Author: psaparliaments

Categories
News

September 2022 Newsletter

We hope that you are keeping safe and well and that you had a lovely summer. We have some updates for you in our first newsletter of the new academic year:

  1. PSA Parliaments Annual Conference 2022 in Birmingham & Online
  2. PSA Annual Conference 2023 in Liverpool & Online
  3. PSA Parliaments Online Brown Bag Seminars
  4. Urgent Questions with Pete Dorey
  5. PhD Opportunity in Irish Politics at the University of Liverpool
  6. Workshop on Belonging, Inclusion & Exclusion at Westminster
  7. Gen+ParlNet: Call for Abstracts & a Save the Date
  8. Congratulations to Wang Leung Ting!
  9. Recent Publications that have Caught Our Eye
  10. Recently on the Blog

If you have any notices/messages you would like us to circulate to the group, please let us know.

1. PSA Parliaments Annual Conference 2022 in Birmingham & Online

Our Annual Conference will be held at The Exchange in Birmingham and online on 3rd-4th November 2022.

The theme of the conference is What Next? 

The deadline for submitting paper proposals is Friday 16th September but we have already made tickets available for those who know they will be attending.

The conference (including lunch and refreshments) is free for all attendees, whether presenting or in the audience, but you must register beforehand.

Please see here for full details of the conference, including how to submit proposals and book tickets.

We are very much excited to be meeting up in person after two years of online conferences and we hope to see as many of you there as possible!

2. PSA Annual Conference 2023 in Liverpool & Online

The 73rd Annual Conference of the Political Studies Association will be held in Liverpool and online on 3rd-5th April 2023 (see here for details) and PSA Parliaments will be convening a number of panels.

The submission process is different from previous years in that specialist groups have been given an exclusive timeframe until the 12th September for them to receive papers and propose panels ahead of the open call in October.

If you would like to propose a paper or a panel to be held under the auspices of the prize-winning PSA Parliaments group, then please fill out this form before 12th September.

As always, we do not have any preferences in terms of theory, method or empirical focus and we welcome papers from PhD students through to professors, as well as from practitioners. We are fully committed to avoiding all-male panels. We are also seeking to increase the proportion of papers on our panels from people from an ethnic minority background so please get in touch with Alexandra if you come from an ethnic minority background and would like to discuss how your research could be highlighted on our panels.

3. PSA Parliaments Online Brown Bag Seminars

After the success of our online events over the past couple of years, we’re hoping to hold some online seminars this year.

The purpose of the seminars will be to allow people to showcase their work and to generate debate and discussion. As such, papers presented will be recently published work, or work accepted for publication, rather than work in progress. The seminars will last an hour and will be held on Wednesday lunchtimes on an ad hoc basis.

If you would like to present a paper, or want to nominate someone, then please email Stephen.

4. Urgent Questions with Pete Dorey

This month’s interviewee is Professor Pete Dorey, co-author of House of Lords reform since 1911: Must the Lords go? (Palgrave Macmillan) and the textbook Exploring British Politics (Routledge).

Head over to Urgent Questions to read about being an ageing indie kid, curries and how delivering newspapers shapes your politics!

5. PhD Opportunity in Irish Politics at the University of Liverpool

The Institute of Irish Studies at the University of Liverpool invites applications for a PhD studentship beginning in September 2022.

Potential areas of research include power-sharing, post-conflict governance, gender and the politics of Northern Ireland/Ireland, constitutional change, political economy of Ireland/Northern Ireland, British-Irish relationships, parliamentary studies, or UK devolution. Applications broadly focussed on the governance and politics of Northern Ireland, or comparative projects which include the governance and politics of Northern Ireland, will also be considered. Qualitative, quantitative and mixed-methods projects are welcome.

Full details of the studentship, including how to apply, can be found here.

6. Workshop on Belonging, Inclusion & Exclusion at Westminster

Colleagues from London South Bank University and the University of Leeds are holding a workshop on ‘Belonging, Inclusion and Exclusion at Westminster’ in London on Friday 23rd September (1-4pm).

More details are available here.

7. Gen+ParlNet: Call for Abstracts & a Save the Date

Our friends at Gen+ParlNet will host three online seminars this academic year (the + is to make explicit that Gen+ParlNet very much welcomes research addressing gender and parliaments from intersectional lenses).

The seminars aim to provide a wonderful opportunity for researchers to get new eyes on their research from colleagues in the field.

Each seminar will feature two papers which will be circulated in advance. After a brief introduction by the author (10 min), a designated discussant will comment on the paper. Hereafter, all participants will be able to give their comments on the paper. The seminars will last for 90 minutes each (though Seminar 3 may be extended) and will be open to all who pre-register.

The three seminars will be held on: Thursday, November 10 at 09.00; Thursday, February 02 at 15:30; and Tuesday, May 02 at 9:00 (all Brussels time).

The first two seminars are open for submissions of abstracts that address questions relating to gender+ sensitive parliaments in a wide sense, and we encourage all scholars to submit their abstracts for one of these seminars to Mette Marie Staehr Harder no later than October 1st.

A website for the network will be up and running shortly but, in the meantime, you can register for their mailing list by contacting Sonia Palmieri and you can follow them on Twitter here.

8. Congratulations to Wang Leung Ting!

Congratulations to a good friend of PSA Parliaments, Wang Leung Ting, who has recently taken up a lectureship post in comparative politics at the University of Reading!

9. Recent Publications that have Caught Our Eye

Cherry Miller has published an article, Between Westminster and Brussels: Putting the “Parliament” in Parliamentary Ethnography, in Politics & Gender.

Moritz Schmoll and Wang Leung Ting have published an article, Explaining Physical Violence in Parliaments, in the Journal of Conflict Resolution.

David Judge and Mark Shephard have published an article, Divining the UK’s national interest: MPs’ parliamentary discourse and the Brexit withdrawal process, in British Politics.

Monique Doyle, Jennifer Rault-Smith and Rashaad Alli of the South African Parliamentary Monitoring Group have published a report on parliamentary oversight in light of state capture and the Zondo Report.

The Westminster Foundation for Democracy (WFD) and the National Democratic Institute (NDI) have published four new policy briefs on parliaments and public debt management:

More details about the briefs can be found here.

Ben Worthy, Cat Morgan and Stefani Langehennig have published a project report for their Leverhulme Trust funded project, Who’s Watching Parliament?, which looked at how new data tools like TheyWorkForYou are impacting upon Parliament. 

The House of Lords Liaison Committee have published a report Review of House of Lords investigative and scrutiny committee activity in 2021–22.

And, finally, new issues of Parliamentary Affairs, Government & Opposition, Representation and the Journal of Legislative Studies have been published.

If you would like your published research to be featured in this section, please email Stephen with details.

10. Recently on the Blog

We published three great blogs over the summer:

If you have an idea for a blog on some aspect of parliamentary study, please get in touch with our communications officer, Chris.

Categories
Urgent Questions

Professor Diana Stirbu

DIANA STIRBU

Diana Stirbu is Professor of Public Policy & Governance at London Metropolitan University. She is perhaps best known for her work on the Welsh Parliament / Senedd Cymru and has recently completed an Academic Fellowship there, conducting research into measuring the effectiveness of the committee system.

Please tell us a little bit about how you entered academia and your academic career

I would say that it all started with a rather radical career change for me: from being a computer programmer in a nuclear power station in Romania to becoming passionate about parliaments, public administration, and political science research. In 2003 I won an EU scholarship to study a master’s degree in the UK (University of Liverpool). That then led to a PhD and to my first job as a researcher at the Hansard Society’s Parliament and Government programme and eventually to my first academic job at London Metropolitan University in 2010. Here at London met, I have taught in the Politics and IR programme at first, the Master of Public Administration and, in 2019, I was promoted to professorship.

Which five books/articles (written by someone else) have been most important to you in your academic career?

Richard Rawlings ‘Delineating Wales. Constitutional, Legal and Administrative Aspects of National Devolution’ was instrumental in the early stages of my PhD.

Robert E. Goodin ‘The Theory of Institutional Design’ and B. Guy Peters ‘Institutional Theory in Political Science’ have shaped my interest in institutionalism, a perspective that has driven a lot of my research.

Vicky Randall ‘Women in Politics’ opened up a whole new field and standpoint in political research.

Michael Marinetto ‘Studies of the Policy Process’ was my go to textbook in the first years of teaching career.

Which person has been most influential and important to you in your academic career?

