act will be tremendous.

The government's response in the Queen's Speech has a lot of rhetoric about green investment, but includes the dropping of their previous commitment to a non regression clause in the Withdrawal Bill. This had guaranteed we would keep environmental protections when leaving the EU.

They also want to clamp down on the protest camps used by numerous groups such as the campaigners against the environmentally disastrous HS2. Protest camps are used as a way of organising and mobilising support. The government want new legislation to turn these centres of protest into a criminal trespass.

If the government seeks to confront Extinction Rebellion, rather than accommodate their demands, then the decisive factor is who will win the public's support.

If we win that public debate then Boris Johnson will shift, just as he did on fracking. If we lose, then the planet loses and none of us can afford for that to happen.
Jenny Jones is a Green Party member of the House of Lords. Follow her on Twitter. Like this article? Left Foot Forward relies on support from readers to sustain our progressive journalism. Can you become a supporter for £5 a month?

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One year on: Extinction Rebellion are stronger than ever

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"The gap between government inaction and the disaster of the climate emergency is becoming easier to see" Extinction Rebellion has been an incredibly successful protest group. In one year they have forced Parliament to declare a climate emergency and ensured that the climate emergency was a top issue during the General Election, with Channel 4 organising the first climate change hustings.

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This first module focuses on the institutions of the European Union. The EU is run by its institutions and a good knowledge of the EU's institutional structure is essential to understanding the European Union. This module will focus on the role key EU institutions play within the EU structure and the relationships between them.

The map displayed below, shows all member states which make up the European Union, and provides information about the buildings and institutions which govern the EU - click on the European Union flags to find out more. Also, click the blue marker icons to read latest news from European Parliament. You may also find it useful to save this link to Europa's interactive map in your 'favourites'.

As EU membership has grown, so have the powers and functions of its institutions. The reforms have reflected the short-term needs and there has been no master plan in use (McCormick, 2011, p.74). As a result, the balance of power between the institutions has been shifting and the influence of the heads of the states on European politics has been changing. The functions and roles of the institutions have transformed. Studying them and their transformations can tell us about the European integration and its future. Also, studying institutions is essential if we want to understand EU politics and policy-making, find out how democratic the EU is and who decides about its shape.

Thinking about EU Institutions

The module will start by looking at the three central institutions in the EU: The European Commission, the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union. It will invite you to find out about how these institutions are composed, what they do and how they relate to each other.

We will also look at the European Council, the European Central Bank, the European External Action Service (that you need to know about even though it's not technically speaking an 'institution'), the European Courts, the Court of Auditors, the Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions.

Furthermore, in addition to enhancing your knowledge of the main institutions, we will concentrate on some misconceptions regarding the institutions of the EU. Namely, the differences between the European Council, the Council of the European Union and the Council of Europe as well as addressing the commonly held confusion between the European Court of Justice and the European Court of Human Rights.

Quick quizzes

Before getting started on this module, you may want to take the following very short quizzes.

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Module 1: Understanding EU Institutions - European Studies Hub

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This first module focuses on the institutions of the European Union. The EU is run by its institutions and a good knowledge of the EU's institutional structure is essential to understanding the European Union. This module will focus on the role key EU institutions play within the EU structure and the relationships between them.

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Participants in Climate Assembly UK, which was commissioned by six cross-party House of Commons Select Committees, will look at how the UK will reach its net zero emissions climate target, and what can be done by members of the public to help reduce carbon emissions. The citizens' assembly has been launched before the dissolution of Parliament, to ensure that the assembly's report is available to the new Parliament as it begins its work.

In June this year, following a recommendation by independent advisors the Committee on Climate Change (CCC), the UK became the first major economy in the world to adopt a target of reaching net zero emissions by 2050. This means that by 2050 the UK will have to reduce the amount of greenhouse gases it produces to a much lower level than today, and balance its remaining emissions by absorbing the same amount from the atmosphere.

Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Chair's comments

Commenting, Rachel Reeves MP, Chair of the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) Committee said:

"Adopting the net zero target was a major milestone for the UK, reflecting the strong cross-party support for action on climate change.

"We now need to set out a clear roadmap for the actions to achieve net-zero. It's very clear that we will all need to play a part in meeting this target and that we all share a responsibility to future generations to do so. Finding solutions which are equitable and have public support will be crucial. Parliament needs to work with the people and with Government to address the challenge of climate change.

"The Climate Assembly UK will advise Parliament on how people want us to meet the net zero target, and suggest policies that the Government can implement to secure success."

