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Policy-making in Postwar Britain: A Nation-level Test of Elitist and Pluralist Hypotheses

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2009

Christopher Hewitt
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In the study of power structures, whether of the local community or the national society, three main approaches have been proposed: the reputational, the sociology of leadership and the issue approaches. Of these the least popular in practice is the last-named, which would attempt to discover ‘who rules?’ through an analysis of actual decision-making in a series of issues. This is particularly true of studies of national power, where evidence on how high-level political decisions were made is cited only to illustrate or exemplify an argument.² Although some studies of local community power have relied primarily on the issue method, studies of national power have almost invariably utilized the sociology of leadership method,³ and no systematic comparative analysis of a sample of national issues has been made. Since even those writers like Bachrach and Baratz who have raised objections to ‘the assumption that power is totally embodied and fully

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Article
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British Journal of Political Science , Volume 4 , Issue 2 , April 1974 , pp. 187 - 216
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1974

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References

1 For a discussion of these methodologies, see the following works: Rose, Arnold, The Power Structure (New York: Oxford University Press, 1967)Google Scholar; Polsby, Nelson, ‘Three Problems in the Analysis of Community Power’, American Sociological Review, XXIV (1959), 796–803CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Walton, John, ‘Discipline Method and Community Power’, American Sociological Review, XXXI (1966), 684–9CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Wolfinger, Raymond, ‘Reputation and Reality in the Study of Community Power’, American Sociological Review, xxv (1960), 634–44Google Scholar; Bachrach, Peter and Baratz, Morton, ‘Two Faces of Power’, American Political Science Review, LVII (1962), 947–52CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and ‘Decisions and Non-Decisions’, American Political Science Review, LVII (1963), 632–42Google Scholar; Dahl, Robert, ‘A Critique of the Ruling Elite Model’, American Political Science Review, LII (1958), 463–9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 Rose, The Power Structure includes a case history of the Medicare issue, while Wright Mills, C., Power Elite (New York: Oxford University Press, 1956)Google Scholar gives only five decisions to illustrate his ‘power elite’ thesis. Aaronovitch, Sam, The Ruling Class (London: Lawrence and Wishart, 1961)Google Scholar cites the outcome of two issues to illustrate his argument that the finance capitalists rule politically.

3 The sociology of leadership method has been utilized in the following studies: Aaronovitch, The Ruling Class; Mills, Power Elite; Guttsman, Wilhelm, The British Political Elite (London: MacGibbon and Kee, 1963)Google Scholar; Porter, John, The Vertical Mosaic (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1966)Google Scholar; Sweezy, Paul, ‘Power Elite or Ruling Class’, Monthly Review, VII (1956), 148–54Google Scholar; William Domhoff, G., Who Rules America? (Englewood: Prentice-Hall, 1967).Google Scholar The only systematic study of national power not using this method was by Hunter, Floyd, Top Leadership USA (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1959)Google Scholar who relied upon the reputational method.