Professor Laura McAllister (at Cardiff University now) was the most influential for my academic career. Not only did she facilitate my first research placement (and first encounter with) the Welsh Parliament during my master, she supported me throughout my PhD as my supervisor and shaped me into the academic that I have become. I really appreciated Laura’s ability to engage with such a wide range of policy actors (from sports, to gender and equality in government, to constitutional design and offering advice to parliaments), and I am ever so grateful for involving me in many projects as a doctoral student. In a sense, my interest in research impact, my outreach work outside academia has been shaped by her.

Which of your own pieces of research are you most proud of?

Can I choose two? I think I am most proud of my first ever joint article with Laura McAllister, published in Policy & Politics in 2007, when I was still doing my PhD. The other work I am quite proud of is my Fellowship report to the Welsh Parliament (the Senedd) about the effectiveness of the Senedd Committees. I am proud of that because I managed to engage meaningfully with officials and politicians in the Senedd.

What has been your greatest achievement in academia?

Being promoted to Professor.

What has been your greatest disappointment in academia?

Every article rejection of grant proposal rejection feels like the greatest disappointment. It’s tough.

What is the first or most important thing you tell your students about parliaments?

I don’t get to teach an awful lot about parliaments, but when I do get the chance, I tell them they are the most fascinating public sector organisations.

Where were you born, where did you grow up, and where do you live now?

I was born in eastern part of Romania and grew up in a small town in the south-east of the country, by the river Danube. I now live in East London.

What was your first job?

Research Assistant in the Ministry of Youth and Sports in Romania.

What was the toughest job you ever had?

The summer jobs in one of my mum’s grocery stores, during my high school and university years. It was exhausting but also kind of exciting and got to meet so many people.

What  would your ideal job be, if not an academic?

Probably something to do with gardening or coaching football.

What are your hobbies?

Photography and alternative processes in photography. I used to be an active member of a studio in East London and learnt how to do lith printing and cyanotypes. So much fun experimenting with different processes and materials in photography.

What are your favourite novels?

Over the years I have had so many favourites. I am still under the spell of  Bernardine Evaristo’s ‘Girl, Woman, Other’ , although I read this a couple of years ago– it was so powerful, so vibrant, such captivating story-telling. More recently, I have loved Mieko Kawakami’s ‘Breasts and Eggs’ – such a literary celebration of womanhood.

What is your favourite music?

Too many to mention here, but let’s try. I work out (including the ultra-rare dancing night out) on electronic music (anything Jon Hopkins, Nicolas Jaar, Moderat, etc). Sunday mornings are jazzy or Brazilian bossa nova. The latest amazing concert I have been to was Marisa Monte (a Brazilian grandee). When I need to concentrate and write, I prefer classical music. One of my favourite bands is The Doors. And yes, my latest guilty pleasure is cooking on Harry Styles tunes.

What is your favourite artwork?

I love Yayoi Kusama’s art. The Kusama: Infinity (2018) documentary was a great one about her evolution as an artist.

What is your favourite film?

Again, too many to mention, but the latest one I have seen and left me quite amazed was Everything, Everywhere, All at Once. I mean, you can’t have a better film coming out of this pandemic.

What is your favourite building?

The Welsh Parliament building (The Senedd) in Cardiff Bay is an absolute masterpiece. It’s not only about the architectural merits of the building, but the symbolism of it: the openness, the transparency and the way it uses Welsh sourced slate for instance to make a compelling story of Wales’ democracy.

What is your favourite tv show?

It has to be Parks and Recreation. I mean, a TV series about local government, with Joe Biden featuring multiple times in it. And the whole dynamic between Leslie Knope and Ron Swanson… it’s just so good.

What is your favourite holiday destination?

Brazil, Japan, Portugal, Romania. I love Brazil and its energy and complexity. Portugal and Romania feel like home. Japan is just so beautiful and different and has the best food in the world.

What is your favourite sport?

I used to play football. I love football, but I get annoyed by the exploitative and discriminatory nature of the industry surrounding it. I am so glad that women’s football is getting more profile though. I also played and love watching tennis.

What is your favourite restaurant?

In London: Monohom Ramen in Old Street. It’s a small Japanese ramen restaurant, and yes, ramen is one of my favourite foods.

In Portugal / Porto: Capa Negra restaurant serves the best Francesinha, a Porto specific dish that is an absolute calorie bomb.

I also love (of course) Romanian food. My grandmother was an amazing cook and  I remember fondly the taste of my favourite things cooked by her (sarmale – stuffed vine leaves or cabbage leaves with mince meat, rice and lots of herbs; chicken/duck cooked in a pot with lots of garlic, herbs and home made tomato sauce; garlic green beans stew). Never quite get the same taste in restaurants though.

Hybrid proceedings in Parliament: yes please or no thanks?

Yes, please, if and when needed. No need for parliament to be stuck in old ways when all other industries and workplaces are adapting to new ways of working.

Appointed or elected upper chamber?

Elected and representing regions.

Restoration or Renewal?

Both.

Cat or Dog?

Dog.

Trains, planes or automobiles?

Trains.

Fish and chips or Curry?

Curry – but needs to be a good curry.

And, finally, a question asked by Seth, who has just turned 10: Would you rather never wear shoes or never wear a hat for the rest of your life?

Pragmatic answer would be never wear a hat.

Categories
Blog

The Black Box of Authoritarian Legislatures

Almost every country in the world has a legislature. They are at the centre of democratic politics, but also take on crucial roles in authoritarian regimes. Felix Wiebrecht illustrates how a multidimensional approach helps us to understand their role in dictatorships and paves the way for more research

Authoritarian legislatures matter

Hager Ali notes that we need better typologies of authoritarian regimes. The same applies to their legislatures. They can differ from each other as much as from their democratic counterparts, despite earlier research describing them as nothing but ‘window-dressing’ or rubberstamp institutions.

But even under authoritarianism, legislatures matter. This is increasingly accepted in comparative politics, but research still struggles to identify why exactly that is the case. In authoritarian regimes, legislatures have, for instance, been credited with important roles in co-optation, power-sharing, and the collection of information. However, as scholars of authoritarianism, we seem to emphasise one task over another without linking these features into a unified framework of authoritarian legislatures.

Legislatures are multi-dimensional

Recent research has taken a step toward advancing our understanding of authoritarian legislatures by comparing their strengths across regimes. While some authoritarian legislatures are correctly described as mere democratic façade, others have a much more significant impact on authoritarian politics.

Yet legislative strength is often primarily used to refer to parliaments’ relationship with the executive, i.e., the dictators. While this may be the most important dimension, it is only one of several. Therefore, a more disaggregated approach may prove useful in understanding their role and consequences in authoritarian regimes.

Like any legislature, authoritarian legislatures fulfil several functions simultaneously, including co-opting outsiders, legitimation, and providing a forum for elite bargaining

In fact, legislatures always perform multiple tasks at once. While the name suggests that law-making is legislatures’ primary task, even in democracies, they fulfil several functions simultaneously. These may also include linkage, representation, authorisation, and legitimation.

The same applies to authoritarian legislatures. They co-opt regime outsiders, legitimate the regime, and provide a forum for elite bargaining, all at the same time. Figure 1 shows how we can conceptualise legislatures’ tasks under authoritarianism.

Figure 1: Dimensions of authoritarian legislatures’ tasks

Figure 1: Dimensions of Authoritarian Legislatures’ Tasks

A matter of degree

The question then is not whether a legislature in any given regime performs these functions. Most legislatures in authoritarian regimes will perform all six tasks at least to some degree. For instance, even the Cortes in Spain under Franco engaged in lawmaking. The Vietnamese National Assembly, although primarily focused on portraying regime unity, also co-opts a small number of non-Party members. Instead, the question is to what degree authoritarian legislatures engage in these activities.

While China’s National People’s Congress has little ability to constrain party and government leaders, it fulfils several other functions, which can each be compared with other legislatures

Consider the example of China’s National People’s Congress (NPC). The NPC hardly constrains party and government leaders. However, we have evidence that behind the scenes, bargaining between elites and different government agencies is relatively common. Yet, as in Vietnam, it allows the maintenance of an appearance of strength and elite unity toward the public.

Since the NPC only accommodates a limited number of delegates that are not members of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), its potential for co-optation is limited. On the other hand, its delegates have been shown to transmit important information upward.

Based on this previous research from the context of China, I invite scholars and practitioners to think of the NPC according to Figure 2. It shows that the NPC can fulfill different functions simultaneously but to varying degrees. Legislatures in communist regimes, for instance, send a stronger signal of elite unity to citizens. Meanwhile, in competitive regimes, they may actually be used as a scapegoat to improve the public perception of dictators.