Citizens' assemblies bring together people from all walks of life to discuss important issues. They have been used all around the world, including in the UK, to help shape the work of governments and parliaments. 30,000 addresses have been chosen at random to receive invitations to participate in Climate Assembly UK which will run over four weekends between late January to the middle of March next year in Birmingham. A representative sample of the population will then be selected from those who respond to the invitation, with 110 people taking part in the assembly.

Treasury Chair's comments

Commenting, Mel Stride MP, Chair of the Treasury Committee said:

"Public concern around climate change is as high as it has ever been and this is a chance for people from all parts of society to come together, to decide how we as a country can best meet our net zero emissions target.

"Net zero is an opportunity, therefore, for people to not just explore ways in which the UK can end its contribution to climate change, but also create a cleaner, healthier environment as well as benefit from the opportunities around creating a low-carbon economy."

Key themes to be discussed at Climate Assembly UK will include how people travel, what people buy and household energy use. The outcomes of discussions will be presented to the six select committees, who will use it as a basis for detailed work on implementing its recommendations. It will also be debated in the House of Commons.

Further information

Image: Pixabay

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Parliament sends 30,000 invitations for citizens' assembly on climate change - News from Parliament

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Participants in Climate Assembly UK, which was commissioned by six cross-party House of Commons Select Committees, will look at how the UK will reach its net zero emissions climate target, and what can be done by members of the public to help reduce carbon emissions.

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Example cases
https://www.supremecourt.uk/current-cases/index.html

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Results of the 2019 General Election in England

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Up to the minute results of the 2019 UK General Election in England from BBC News

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British politics has become increasingly adversarial with the arrival of Corbyn's hard-left Labour party. The core differences in policy and ideology in the two parties has therefore become more prevalent in politics. Theresa May's government has also taken an increased right-wing stance compared the right-centre government of Cameron before her and therefore we can see huge differences between the two parties today. However, on issue such as the principle of the living wage the parties do share some of the same intentions.

The Labour and Conservative parties hugely differ over the matter of Welfare reform. Since Jeremy Corbyn became Labour leader there has been growing division on the matter as they believe May and the Conservatives are unfairly targeting the poorest individuals in order to eliminate the deficit. The Conservative idea of austerity is opposed to Labour policies, but the Tories believe this is necessary, especially since the 2008 financial crisis, which placed Britain with a heavy debt. Additionally, Conservative ideas declare that benefits shouldn't be encouraged as they decrease motivation for individuals to find work, whereas Labour believe it aid those in society who are limited by factors, such as health, background or education. For example it was announced in April 2017 that £1.2 billion would be cut from Child Tax Credit by 2020 and this would be limited to the first 2 children born in a family. Additionally, £350 million a year by 2020 is to be cut from disability benefits by 2020, a plan which has outraged Labour who says that these individuals need more support than jobseekers as they are in a more difficult position. The difference in ideas was evident in a question time in 2017 where Corbyn urged May to rethink the "shameful" cuts. Therefore, it is evident that the current parties are greatly divided on the issue of welfare.

However, both parties can be seen to agree on the principle of the living wage. Introduced by the Conservative in April 2016, the living wage was introduced to establish a wage high enough for an individual to live off of. The Conservatives have strongly supported the wage with the ideal that a higher wage for workers would increase motivation for people to seek employment rather than relying on benefits. The Labour Party fundamentally agree with this, believing that the minimum wage wasn't sufficient for citizens to live off of and wanting insurance that individuals would benefit off of this new wage. The parties both have plans to increase this wage and therefore we can see similarities in their policy making. However, the parties differ on the extent to which this wage should increase. Conservative plans are estimated by the IFS to positively affect 2.8 million workers and cost employers £1 billion on average, whereas Labour's plans would affect 7.1 billion workers and cost employers £14 billion a year. Therefore, while the parties agree on the existence of this wage there are differences in how they would both implement it.

Policies on taxation have also been a constant source of distinction between the two parties. The Labour Party essentially believe that the top percentage of the country should face more taxation than the Tories have implemented on them in order to pay for other areas, which need reform such as the NHS, and make wealth distribution more equal in the UK. Labour also believes that corporation tax should be increased, which opposes the Conservative belief that corporation tax should be kept low in order to encourage business in the UK to stimulate the economy. This is evidenced by the tax decrease from 28% to 20% to corporations and May's claim that she wants the tax to be the lower than any of the other top 20 global economies to encourage business and investment. May also plans to increase the threshold at which the 40p rate of taxation is paid to earners of £50,000 a year, which would benefit the working class. Labour has condemned this as they claim the wealthiest earners are benefitting, while some of the poorest in the country are being denied benefits. Therefore, it is clear that the two parties differ on their policies of taxation and Corbyn's labour are very much opposed to the tax cuts implemented by the Conservative government.