Figure 2: dimensions of the Chinese National People’s Congress’ tasks

Figure 2: Dimensions of the Chinese National People’s Congress’ Tasks

The NPC’s impact on policymaking may, in comparison to other legislatures, still be limited. Nevertheless, it should be stronger than legislatures’ influence in places such as the Middle East.

Since research on China’s NPC is relatively advanced, it is possible to produce the hexagon on the basis of existing studies. Other regimes, however, lack comprehensive studies on legislatures which makes it difficult to conceptualise them in the same way.

Inner workings

To generate a more nuanced typology of authoritarian legislatures, we need more research on their effects and inner workings in different regimes. Recent studies have paved the way for emerging research agendas, for instance on understanding legislators’ backgrounds, the work of committees in developing countries, and legislative amendments. Advancing along these lines will help us to move beyond current debates on authoritarian parliaments.

As almost every country has a legislature, it makes little sense to debate if they matter or not. Instead, we should ask ourselves more specifically where, when, for what, and for whom legislatures in authoritarian regimes matter.

We must move beyond asking whether a legislature exists to ask where, when, for what, and for whom legislatures in authoritarian regimes matter

Empirically, this also entails moving beyond treating the mere existence of a legislature as an indicator of anything. A legislature may or may not be constraining the executive. It may or may not be active in lawmaking. And so forth.

Future research should therefore also strive for more comprehensive data collection efforts concerning legislatures in authoritarian regimes. Geddes, Wright, and Frantz, for instance, only include a question on whether the legislature houses an opposition in their dataset. This can give us an idea about parliaments’ potential for co-optation but is not enough when studying legislatures.

Comparison and context

While it may be challenging to collect more comparative data across parliaments, such efforts will be extremely rewarding. Understanding the extent to which they perform all functions mentioned above goes beyond the mere study of legislatures. It will also shed light more generally on issues of elite politics, redistribution as well as political economy, and regime stability in authoritarian regimes.

By Felix Wiebrecht

Postdoctoral Research Fellow, V-Dem Institute, University of Gothenburg

Felix’s research focuses on authoritarian legislatures and elite politics, both globally and sometimes on China specifically.

His work has featured in Democratization, Policy & Politics, and the  Journal of East Asian Studies.

Felix is also the Co-Organiser of the Authoritarian Political Systems Group.

felixwiebrecht.com

He tweets @FelixWiebrecht

This post was originally published in The Loop. The original piece is available here: https://theloop.ecpr.eu/the-black-box-of-authoritarian-legislatures/

Categories
Blog

Keeping an eye on the money we don’t have. Parliament’s oversight role on public debt 

Always be prepared for the next crisis. It seems that public debt spiraling out of control is on track to becoming the next global crisis.

Did you know that twenty-five of the poorest countries currently spend more on debt repayments than on education, health and social policy combined? Sixty percent of low- and middle-income developing countries are highly debt vulnerable. Public debt is currently at the highest level globally in over fifty years and triple its 2008 level. National economies might collapse, as we have seen recently in Sri Lanka. 

The origins of this situation are, among others, the COVID-19 crisis and its economic and financial impact, and debt management practices which might not have been very prudent.

But it is not all doom and gloom. There are ways to conduct public debt management in a responsible and accountable way. While public debt has traditionally been managed by the Ministry of Finance and executive agencies, there is increasing recognition of the unique roles for parliament in the governance of public debt. The role of parliaments is to ask questions, to scrutinize, to provide quality assurance of the process, and to ask what the priorities are. Parliaments are increasingly taking on this challenge, as we have seen in – for instance – Kenya, Zambia, Georgia, the Maldives, and the Caribbean.

In its submission to the UK House of Common’s International Development Committee’s inquiry, Westminster Foundation for Democracy (WFD) suggested that the UK’s international development policies can be strengthened by including a public debt accountability lens through an enhanced role for parliaments in oversight of public debt. There are six incentives as to why national parliaments in partner countries can play a more active legislative and oversight role with regards to public debt:

  1. It serves as a catalyst for greater debt transparency.
  2. It helps to establish and implement a stronger legal framework on public debt management.
  3. It strengthens oversight over government policies and spending.
  4. It protects the national interest in emergency contexts and highlights the gendered effects of public debt.
  5. It unearths the risks of State-Owned Enterprises becoming a major cause of debt accumulation and debt crises.
  6. It contributes to deliver the requirements of successful Nature-for-Debt swaps, hence contributing to action on climate change mitigation and adaptation, for which these countries are otherwise receiving insufficient multilateral support, and to climate change finance accountability.

These six arguments for parliamentary involvement in public debt management should incentivise the UK and others making parliamentary oversight on public debt management one of the criteria for their debt relief schemes. Strengthening the governance and domestic accountability in debt relief schemes will contribute to prudent debt management and more sustainable economies.

However, based on our interaction with a range of parliaments globally, there are three main challenges. Firstly, parliaments might struggle with the technical nature of public debt questions. MPs and parliamentary staff might feel weary and intimidated about the complexity of the subject matter. Secondly, parliaments often do not have access to the relevant data to exercise oversight on public debt as the documentation is not shared by the executive. Fortypercent of low-income developing countries have never published public debt data or have not updated information in the past couple of years, and lenders such as China apply strict nondisclosure clauses. So, there is a need to bridge the information disconnect between the executive and the legislature. Thirdly, private sector lending has increased sharply in recent years, accounting for nearly 20% of loans to east and southern Africa. Often sold on to other private companies, including hedge funds and vulture funds, private lending is notoriously opaque as revealed by scandals in countries ranging from Mozambique to Malaysia.

To assist parliaments in facing these challenges, WFD is rolling out targeted support to parliaments through pilot assessments in public debt oversight, tailor-made learning and knowledge building, and parliamentary assistance programmes. Together with the National Democratic Institute (NDI), WFD recently published four new policy briefs. The briefs explain that, while most countries do have a financial administration act, far fewer countries have specific public debt legislation in place. Setting a legal framework for public debt management is one of parliament’s key tasks. The briefs outline best practices in the implementation and monitoring of a legal debt framework and the ratification of loan agreements. Beyond parliament’s legislative role, the briefs also cover parliament’s oversight role of public debt, and oversight over public debt in emergency contexts. The way how public debt was managed during the COVID-19 crisis has informed the brief on emergency context, though it is applicable to other potential future emergencies as well.

In addition, WFD developed a baseline assessment methodology on parliaments and public debt oversight and an e-course for parliamentarians, parliamentary staff, civil society and those engaged in public financial management. The e-course explores the concepts, mechanisms and risks which impact public debt management, and brings together expert contributors, country examples and interactive exercises.

In conclusion, it is worth mentioning that parliament’s capacity to oversee public debt management is very much linked to the depth of parliamentary scrutiny throughout the budget cycle, the resources available to committees, parliament’s oversight practices in general, and its ability to work collaboratively with civil society to enhance the political space to upscale transparency. 

Solid and accountable public debt management is not only the task of the government borrowing money. It is also a responsibility of the lenders — lending countries and lending international institutions — to ensure due diligence of the viability of the economic projects and of the rationale underpinning borrowing requests. Hence, the current initiative of revitalizing the UNCTAD principles on the promotion of sovereign lending and borrowing cannot be timelier and will hopefully contribute to avoiding a next global crisis of public debt spiraling out of control.

Franklin De Vrieze,
Head of Practice Accountability, Westminster Foundation for Democracy.

Categories
Urgent Questions

Professor Pete Dorey

PETE DOREY

Pete Dorey is Professor of British Politics at Cardiff University. He is the co-author of House of Lords reform since 1911: Must the Lords go? (Palgrave Macmillan) and the textbook Exploring British Politics (Routledge).

Please tell us a little bit about how you entered academia and your academic career

I’d always been vaguely interested in politics as long as I can remember, not from my parents, but somehow instinctively. I vaguely recall seeing some racist graffiti when I was about 9 or 10 years old, and instinctively being disgusted by it, and that, I think, prompted my curiosity about how people think (or don’t!), and what consequences that had on society in general, and people in particular. Once I started my degree at Sussex University, I knew I wanted to be an academic – I was interested in British politics, wanted to enthuse others in the way that I’d been inspired by my teachers, and loved writing, so becoming a Politics lecturer, teaching and publishing, seemed a natural career path to pursue. Besides, I could never envisage myself doing a corporate 9-5 job and wearing a suit!

Which five books/articles (written by someone else) have been most important to you in your academic career?

Ralph Miliband: The State in Capitalist Society – lent to me as summer holiday reading by my A-Level Sociology tutor. I have always been very grateful to her. It remains one of my favourite books about power and inequality in Britain; it is still relevant.

Ian Gilmour: Dancing With Dogma: Britain Under Thatcherism – the best critique of Thatcherism and its consequences, written by an eloquently despairing One Nation Tory.

Philip Norton: The Commons in Perspective – read this while doing my PhD at Hull University, and it prompted my life-long academic interest in Parliament.

John Kingdon: Agendas, Alternatives, and Public Policies – fascinating study about the interplay between problem-definition (including the role of ideas and ideology in ‘constructing’ problems), policy-formulation and adoption, and the need for the correct political circumstances to exist for policy change to be enacted, or else the problem/policy falls off the agenda.

George Orwell: The Lion and the Unicorn – Brilliant collection of essays on British politics, culture and national identity, and although published in 1941, many of his observations and criticisms are still relevant today.

Which person has been most influential and important to you in your academic career?

My A-Level English Lit, Politics, and Sociology, tutors at 6th Form, and also my Form Tutor who taught History; they all seemed to discern some academic potential in me, nurtured an intellectual curiosity (and lent me books), and encouraged me to apply for university – not something which anyone in my family had ever considered: “education is not for the likes of us.”

I also felt privileged to have been taught, at Leeds University, by the late David Coates, whose inspiring teaching reinforced by desire to pursue an academic career. We kept in touch thereafter, even after he’d emigrated to the United States.

Which of your own pieces of research are you most proud of?

I usually compare my publications unfavourably to those of the many more prestigious and prominent academics – Imposter Syndrome, I guess – but I was proud that my 2010 British Conservatism: The Politics and Philosophy of Inequality was awarded a PSA prize.

What has been your greatest achievement in academia?

Writing, co-authoring or editing 18 books – so far!

What has been your greatest disappointment in academia?

Seeing universities transformed into soulless corporate businesses, replete with concomitant business jargon and management-speak, academics ‘proletarianized’ and micro-managed, and the slavish obsession with the REF and ‘grant capture’. Those of us who still believe in the educative, pedagogic and scholarly function of universities are made to feel that we are dinosaurs. I utterly despair at what has been done to British Higher Education by successive governments since the 1990s, and the unconcealed contempt with which they have treated academics; pandering to a philistine English anti-intellectualism.

What is the first or most important thing you tell your students about parliaments?

That if Parliament did not exist, it would have to be invented, and the importance of the ‘hidden face of power’ (Bachrach and Baratz) or ‘anticipated reactions’ which act as subtle constraints on Ministers and the Executive much of the time.

Where were you born, where did you grow up, and where do you live now?

Born and raised in Lancing (nowheresville), about 10 miles west of Brighton, but have always considered myself to be a proud Brightonian. There was absolutely nothing to do in Lancing, and I couldn’t wait to move away to a city. Since leaving, I have lived in Brighton, Leeds, Bristol and now Bath, where I live with my wife (having been married for 24 years).

What was your first job?

A paper-round while at school (at Christmas-time, I learned that the poorest people were the most generous tippers, and vice versa – I’m sure this helped shape my formative political values!), then a supermarket shelf-stacker on Saturdays and in school-holidays while at sixth-form. First academic job was a one-year Lectureship at Bath University, covering for the late, great, Elizabeth Meehan while she was on research leave.

What was the toughest job you ever had?

Temporary post-person in Leeds in the run-up to Christmas while I was a PhD student. The permanent posties thought it amusing to give the student ‘casuals’ the heaviest postbags, and delivery rounds in the least salubrious parts of Leeds. I was allocated two of the (then) most ‘renowned’ council estates, Gipton, and Halton Moor, where many gardens had an Alsatian or Rottweiler roaming free.

What  would your ideal job be, if not an academic?

As I love books, either a Librarian or working in a bookshop.

What are your hobbies?

Reading, independent cinema, gigs, attending plays at Bath Theatre Royal, curries, watching TV crime dramas and natural history documentaries, wine-tasting – have passed Level 1 of the Wine & Spirit Education Trust, coastal and riverside walks, European city-breaks.

What are your favourite novels?

Anything by my favourite author, Haruki Murakami – brilliantly imaginative writer whose stories have a slightly surreal quality to them.

The Handmaid’s Tale – Margaret Atwood’s harrowing dystopian novel which now tragically reads like current affairs.

The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet – David Mitchell’s wonderfully imaginative tale set in the era of late 18th century Dutch-Japanese trading; great characters and sparkling dialogue.  

Birdsong – Sebastian Faulks’ beautifully written intergenerational First World War saga.

The Wasp Factory – Iain Banks’ part-mischievous, part-macabre story.

The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists – Robert Tressell’s classis socialist novel – not much seems to have changed since it was published in 1914, in terms of the conservative and deferential attitudes of much of the working class.

What is your favourite music?

Music (rock/Indie/Glam) is very important to me, so I could not name just one album. My favourites include: Led Zeppelin – Volume IV and Physical Graffiti; Mott The Hoople – Mott; David Bowie – Aladdin Sane; The Stranglers – Rattus Norvegicus; Hawkwind – The Space Ritual; Portishead – Dummy; P. J. Harvey – Let England Shake; Manic Street Preachers – The Holy Bible; Pulp – Different Class; The Clash – Give ‘Em Enough Rope; Joy Division – Closer; Mitski – Be The Cowboy; Asian Dub Foundation – Tank; J. S. Bach – The Brandenburg Concertos.

Plus any albums by Half Man Half Biscuit, Klaus Nomi, Killing Joke, Wire, The Cure, Suede, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, Psychedelic Furs, Mazzy Star, and Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry.

Basically, I’m an ageing Indie-kid who also likes dub-reggae!

Two film soundtracks I adore: Jocelyn Pook; ‘The Masked Ball’ (from Eyes Wide Shut and also Killing Joke’s ‘intro
music’ at gigs); Michael Nyman: ‘Memorial (from The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover).

What is your favourite film?

The Wicker Man – everything about it; the plot, the crackling dialogue, the quirky local characters, Christopher Lee’s fantastic role as Lord Summerisle, the slightly sinister soundtrack of supposedly Scottish folk-songs, and the totally mesmerising ending when Edward Woodward (Sergeant Howie) meets his tragic fate.

Pulp Fiction – Stellar performances from Uma Thurman, John Travolta, and Samuel L. Jackson, skilful juxtaposing of scenes from different time-frames, some superb dialogue and dark, desert-dry, humour.

Eyes Wide Shut – Weirdly wonderful, while sometimes exuding a somewhat sinister or menacing undercurrent, particularly ‘The Masked Ball’ scene. Great soundtrack.

What is your favourite building?

The Brotherton Library, Leeds University – I have such fond memories of studying in it while a postgraduate. Also, because it is on a slight hill, when you leave the building, Leeds city-centre is laid-out in front of you at the bottom of Woodhouse Lane. The library is also an iconic landmark which can be seen from many parts of Leeds.

What is your favourite tv show?

Crime dramas like Spiral, Mare of Easttown, Crimson Rivers, and ITV’s 1980s’ series of Sherlock Holmes starring Jeremy Brett. For laughter, Fawlty Towers, Have I Got News For You and Would I Lie to You.

What is your favourite holiday destination?

For adventure and/or experiencing different cultures – India, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Costa Rica, Brazil.

For city-breaks – Aix-en-Provence, Bordeaux, Brighton, Bruges (my sister-in-law lives there!), Buenos Aires, Cascais, Istanbul, New Orleans, Paris, Porto, Prague, Sitges, and Venice.

What is your favourite sport?

Football – not to play, but because I am a life-long supporter of Brighton & Hove Albion.

Cricket – I love listening to Test Match Special in the summer while I am writing; the whimsical conversations and anecdotes are often more entertaining than the actual cricket!

What is your favourite food?

I love curries – fortunately, there is a marvellous family-run Bangladeshi restaurant just a 10-minute walk from our house. The curries are consistently delicious. We go once or twice each month, and are on first-name terms with all the lovely staff.

Hybrid proceedings in Parliament: yes please or no thanks?

Preferably not, unless an MP has carer or primary childcare responsibilities.

Appointed or elected upper chamber?

Appointed, but entirely by an independent commission on the basis of expertise or experience from all walks of life, and reflecting Britain’s demographics, in terms of ethnicity, gender, and sexuality.

Restoration or Renewal?

Gradual renewal under the guise of restoration!

Cat or Dog?

Dog (Labrador).

Trains, planes or automobiles?

Trains – I like long train journeys where I can either write on my laptop, or immerse myself in a book.

Fish and chips or Curry?