Both parties seem to agree on the matter of Trident. While, traditionally Labour has been anti-nuclear weapons they appear to have accepted the policy of maintaining a nuclear deterrent. Meanwhile, the Conservative priority of national security favours a nuclear weapons programme for the same reason. Both parties can therefore be seen to support Trident for defensive reasons. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has favoured a more 'old labour' approach, voicing a support for leaving Trident and global disarmament when he was a member of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament. However, he has since said he supports the will of the Labour Party to keep Trident and would respect the commitment to renewal Trident, which is in the Labour manifesto, if elected Prime Minister. Therefore, it can be said that the current parties agree on the issue of Trident, even if the leader has a different opinion.

Lastly both parties agree on the need to move forward with Brexit, as the people have spoken through a referendum. However at the same time they disagree about how Brexit should look. The Tories seem to be heading towards a 'hard Brexit', committing themselves to leaving the Customs Union and the Single Market. The Labour Party, however, after holding a similar line have now conceded that it is in Britain's interests to remain within the Customs Union. It is believed that within time they will also move on the Single Market, with prominent backbench voices like Chukka Umunna calling for the right to remain within market and the possibility of another referendum.

To conclude, there are broad differences between the current Labour and Conservative parties. The election of Corbyn as labour leader only accentuated these differences, as he strongly believes in the importance of benefits and taxing the rich to achieve more equal wealth distribution in the UK. This evidently disagrees with May's policies, such as tax cuts and even their decisions on the national living wage can be seen to differ. Therefore, it is clear the parties currently hugely differ over policies and ideas.

Georgina Trott

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Differences between the Labour and Conservative parties over policies and ideas

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British politics has become increasingly adversarial with the arrival of Corbyn's hard-left Labour party. The core differences in policy and ideology in the two parties has therefore become more prevalent in politics. Theresa May's government has also taken an increased right-wing stance compared the right-centre government of Cameron before her and therefore we can see huge differences between the two parties today.

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Applicable to multiple sections of the course

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Edexcel: Component 2: 2.4: The role and significance of select committees.
Component 3: 6.2.3 Compare and debate the following aspects of the UK and US legislative branches and their resulting impact on politics and government: powers, strengths and weaknesses of each of the Houses.
AQA: Component 1: 3.1.1.2: The structure and role of Parliament: the work of committees.
Component 2: 3.2.2.1 Constitutional arrangements: the legislatures: their relative strengths and weaknesses and the extent to which their roles are similar and their powers equal Background: what you need to know
Make sure you are aware of the checks on executive power which exist in the UK's uncodified constitution, particularly the role of parliamentary committees. You need to be familiar with the system of select committees of the UK parliament and also with the committee system in the United States Congress, where committees are more powerful than their UK equivalents.

Click to read the article below and then answer the questions:
Using the article
As well as a brief mention of the UK Supreme Court's striking down of Boris Johnson's attempt to prorogue parliament for five weeks in September 2019, the author looks at the role of parliamentary select committees in scrutinising the executive.

The pledge in the Conservative Party's manifesto in the December 2019 election to establish a Commission on Constitution, Democracy and Rights means that the relationship between the executive, parliament and the judiciary is to be reviewed.

The article mentions the inability of select committees to force individuals to give evidence to their inquiries, citing the example of the refusal of Dominic Cummings (now Boris Johnson's chief adviser) to testify to a select committee hearing in February 2019, for which he was found to be in contempt of parliament.

Explain in your own words why the writer of the article argues that parliamentary select committees should be given the power to compel individuals to give evidence to their hearings.

Then answer one of these questions, depending on which exam board specification you are studying:
Question in the style of Edexcel Politics A-level: Paper 3

1. Analyse the differences in the power of committees in the US Congress and in the UK Parliament. In your answer you must consider the relevance of at least one comparative theory. [12 marks]

Question in the style of AQA Politics A-level: Paper 2

2. Explain and analyse three ways that structural theory could be used to study the relative power of committees in the US Congress and in the UK Parliament. [9 marks]

TIP: The three comparative theories (rational, cultural and structural) are an essential aspect of the comparative element of both exam boards' specifications. Your A-level Politics textbook has details of these. The most appropriate comparative theory in this case is probably structural theory, as that focuses on structural comparison of the different institutions of the two countries. The Edexcel format of questions leaves it up to you to choose which comparative theory to refer to, whereas the AQA format specifies one of the three.

Mark Rathbone

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School politics: A Boris Johnson government requires more checks on power

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Edexcel: Component 2: 2.4: The role and significance of select committees. Component 3: 6.2.3 Compare and debate the following aspects of the UK and US legislative branches and their resulting impact on politics and government: powers, strengths and weaknesses of each of the Houses.

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links to democracy and representation

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Edexcel Component 2: 1.3: The impact of devolution on the UK; 1.4: Debates on further reform: the extent to which devolution should be extended in England.

AQA Component 1: 3.1.1.5 Devolution: debate around devolution in England.
Background: what you need to know
Make sure you understand how the devolution of power by Tony Blair's government in the late 1990s to the Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Assembly and the Northern Ireland Assembly have affected the governance of the UK and created an asymmetric allocation of powers, with no comparable devolved institutions in England.

Look too at why attempts to address this asymmetry (the possibility of directly elected mayors introduced by the Local Government Act 2000; the proposed North-East Assembly in 2004; the English-Votes-For-English-Laws changes to procedures in parliament introduced in 2015) have done little to alleviate the feeling of powerlessness felt by many voters in England.
Click to read the article below and then answer the questions: Using the article
﻿The article takes as its starting point the advance by the Conservatives among voters in traditional Labour strongholds in the Midlands and the North of England, and Boris Johnson's promise to "honour their trust by transforming areas of the country long described by apparent hopelessness".

It urges Johnson's government to "empower local communities" and restore "the funding and responsibilities of locally-elected representatives", while arguing that "the sharp cuts in local authority investment presided over by earlier Conservative administrations" have been a major cause of a "spiral of neglect".

The economic side of this issue and the need for fairer distribution of funding is further explored in this article: Johnson to overhaul public spending rules to boost UK regions

Think about whether at the heart of this debate there is a political issue about where decisions are taken or a purely economic one about allocation of funding.
Write a paragraph about each of the following:
* The 'West Lothian Question'

* Directly elected mayors, introduced by the Local Government Act 2000.

* The referendum on the proposed North-East Regional Assembly in 2004.

* The English-Votes-For-English-Laws changes to procedures in parliament introduced in 2015.
Answer one of these questions, depending on which exam board specification you are studying:
Question in the style of Edexcel Politics A-level: Paper 2

* Evaluate the extent to which there is a need for devolution of power to the regions of England. In your answer you should draw on relevant knowledge and understanding of the study of Component 1: UK politics and core political ideas. You must consider this view and the alternative to this view in a balanced way. (30 marks)

Question in the style of AQA Politics A-level: Paper 1

* 'There is an urgent need for devolution of power within England.' Analyse and evaluate this statement. (25 marks)

Mark Rathbone

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School politics: How Britain can bring power closer to the people

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Edexcel Component 2: 1.3: The impact of devolution on the UK; 1.4: Debates on further reform: the extent to which devolution should be extended in England. AQA Component 1: 3.1.1.5 Devolution: debate around devolution in England.

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AQA Component 1, Section 3.1.2.2: Elections and referendums
Click on the links to view the video and read the articles:

Both Edexcel and AQA require you to study three key general elections. You are expected to know about the 1997 election, one pre-1997 and one post-1997 contest: the context of the election and the part played by party leaders, policies and campaigns in deciding the outcome. Now that the results are out, you could choose to study the December 2019 election.
Background
The 2019 election is remarkable for the scale of the Conservative victory - it was the worst result for Labour since 1935. Only in Scotland, where the SNP increased its share of seats, was there a significant challenge to Conservative dominance. Boris Johnson's success in winning traditionally Labour seats in Northern England and the Midlands - the so-called 'red wall' - was critical to the outcome.

How can we explain this - was it mainly due to the single issue of Brexit, or was it a broader rejection of Jeremy Corbyn as a potential national leader and of Labour's radical left-wing manifesto? Did the campaigns fought by the main parties play an important part in determining the result?
Using the articles
Using the information in the articles, and other sources available to you, answer one of the following questions, depending on which exam board specification you are following.

Question in the style of Edexcel Politics Paper 1:

Evaluate the view that party policies and manifestos are the most important factor that explains the outcome of general elections. You should refer to three key general elections, including the 1997 election, in your answer.