Curry, obviously; see answer above!

Scones: Devonshire or Cornish Method?

I don’t eat scones, so have no opinion.

And, finally, a question asked by Seth, who has just turned 10: Who is your best friend and why?

My wife, Jane – she really is my soulmate. We share the same social values and political views; like the same indie-bands and dub-reggae, and regularly going to gigs (7-8 per year); have the same dark or dry sense of humour; love going for curries; like new world chardonnay and wine-tasting courses; share a love of literature and are always recommending or sharing books; have read The Guardian since our teens (to the dismay of our parents); and shared many adventure holidays together – backpacking around India/Vietnam/Cambodia, safari in Kenya, piranha-fishing in Brazil, and most recently, and best of all, trekking through the rain-forests of Costa Rica, successfully searching for tarantulas, scorpions, venomous snakes, poison dart frogs, and exotic birds.

Categories
Blog Uncategorized

The Butterfly Effect: Representation as Fractal Politics

What does a coastline have in common with effective rhetoric? Each component resembles something bigger, and bigger, and bigger. And what can this sort of fractal pattern show us about politics? To Alex Prior, fractals illustrate successful representation, and the impulses that drive it

‘As above, so below’

In launching the ‘Science of Democracy’ blog series, Jean-Paul Gagnon argues that democracy’s words require a new narrative. Agustín Goenaga credits Gagnon with a ‘living archive’ of stories. As I have argued previously, the best way of understanding narratives and stories – and their importance to democracy – is through their fractal nature.

Fractals are patterns; we see them constantly. They are in trees, lightning, coastlines. If you zoom in on any of those images, they still resemble themselves. This is self-similarity, a defining characteristic of fractals.

Self-similarity is a defining characteristic of fractals and of representation, which makes present what is not physically there

It is also a characteristic of representation (in its many forms): ‘making something present’, typically by acting on something or someone’s behalf. The notion that we can make present what is not physically there (a constituency, an idea, or anything else) is central to my research on parliamentary systems. Such systems depend on representatives making others’ voices and values present.

Fractal politics?

Self-similarity – and recursion (the repetition of a structure with continual reference, at each stage, to the structure itself) – is applicable to politics in many ways. For example, some advocate ‘fractal democracy’ as a practical model of governance. Says Jasper Sky: ‘Groups of seven people each choose one representative, and those seven representatives then meet to choose a representative, and so on, up several levels of representation…[with] the person at the top of the fractal hierarchy to be held fully accountable at every level.’

Fractals also give us a conceptual framework for politics. ‘Fractal politics’, writes Gordon Fletcher, ‘reflects the sociological sensibility that people seek out self-similarity in the form of opinions and worldviews that align with their own identity’. Fractals can help us understand not only political communication and support, but the ways in which we interact with our own social reality.

But how can we study (or even conceptualise) these opinions and those who ‘make’ them? And what does it really mean to seek out self-similarity (i.e., to seek ourselves) in the opinions and worldviews of others? The answer to both questions lies in representation.

A fractal reading of representation

Fractals can be read into theoretical works on representation, such as those of Derrida, who contends that ‘[e]verything begins by referring back (par le renvoi), that is to say, does not begin’. Derrida’s description centres around self-similarity and recursion (‘referring back’), as well as infinite replicability (‘does not begin’).

So far, so fractal. But fractals are even more relevant to contemporary representation theory. Saward’s theory of the representative claim identifies how ‘[m]akers of representative claims suggest to the potential audience: (1) you are/are part of this audience, (2) you should accept this view, this construction — this representation — of yourself, and (3) you should accept me as speaking and acting for you.’

Representation is a ‘claim’ made to an audience about the maker of the claim (a politician, for example), about what they ‘stand for’, and about that audience

Saward shows us how representation works. It is a ‘claim’ (or a series of claims) made to an audience about the maker of the claim (a politician, for example), about what they ‘stand for’, and about that audience.

A representative claim can be made at different scales (e.g., to a person, a group, a region), sometimes simultaneously. It is also accepted or rejected (i.e., interpreted) by audiences at many different scales (e.g., myself as an individual, as a citizen, as a person, etc). Fractals are invaluable in helping to conceptualise the way that representative claims in politics and beyond connect (or fail to connect) with their audience.

Effective (and ineffective) representative claims, in fractals

Consider Obama’s effective ‘yes we can’ 2008 slogan. People saw themselves within this slogan, at many (potentially infinite) scales:

Figure 1: An effective representative claim

Representative claim 'Yes we can' mapped out down to a fractal level, in a triangle figure

The left image resembles the right image at every scale. Effective representative claims resemble the audience at every level; audience members identify themselves within (with/in) the claim. We thereby read effective representative claims as successful appeals to self-similarity.

This process is not always successful. On 4 June 1958, against the backdrop of the Algerian War of Independence and the collapse of the Fourth Republic, Charles De Gaulle arrived in Algiers and uttered the famous words Je vous ai compris! [I understood you!]. To this day it is unclear who De Gaulle was addressing: Algerians? French Algeria? Colonists? The military?

Figure 2: An ineffective representative claim

Representative claim 'I understood you' mapped as a square figure, that is not fractal

The failure of this representative claim lies in a failed appeal to self-similarity. It failed to reflect (or even define) an audience at any scale.

Self-similarity matters for the maker of the representative claim, not just the audience. Obama included himself (‘we’) in a claim of common purpose, with/in which the audience recognised themselves. De Gaulle’s claim (‘I understood you’) lacks self-similarity. Audience members were left wondering who ‘they’ were, who De Gaulle was, and who/what he ‘stood for’.

Why fractals matter

The mathematician Edward Norton Lorenz is closely associated with chaos theory and the ‘butterfly effect’, by which small initial variations eventually yield drastic outcomes. For example – a person writes a short essay in Canberra; later, I see a broad and rich international academic debate. Fractals are a component of chaos, and a means of visualising it.

Studying representation in action (via fractals) clarifies the appeal of self-similarity, and why some statements are all-encompassing in their alienation

They also provide a means of studying narratives and stories within a ‘science of democracy’. Moreover, studying representation in action (via fractals) clarifies the appeal of self-similarity. We seek patterns, and we seek ourselves. This matters in terms of content and context. Alongside the political statements and patterns discussed earlier, consider that Obama reflected an audience (‘we’) descriptively and symbolically, in a way that De Gaulle could not, and arguably never claimed to (‘I…you’).

Fractals show us how ambiguous (but ostensibly all-encompassing) political and other statements are, in practice. They are all-encompassing only inasmuch as they alienate everyone at the same time. This mattered in 1958, it mattered in 2008, and it matters today.

By Alex Prior, Lecturer in Politics with International Relations, London South Bank University

Alex’s research focuses on public engagement with parliaments and other political institutions. His work also discusses the usefulness of narratives and storytelling in conceptualising, as well as strengthening, political engagement. He tweets @VoterEngagement

This post was originally posted on The Loop blog. See the original post here: https://theloop.ecpr.eu/the-butterfly-effect-representation-as-fractal-politics/

Categories
Blog

Breaking the Glass Chamber: Women, Politics and Parliament, 1945-1997

By Anna Muggeridge

Throughout the second half of the twentieth century, women struggled to achieve political representation at the highest levels and at times, what progress and gains had been made could be lost. The number of women sitting in the House of Commons at any one time, for example, did not slowly but steadily increase. Fewer women were elected in the general election of 1951 than had been elected in 1950; fewer in 1966 than in 1964, and fewer in 1979 than (October) 1974. 1979 famously saw the first woman Prime Minister, but Margaret Thatcher’s relationship with feminism and the wider women’s movement is but one contentious aspect of her premiership. Notably, Thatcher only appointed one woman to a Cabinet position (Baroness Young, who served for just two years) and when Thatcher herself resigned and was replaced by John Major, the country had no women in Cabinet until 1992, when Gillian Shephard and Virginia Bottomley were appointed Education and Health Secretaries respectively. The first Black woman MP, Diane Abbott, was not elected until 1987, almost seven decades after the first white woman, Nancy Astor, took her seat in 1919. And in 1997, Labour’s landslide victory saw more than 100 women elected but this achievement was diminished and trivialised by labelling them ‘Blair’s Babes’. The story of women parliamentarians, and indeed women’s wider engagement with politics, through these years is therefore more nuanced and complex than an initial glance might suggest, and there is still much to be discovered about their experiences.