You must consider this view and the alternative to this view in a balanced way. [30 marks]
Question in the style of AQA Politics Paper 1:
'A successful election campaign is the most important factor in determining the outcome of general elections.' Analyse and evaluate this statement. [25 marks]

Graham Goodlad, St John's College

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School politics: Boris Johnson's big win with Conservatives

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AQA Component 1, Section 3.1.2.2: Elections and referendums Click on the links to view the video and read the articles: Both Edexcel and AQA require you to study three key general elections. You are expected to know about the 1997 election, one pre-1997 and one post-1997 contest: the context of the election and the part played by party leaders, policies and campaigns in deciding the outcome.

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I surveyed over 13,000 people on election day who had already cast their vote, to help understand how this extraordinary result came about. The results show who voted for whom, and why.
The demographics
Labour won more than half the vote among those turning out aged 18-24 (57%) and 25-34 (55%), with the Conservatives second in both groups. The Conservatives were ahead among those aged 45-54 (with 43%), 55-64 (with 49%) and 65+ (with 62%).

Men chose the Conservatives over Labour by a 19-point margin (48% to 29%), while women did so by just 6 points (42% to 36%). The Conservatives won among all socio-economic groups by margins of between 6 points (DEs) and 20 points (C2s).
When did you decide?
More than half of voters said they made up their minds within the last month, with a quarter saying they did so within the last few days, including 16% saying they decided on election day or the day they filled in their postal ballot. Labour support was higher among those making up their minds within the last week of the campaign.
How easy was the decision?
39% of all voters said they found their decision harder than usual. Labour (42%) and Lib Dem (56%) voters were more likely to say they found the decision harder than usual than those who voted Conservative (32%). Those who voted Conservative and SNP were the most likely to say they found the decision easier than usual, with 27% of voters for both parties saying they found it much easier than usual.

44% of Remain voters said they found their decision harder than usual, compared to 35% of Leave voters.
Tactical voting
Just over a quarter (26%) of all voters said they were trying to stop the party they liked least from winning, including 43% of those who voted Lib Dem and 31% of Labour voters. One in three Remain voters said they were voting to stop their least preferred party compared to 18% of Leave voters.

Overall, 72% said they were voting for the party they most wanted to win, including 82% of Conservatives, 74% of SNP voters, 67% of Labour voters and just over half (54%) of Lib Dems.

39% of those trying to stop their least preferred party voted Labour, 30% voted Conservative and 20% voted Lib Dem.
Where did 2017 voters go?
84% of 2017 Conservative voters stayed with the Tories, with 8% going to the Lib Dems, 5% going to Labour and 2% going to the Brexit Party. 79% of those who voted Labour in 2017 stayed with the party, while 9% went to the Conservatives, 7% to the Lib Dems, 2% to the Greens and 1% to the Brexit Party. Three quarters of 2017 UKIP voters switched to the Conservatives, with 11% going to the Brexit Party.
Best Prime Minister
49% of all voters said Boris Johnson would make the best Prime Minister, with 31% naming Jeremy Corbyn and 20% saying they didn't know. 95% of Conservative voters named Johnson, while 76% of Labour voters named Corbyn. Lib Dem voters named Corbyn over Johnson by 26% 19%, with 55% saying they didn't know.
The issues
Asked to choose their top three broad reasons for their decision, Conservative voters were most likely to say their party or leader "was the most likely to get the Brexit outcome I wanted" (68%), "would do a better job of running the economy" (64%), and that the leader "would make a better Prime Minister" (58%).

The top reasons Labour voters chose were that they "trusted the motives of the party I voted for more than those of other parties" (65%), that they "preferred the promises made by the party I voted for more than the promises of other parties" (59%), and that they thought Labour would do a better job of running the economy (though only 39% chose this as a reason). Only 19% of Labour voters said that believing the party would get the Brexit outcome they wanted was among their top three reasons for doing so.

For Lib Dems, the most important reason was "trusting the motives of the party" (62%), followed by getting "the Brexit outcome I wanted" and that they "preferred the promises" made by the Lib Dems (both 53%).

Asked to choose from a longer list of issues which three had been the most important in their voting decision, 72% of Conservative voters named getting Brexit done, with 41% naming the NHS, 29% naming the economy and 25% choosing having the right leadership or the best PM. For Labour voters, the NHS was by far the most important issue, named by 74%; 28% mentioned stopping Brexit or getting a second referendum, while 27% mentioned poverty and inequality. Among Lib Dems, 65% mentioned stopping Brexit or a getting second referendum, 58% mentioned the NHS and 30% mentioned climate change and the environment.
The Brexit effect
73% of those who voted Leave in the EU referendum voted Conservative, while 16% voted Labour and 4% for the Brexit Party. 92% of 2017 Conservative Leave voters stayed with the Tories. 64% of 2017 Labour Leave voters stayed with Labour, while 25% switched to the Conservatives.

Labour took 47% of the vote among those who voted Remain in the EU referendum, while the Lib Dems took 21% and the Conservatives took 20%. 66% of 2017 Conservative Remain voters stayed with the Conservatives, with 21% going to the Lib Dems and 8% to Labour. 84% of 2017 Labour Remain voters stayed with Labour, while 9% went to the Lib Dems.

One in twenty (5%) said they voted Leave in the 2016 referendum but now think we should remain; 13% said they voted Remain but the referendum result should be honoured.

Nearly three quarters (73%) of Conservative voters said they voted Leave and wanted Brexit to happen as soon as possible; a further 18% said they voted Remain but wanted the referendum result to be honoured. 61% of Labour voters and 76% of Lib Dem voters said they voted Remain and still wanted to prevent Brexit happening if at all possible.

80% of Leave voters who wanted to get on with Brexit voted Conservative, with 11% choosing Labour and 4% the Brexit Party. More than half of Leave voters who now wanted to remain voted Labour (58%), with 14% going to the Lib Dems and another 14% to the Conservatives. Remain voters who wanted the referendum result to be honoured chose the Conservatives over Labour by 62% to 23%, with 8% going to the Lib Dems. Among remainers who still wanted to prevent Brexit if at all possible, just over half (56%) voted Labour, with 26% going to the Lib Dems; 5% of them voted Conservative.

15% of voters said they would probably have voted for a different party had Brexit not been on the agenda at this election. This included 28% of those who ended up voting Lib Dem, 14% of Conservatives, and 11% of Labour voters. 2016 Leave and Remain voters were equally likely to say they would probably have voted differently had it not been for Brexit (16%).

Half of Labour voters who would have voted differently had it not been for Brexit said they would probably have voted Lib Dem; 52% of Lib Dems who would have voted differently had Brexit not been on the agenda said they would probably have voted Conservative.

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I surveyed over 13,000 people on election day who had already cast their vote, to help understand how this extraordinary result came about. The results show who voted for whom, and why. The demographics Labour won more than half the vote among those turning out aged 18-24 (57%) and 25-34 (55%), with the Conservatives second in both groups.

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AQA Component 1, Section 3.1.2.3: Political parties
Background

These three articles discuss the policy platforms of the three main UK parties, which is a key area for both the Edexcel and the AQA specifications. They focus mainly on their economic policies. Embedded in the 22 November article about the Labour Party is a short film, entitled 'A brief guide to the UK general election', which offers a helpful introduction and touches on a number of key policy areas, including Brexit, the economy and the NHS.
﻿Boris Johnson plays a defensive game with the Tory manifesto Labour leadership defends radical tax plans Liberal Democrats aim to tax and spend in a big way

Using the articles

Identify the differences between the parties' policies. Are there any similarities between them? You may like to present this information as a table. What do the articles reveal about the parties' different strategies for winning votes, and the groups in society they are trying to attract?
Question in the style of Edexcel Politics Paper 1:
Then, using the information in the articles, and other sources available to you, answer one of the following questions, depending on which exam board specification you are following.

Evaluate the view that the ideas and policies of the three main political parties have become very strongly opposed in recent years.
Question in the style of AQA Politics Paper 1:
You must consider this view and the alternative to this view in a balanced way. [30 marks]

'The three main political parties have little common ground in terms of their policies.' Analyse and evaluate this statement. [25 marks]

TIP: It is a good idea to organise your answer thematically - so a paragraph on taxation, one on public services, one on Brexit and so on. This will help you to compare and contrast the policies of the parties throughout the answer. Don't fall into the trap of writing separately about the Conservatives, Labour and Liberal Democrats, as this would limit your opportunities for analysis and evaluation.

Graham Goodlad, St John's College

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School politics: Political party platforms

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AQA Component 1, Section 3.1.2.3: Political parties Background These three articles discuss the policy platforms of the three main UK parties, which is a key area for both the Edexcel and the AQA specifications. They focus mainly on their economic policies.