In September, the Mile End Institute at Queen Mary, University of London, will host a conference which seeks to bring together historians, political scientists, and sociologists to generate new conversations, relationships, and understandings of what politics meant to and for women in the second half of the twentieth century. In addition, the conference will play host to a number of current and former female members of both the House of Commons and the House of Lords, who will reflect on their own experiences, including Baroness Angela Browning, Dame Margaret Hodge, Baroness Estelle Morris, Baroness Emma Nicholson, Baroness Dawn Primarolo, Baroness Gillian Shephard, and Siân James. We will also hear from campaign groups including 50:50 Parliament and the Fawcett Society, who will lead discussions about the future of women in politics. Keynote lectures by historians, sociologists and political scientists – including Professor Laura Beers, Professor Julie Gottleib, Professor Khursheed Wadia, Professor Clarisse Berthèzene, and Professor Sarah Childs, will enable scholars to reflect on the different insights and perspectives from cutting edge research on women in political campaigns, parties and institutions.

It is only by drawing together those working in a range of disciplines, as well as those with direct experience of working in and with parliament, that a true picture of women’s experiences in politics in this period will start to emerge. More significantly, the conference offers the opportunity to develop new directions in research into women’s politics in the later twentieth century, shaping the questions and lines of enquiry of current and future researchers into this relatively understudied area of British political history.

Papers at the conference will address a variety of local, national and international themes. With talks by, for instance, Micaela Panes on women’s activism in South Wales before the 1970s; Tom Chidwick on women’s role in the campaign for a Scottish Assembly, and Charitini Ntini on women’s in the Provisional IRA during the Troubles in Northern Ireland, we ask how far national identities impacted on gendered politics in this period. Other papers explore women’s experiences on the international stage, something which has often been overlooked, such as Richard Johnson’s examination of women and Euroscepticism or Charlotte Lydia Riley’s analysis of women and British overseas development policy.

A number of talks will explore the experiences of women from minoritized backgrounds in this period. Farah Hussain’s timely keynote invites us to consider the role Muslim women play and have played within the Labour party. Beckie Rutherford asks how disabled women conceived of themselves as ‘political’, while Ashlee Christofferson will address the whiteness of ‘sex discrimination’ legislation. While there may, broadly speaking, have been progress in terms of the number of women sitting in Parliament between 1945 and 1997, there is still much opportunity to reflect on how other aspects of individuals’ identities—their race, class, sexuality or religion, for example—intersected with their gender within and outside the House of Commons.

Indeed, many of the papers at the conference will address campaigns which did not (necessarily) take place within parliament, such as Rose Debenham’s talk on the women of Greenham Common; Frances Galt’s research into women’s industrial disputes around the time of the 1970 Equal Pay Act, or Grace Heaton’s analysis of women’s roles in the campaign for the ordination of women. At the same time, other papers will consider how structures, institutions and cultures worked to exclude women: and how women sought to break down these barriers: with Emma Lundin providing a comparative perspective on gender quotas and gatekeeping strategies and Gillian Murphy reflecting on the post-war lobbying group Women for Westminster.

The conference therefore offers a unique opportunity for academics, politicians, policymakers and campaigners to come together to discuss the female political experience in the second half of the twentieth century, and, in so doing, open up new directions for current and future research. We very much hope that you will join us at the Mile End Institute at Queen Mary, University of London from Thursday 15 to Saturday 17 September. Details of how to watch the main sessions if you are not able to attend in person will be available nearer the time. You can view the full programme and sign up for tickets at the MEI website.

Dr Anna Muggeridge is Lecturer in History at the University of Worcester and a Visiting Research Fellow at the Mile End Institute.

Categories
News

June 2022 Newsletter

We hope that you are keeping safe and well. We have some updates for you in our last newsletter of the academic year:

  1. PSA Parliaments Annual Conference 2022
  2. PSA Parliaments Undergraduate Essay Competition 2022
  3. Urgent Questions with Mark Shephard
  4. Book Launch: Accountability, Impeachment, and the Constitution
  5. Report Launch: Public Attitudes to Institutional Reform in Northern Ireland
  6. Petition against Job Losses at De Montford University
  7. Jobs at the University of Birmingham
  8. PSA Diverse Voices Scholarships 2022/23
  9. New Newsletter from IPSA’s Research Committee of Legislative Specialists
  10. Recent Publications that have Caught Our Eye
  11. Recently on the Blog

If you have any notices/messages you would like us to circulate to our prizewinning group, please let us know.

We hope you have a lovely summer. See you in September.

1. PSA Parliaments Annual Conference 2022

We can’t remember if we’ve already mentioned it but PSA Parliaments won Specialist Group of the Year at the PSA awards ceremony!

Our Annual Conference will be held at The Exchange in Birmingham and online on 3rd-4th November 2022.

The theme of the conference is What Next?

Full details of the conference, including how to submit proposals, can be found here.

We are very much excited to be meeting up in person after two years of online conferences and we hope to see as many of you there as possible!

2. PSA Parliaments Undergraduate Essay Competition 2022

Our 2022 Undergraduate Essay Competition is still open for entrants until Monday 6th June. The winner will be presented with a prize of £100 and a runner-up prize of £50 at our annual conference in November 2022.

The competition is open to all undergraduate students who have submitted a piece of assessed work which contributes to our understanding of parliaments or legislatures.

Full details of the competition can be found here.

3. Urgent Questions with Mark Shephard

This month’s interviewee is Dr Mark Shephard, Deputy Editor of Journal of Legislative Studies and Joint Chair of the Study of Scottish Parliament Group.

Head over to Urgent Questions to read about Houston, Kate Bush and the Kate Bush of Parliamentary Studies, and Prawns!

4. Book Launch: Accountability, Impeachment, and the Constitution

We are delighted to announce that PSA Parliaments will be co-hosting the book launch of Chris Monaghan’s forthcoming monograph Accountability, Impeachment, and the Constitution (Routledge).

The launch will take place virtually on Wednesday 8th June 2022 at 2pm BST. The speakers are:

  • Chris Monaghan (University of Worcester)
  • Matthew Flinders (University of Sheffield)
  • Alison Young (University of Cambridge)

Full details of the event, including how to register, can be found here.

5. Report Launch: Public Attitudes to Institutional Reform in Northern Ireland

Sean Haughey and Jamie Bow will be launching their report “Public Attitudes to Institutional Reform in Northern Ireland: Evidence from a Deliberative Forum” in Belfast on Thursday 9th June 2022 at 11am BST.

Full details of the event, including how to register, can be found here.

6. Petition against Job Losses at De Montford University

58 members of staff at De Montford University, including those based in the Local Governance Research Centre, are facing redundancy.

Please consider signing the petition against the job losses here.

7. Jobs at the University of Birmingham

The Department of Political Science and International Studies at the University of Birmingham are looking to make four appointments at either Assistant Professor or Associate Professor level with one of the sub-disciplinary areas mentioned in the advert being ‘Democracy, Representation and Accountability’.

Further details of the jobs can be found here and here.

8. PSA Diverse Voices Scholarships 2022/23

The PSA has recently launched a new initiative to support black and minority ethnic scholars currently undertaking PhD study in politics and international relations and are looking to award three Diverse Voices Scholarships in 2022 to students who meet both the following criteria:

  • A PhD student (in their second or final year in 2022/23 academic year) affiliated to a UK Higher Education Institution; and,
  • Those self-identified as Black British, Asian British, or minority ethnic UK permanent residents.

Full details of the scholarships, including how to apply, can be found here.

9. New Newsletter for the Research Committee of Legislative Specialists

Our good friends at the International Political Science Association’s Research Committee of Legislative Specialists have launched the first of their re-vamped newsletters.

You can read the newsletter here and you can join RCLS for free and receive future newsletters here.

10. Recent Publications that have Caught Our Eye

Emmeline Ledgerwood has published ‘Armed with the necessary background of knowledge’: embedding science scrutiny mechanisms in the UK Parliament in the British Journal for the History of Science.

Caroline Bhattacharya has published Restrictive rules of speechmaking as a tool to maintain party unity: The case of oppressed political conflict in German parliament debates on the euro crisis in Party Politics.

Patrícia Calca has published a monograph Executive-Legislative Relations in Parliamentary Systems Policy-Making and Legislative Processes with Palgrave Macmillan.

The Inter-Parliamentary Union have published their third Global Parliamentary Report which examines public engagement in the work of parliament.

And, finally, a new issue of Legislative Studies Quarterly has been published.

If you would like your published research to be featured in this section, please email Stephen with details.

11. Recently on the Blog

We published one great blog this month:

If you have an idea for a blog on some aspect of parliamentary study, please get in touch with our communications officer, Chris.

Categories
Events News

PSA Parliaments at #PSA22

The PSA Annual International Conference (PSA22) was held last month in York and online, providing an opportunity for our fantastic community of scholars and practitioners in parliamentary and legislative studies to finally meet up in person, three years after the last PSA in Nottingham in 2019, but also allowing others to contribute virtually through the hybrid proceedings.

The PSA Annual International Conference (PSA22) was held last month in York and online, providing an opportunity for our fantastic community of scholars and practitioners in parliamentary and legislative studies to finally meet up in person, three years after the last PSA in Nottingham in 2019, but also allowing others to contribute virtually through the hybrid proceedings.

We were delighted to host an exceptional and very well attended programme of PSA Parliament panels, featuring ground-breaking research on parliaments and legislatures from around the globe, across five panels and a roundtable on Monday 11th and Tuesday 12th April.

Monday started with our panel How to be a parliamentarian? Representation and roles, in which David C.W. Parker and Jeffrey L. Lazarus (Montana State University-Bozeman, Georgia State University) explored public spending and constituency data in the UK Parliament; Caroline Bhattacharya, Stephen Holden Bates, Stephen McKay (University of Helsinki, University of Birmingham, University of Lincoln) considered how the roles of backbench MPs’ roles changed between 1979 and 2019. Luai Allarakia (University of Richmond) examined conflict within Kuwait’s National Assembly and Omomayowa Olawale Abati (Stellenbosch University) considered youth representation in Nigeria’s Lower National Legislature.

We hosted a roundtable during Monday lunchtime, chaired by Cristina Leston-Bandeira and Louise Thompson, as part of the planning process for a second edition of the successful Exploring Parliament textbook. The roundtable featured the most senior official in the House of Lords—the Clerk of the Parliaments, Simon Burton, and House of Commons Principal Clerk, Farrah Bhatti, in addition to leading parliamentary scholars Sarah Childs and Jack Sheldon.

Our final Monday panel How to be a parliamentarian: how do Members participate? featured Donald Keya Manyala and Benson Inzofu Mwale (Parliament of Kenya) presenting their paper: Participation of Minority Legislators in Legislative Business at the National Assembly of Kenya; Alia Middleton, Louise Thompson (University of Surrey, University of Manchester) examining the parliamentary lives of former UK Prime Ministers and Joel Martinsson (Linnaeus University / Swedish Parliament) considering when and why Swedish parliamentarians submit motions on behalf of special interest organizations.

On Tuesday our day started with Felix Wiebrecht, (The Chinese University of Hong Kong) presenting his research on legislatures in authoritarian regimes; James Strong (Queen Mary University of London) exploring whether UK War Powers Convention fundamentally changed the House of Commons’ influence over the use of force;Temitayo Odeyemi, Cristina Leston-Bandeira, Alexander Beresford (University of Leeds) considering non-state actors and Nigeria’s national-subnational legislative public engagement; and Alexandra Meakin (University of Leeds) discussing public engagement and the Restoration and Renewal of the Palace of Westminster, as part of our panel Parliamentary powers, prerogatives, and public engagement.

Our second panel of the day, How MPs use old and new media and how old and new media affects MPs, started with research from James Weinberg (University of Sheffield) on the mental health of politicians in the UK, Canada and South Africa; Tevfik Murat Yildirim, Gunnar Thesen (University of Stavanger, Norway) then discussed the public visibility of Members of Parliament in the UK and Sebastian Ludwicki-Ziegler (University of Stirling) explored parliamentarians’ communication strategies.

Our final panel of the day (and conference!), on Comparative and inter-parliamentary analysis included papers from Margaret Arnott (University of the West of Scotland) interparliamentary relations in the devolved UK; André Vella (University of Birmingham) on parliamentary privilege in Commonwealth legislatures; Franklin De Vrieze (Westminster Foundation for Democracy) on the oversight role of parliaments in public debt management; and finally Sebastian Ludwicki-Ziegler, Mark Shephard (University of Stirling, University of Strathclyde) comparing personal attacks and positive self-reference in exchanges between the Conservatives and SNP in PMQs and FMQs.

Thank you to all our paper-givers and attendees (virtual and in-person) for sharing your research and offering excellent perspectives and questions the papers provided. Thank you also the local University of York team for convening the conference, and to Grace Cooper who ensured all the tech ran smoothly.

The location of the next PSA conference has been announced as Liverpool and we look forward to yet another excellent set of parliaments panels.

Categories
News

May 2022 Newsletter

We hope that you are keeping safe and well. We have some prizewinning updates for you:

  1. Prizes, Prizes, Prizes at #PSA22
  2. PSA Parliaments Roundup at #PSA22
  3. PSA Parliaments Annual Conference 2022: Date for Your Diary
  4. PSA Parliaments in Parliamentary Affairs
  5. PSA Parliaments Undergraduate Essay Competition 2022
  6. Urgent Questions with Louise Thompson
  7. Book Launch: Held in contempt: What’s wrong with the House of Commons?
  8. Book Launch: Accountability, Impeachment, and the Constitution
  9. New Website for the Research Committee of Legislative Specialists
  10. Other Events: Global Conference on Parliamentary Studies
  11. Call for Chapters: Routledge Handbook of Applied Political Management
  12. Job: Research Fellow in French Politics & Social Media, University of Nottingham
  13. Recent Publications that have Caught Our Eye
  14. Recently on the Blog

If you have any notices/messages you would like us to circulate to our prizewinning group, please let us know.

1. Prizes, Prizes, Prizes at #PSA22

We can’t remember if we’ve already mentioned it but PSA Parliaments won Specialist Group of the Year at the PSA awards ceremony!

The PSA said:

“The study of parliaments is one of the longest-standing yet also most vibrant and modern areas of British political science. The PSA is delighted to be able to recognise the considerable efforts of its Parliaments specialist group in contributing to this. In difficult circumstances since 2020, this specialist group has played an exemplary role in maintaining – indeed, in some respects enhancing – its own activities. The judges were particularly impressed by its communications with members and the high quality of the events that it organises. Recent years have seen several members of this specialist group win individual PSA prizes, further testament not only to the vitality of work in this area but of the continuing strength of the Parliaments group.”

Whoop!

As mentioned in the commendation, there were also prizes for several members and friends of the PSA Parliaments group:

  • Philip Norton won the Sir Isaiah Berlin Lifetime Achievement Prize!
  • Louise Thompson won the Richard Rose Prize for a distinctive contribution to the study of British Politics!
  • Sarah Childs won the WJM Mackenzie Prize for the best book published in political science for her co-authored book with Karen Celis Feminist Democratic Representation!
  • Steven MacGregor won the Walter Bagehot Prize for the best dissertation in the field of government and public administration for his thesis Does government dominate the legislative process?
  • The Institute for Government won the Political Communicator of the Year Prize!

Whoop whoop!

2. PSA Parliaments Roundup at #PSA22

The PSA Annual International Conference (PSA22) was held last month in York and online, providing an opportunity for our fantastic community of scholars and practitioners in parliamentary and legislative studies to finally meet up in person, three years after the last PSA in Nottingham in 2019, but also allowing others to contribute virtually through the hybrid proceedings.

We were delighted to host an exceptional and very well attended programme of PSA Parliament panels, featuring ground-breaking research on parliaments and legislatures from around the globe, across five panels and a roundtable on Monday 11th and Tuesday 12th April.

Monday started with our panel How to be a parliamentarian? Representation and roles, in which David C.W. Parker and Jeffrey L. Lazarus (Montana State University-Bozeman, Georgia State University) explored public spending and constituency data in the UK Parliament; Caroline Bhattacharya, Stephen Holden Bates, Stephen McKay (University of Helsinki, University of Birmingham, University of Lincoln) considered how the roles of backbench MPs’ roles changed between 1979 and 2019. Luai Allarakia (University of Richmond) examined conflict within Kuwait’s National Assembly and Omomayowa Olawale Abati (Stellenbosch University) considered youth representation in Nigeria’s Lower National Legislature.

We hosted a roundtable during Monday lunchtime, chaired by Cristina Leston-Bandeira and Louise Thompson, as part of the planning process for a second edition of the successful Exploring Parliament textbook. The roundtable featured the most senior official in the House of Lords—the Clerk of the Parliaments, Simon Burton, and House of Commons Principal Clerk, Farrah Bhatti, in addition to leading parliamentary scholars Sarah Childs and Jack Sheldon.

Our final Monday panel How to be a parliamentarian: how do Members participate? featured Donald Keya Manyala and Benson Inzofu Mwale (Parliament of Kenya) presenting their paper: Participation of Minority Legislators in Legislative Business at the National Assembly of Kenya; Alia Middleton, Louise Thompson (University of Surrey, University of Manchester) examining the parliamentary lives of former UK Prime Ministers and Joel Martinsson (Linnaeus University / Swedish Parliament) considering when and why Swedish parliamentarians submit motions on behalf of special interest organizations.

On Tuesday our day started with Felix Wiebrecht, (The Chinese University of Hong Kong) presenting his research on legislatures in authoritarian regimes; James Strong (Queen Mary University of London) exploring whether UK War Powers Convention fundamentally changed the House of Commons’ influence over the use of force;Temitayo Odeyemi, Cristina Leston-Bandeira, Alexander Beresford (University of Leeds) considering non-state actors and Nigeria’s national-subnational legislative public engagement; and Alexandra Meakin (University of Leeds) discussing public engagement and the Restoration and Renewal of the Palace of Westminster, as part of our panel Parliamentary powers, prerogatives, and public engagement.

Our second panel of the day, How MPs use old and new media and how old and new media affects MPs, started with research from James Weinberg (University of Sheffield) on the mental health of politicians in the UK, Canada and South Africa; Tevfik Murat Yildirim, Gunnar Thesen (University of Stavanger, Norway) then discussed the public visibility of Members of Parliament in the UK and Sebastian Ludwicki-Ziegler (University of Stirling) explored parliamentarians’ communication strategies.

Our final panel of the day (and conference!), on Comparative and inter-parliamentary analysis included papers from Margaret Arnott (University of the West of Scotland) interparliamentary relations in the devolved UK; André Vella (University of Birmingham) on parliamentary privilege in Commonwealth legislatures; Franklin De Vrieze (Westminster Foundation for Democracy) on the oversight role of parliaments in public debt management; and finally Sebastian Ludwicki-Ziegler, Mark Shephard (University of Stirling, University of Strathclyde) comparing personal attacks and positive self-reference in exchanges between the Conservatives and SNP in PMQs and FMQs.

Thank you to all our paper-givers and attendees (virtual and in-person) for sharing your research and offering excellent perspectives and questions the papers provided. Thank you also the local University of York team for convening the conference, and to Grace Cooper who ensured all the tech ran smoothly.

The location of the next PSA conference has been announced as Liverpool and we look forward to yet another excellent set of parliaments panels.

3. PSA Parliaments Annual Conference 2022: Date for Your Diary

After two years online, we’re hoping it’s going to be third time lucky for holding our own Annual Conference in Birmingham.

Full details, including how to submit proposals, will be released soon but, for the time being, please keep Friday November 4th 2022 free.

The event will be hybrid and, as always, it will be free for members of the group.

4. PSA Parliaments in Parliamentary Affairs

In autumn 2020, we set out on a journey: a team brainstorming session gave rise to the idea of conducting a survey to map the current state of our sub-discipline, which was then followed with ideas about organising a roundtable and analysing the literature and authors of the sub-discipline more closely. And here we are, one and a half years later, with a collection of four articles and an editorial on the past, present and future of parliamentary and legislative studies, which will be published as a special section in Parliamentary Affairs in a few months. All pieces are available now as Advance articles!

In the editorial, we pose the central questions for the special section – what does the sub-discipline of parliamentary and legislative studies look like in the early 2020s, how did we get here, and where are we going? – and outline some of the problems faced by the sub-discipline.

In the article written by our team (and available open access!), we map the current state of parliamentary and legislative studies by drawing on our survey of 218 scholars from 48 countries. Concerns about an underrepresentation of women, ethnic minority and first-generation scholars seem warranted. Though most researchers use both qualitative and quantitative methods to some degree, cluster analysis identifies two groupings of academics with distinct research interests and views. A bibliometric analysis of 25 years of publications in Parliamentary Affairs, Legislative Studies Quarterly and The Journal of Legislative Studies challenges the common view that the sub-discipline is dominated by US-based/focused political science. There is an upward trend in internationalisation (as well as female authorship), a considerable pluralism in theoretical and methodological approaches, and emerging sub-literatures linking the US-focused literature and UK-focused literature.

Check out whether your survey response features in the article, whether you are a Qualint or Quantirc, and where you sit in the co-authorship network!

The special section is completed by three articles, in which Emma Crewe, Shane Martin and Michelle Taylor-Robinson build on their contributions to the roundtable we held in June 2021 and take turns kicking off important discussions on the past, present and future of the sub-discipline. A very insightful exchange between three scholars coming from different perspectives!

5. PSA Parliaments Undergraduate Essay Competition 2022

Our 2022 Undergraduate Essay Competition is still open for entrants until Monday 6th June. The winner will be presented with a prize of £100 and a runner-up prize of £50 at our annual conference in November 2022.

The competition is open to all undergraduate students who have submitted a piece of assessed work which contributes to our understanding of parliaments or legislatures.

Full details of the competition can be found here.

6. Urgent Questions with Louise Thompson

This month’s interviewee is Dr Louise Thompson, author of Making British Law: Committees in Action, co-editor of Exploring Parliament and Parliamentary Affairs, and PSA prizewinner.

Head over to Urgent Questions to read about rivers, The Time Traveller’s Wife and tips on what to watch while ironing!

7. Book Launch: Held in contempt: What’s wrong with the House of Commons?

We are delighted to announce that PSA Parliaments will be hosting a book launch of Hannah White’s forthcoming book Held in contempt: What’s wrong with the House of Commons? (Manchester University Press).

The launch will take place virtually on Wednesday 25th May 2022 between 11:00am and 12:30pm BST. The speakers are:

  • Hannah White (Institute for Government)
  • Mark D’Arcy (BBC)
  • Alexandra Meakin (University of Leeds)
  • Baroness Morgan of Cotes (House of Lords)

Full details of the event, including how to register, can be found here.

8. Book Launch: Accountability, Impeachment, and the Constitution

We are similarly delighted to announce that PSA Parliaments will be co-hosting the book launch of our very own Chris Monaghan’s forthcoming monograph Accountability, Impeachment, and the Constitution (Routledge).

The launch will take place virtually on Wednesday 8th June 2022 at 2pm BST. The speakers are:

  • Chris Monaghan (University of Worcester)
  • Matthew Flinders (University of Sheffield)
  • Alison Young (University of Cambridge)

Full details of the event, including how to register, can be found here.

9. New Website for the Research Committee of Legislative Specialists

Our good friends at the International Political Science Association’s Research Committee of Legislative Specialists have launched a new website: ipsa-rcls.org

You can join RCLS for free and receive their quarterly newsletter here.

10. Other Events: Global Conference on Parliamentary Studies

Registration is now open for the Global Conference on Parliamentary Studies to be held in Budapest and Online on 12-13 May 2022.

Full details of the conference line-up and how to register can be found here.

11. Call for Chapters: Routledge Handbook of Applied Political Management

The Routledge Handbook of Applied Political Management is seeking chapter proposals on an ongoing basis – as long as there is space left – up to the deadline for the first draft: 1 April 2023.

Political management is about how to get things done by managing resources and people within political organisations. It applies and adapts concepts from business management to politics including five core areas of political management: Political Planning, Political Organising, Political HR, Political Leadership and Political Reviewing. Suggested chapter sections and themes and further details on the scope of political management are on the book project webpage.

The editor would welcome submissions from members of the parliamentary specialist group. Themes related to parliaments include workplace well-being, management of staff and advisors, and internal relationships and communication, and strategic and tactical use of rules for political goals/gain. The chapter proposal form can be downloaded here.

There will be an online workshop in early Autumn 2022 so, if you can submit by 1 July 2022, there is the potential to be included as a presenter, meet other authors and get feedback on your ideas.

You can also discuss potential ideas with the editor Jennifer Lees-Marshment.

12. Job: Research Fellow in French Politics & Social Media, University of Nottingham

Applications are invited for a postdoctoral Research Fellow position in political backgrounds and digital campaigning at the University of Nottingham. The role holder will help to coordinate an externally funded collaboration with the Digital Society Project, led locally by Dr William Daniel.

Full details of the Fellowship, including how to apply, can be found here.

13. Recent Publications that have Caught Our Eye

Simon Otjes has published What explains the size of parliamentary staff? in West European Politics.

Steven MacGregor’sprizewinning thesis Does government dominate the legislative process? can be downloaded here.

If you would like your published research to be featured in this section, please email Stephen with details.

14. Recently on the Blog

What with winning prizes and editing cracking special sections, we’ve only managed to publish one great blog this month:

If you have an idea for a blog on some aspect of parliamentary study, please get in touch with our communications officer, Chris.