4 Bachrach, and Baratz, , ‘Two Faces of Power’, p. 948.Google Scholar

5 Dahl, , ‘A Critique of the Ruling Elite Model’, p. 466.Google Scholar

6 Bachrach, and Baratz, , ‘Two Faces of Power’, p. 948.Google Scholar

7 Polsby, ‘Three Problems in the Analysis of Community Power’.

8 Domhoff, , Who Rules America? pp. 7, 145.Google Scholar

9 Polsby, ‘Three Problems in the Analysis of Community Power’.

10 The following is a list of the major sources for the issues. Some issues were reconstructed from such sources as newspaper and magazine accounts. For a fuller description of the history of the issues, data sources and methodology see the author's Ph.D. dissertation ‘The Power Structure of Britain’, Brown University, 1970.Google ScholarBarnett, Malcolm, The Politics of Legislation (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1969)Google Scholar; Beloff, Nora, The General Says No (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1963)Google Scholar; Beveridge, Janet, Beveridge and His Plan (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1954)Google Scholar; Butt, Ronald, The Power of Parliament (London: Constable, 1969)Google Scholar; Cantril, Hadley, Public Opinion 1935-1946 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1951)Google Scholar; Christoph, James, Capital Punishment and British Politics (London: Allen and Unwin,1962)Google Scholar; Dent, H. C., The Education Act (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1944)Google Scholar: Education in Transition (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1948)Google Scholar: Growth in English Education (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1954)Google Scholar; Driver, Christopher, The Disarmers (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1964)Google Scholar; Eckstein, Harry, The English Health Service (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1958)Google Scholar; Epstein, Leon, British Politics in the Suez Crisis (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1964)Google Scholar; Epstein, Leon D., Britain:Uneasy Ally (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1954)Google Scholar; Ford, A. W., The Anglo-Iranian Oil Dispute (Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1954)Google Scholar; Foot, Paul, Immigration and Race in British Politics (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1965)Google Scholar; Hanser, Charles, Guide to Decision: The Royal Commission (Tofowa: Bedminster Press, 1965)Google Scholar; Kazamias, Andreas, Politics, Society and Secondary Education in England (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1966)Google Scholar; Lieber, R. J., British Politics and European Unity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1970)Google Scholar; Mcgregor, O. R., Divorce in England (London: Heinemann, 1957)Google Scholar; Martin, Laurence, ‘The Market for Strategic Ideas in Britain: The Sandys Era’, American Political Science Review, LXI (1962), 23–41CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Meehan, Eugene, The British Left Wing and Foreign Policy (New Brunswick: University of Rutgers Press, 1960)Google Scholar; Mosley, Leonard, The Last Days of the British Raj (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1962)Google Scholar; Parkinson, Michael , Labour Party and Secondary Education 1918–65 (London: Routledge, 1970)Google Scholar; Paulu, Burton, British Broadcasting (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1956)Google Scholar; Ross, George, The Nationalization of Steel (London: MacGibbon and Kee, 1965)Google Scholar; Richards, Peter, Parliament and Foreign Affairs (London: Allen and Unwin, 1967)Google Scholar; Steel, David, No Entry (London: Gollancz, 1969)Google Scholar; Snyder, William, The Politics of British Defense Policy 1945–62 (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1964)Google Scholar; Waltz, K. N., Foreign Policy and Democratic Politics (Boston: Little, Brown, 1967)Google Scholar; Wilson, H. H., Pressure Group: The Campaign for Commercial Television (London: Seeker and Warburg, 1961)Google Scholar; Windlesham, Lord, Communication and Political Power (London: Cape, 1966).Google Scholar

11 Jackson, Robert, Rebels and Whips (London: Macmillan, 1968).Google Scholar

12 For a general overview of this debate, see Rose, , The Power Structure, pp. 1–39.Google Scholar As examples of elitist models, see Mills, Power Elite; Domhoff, Who Rules America?; Guttsman, British Political Elite; and Aaronovitch, The Ruling Class.

13 Keller, Suzanne, Beyond the Ruling Class (New York: Random House, 1963)Google Scholar; Riesman, David, The Lonely Crowd (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1960)Google Scholar; Dahl, ‘A Critique of the Ruling Elite Model’.

14 Rose, The Power Structure; Galbraith, John, American Capitalism: The Concept of Countervailing Power (London: Hamilton, 1952).Google Scholar

13 Kornhauser, W. A., The Politics of Mass Society (Glencoe: Free Press, 1959).Google Scholar

16 Crenson, Mathew, Unpolitics of Pollution (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1971). PP. 179–82.Google Scholar

17 Rose, , The Power Structure, p. 5.Google Scholar

18 Butler, David and Stokes, Donald, Political Change in Britain (London: Macmillan, 1969), pp. 174–92.Google Scholar

19 As Butler and Stokes point out the overall stability of public opinion may hide large movements of individuals in opposite directions (Political Change in Britain, pp. 176–7), but from a majoritarian democratic viewpoint, or from the perspective of the politician this is irrelevant if there are always more people on a given side.

20 The sources for each issue are, in order, Epstein, , British Politics in the Suez Crisis, pp. 141–5Google Scholar; Rose, Richard, Influencing Voters (London: Faber, 1967) p. 184Google Scholar; Gallup Political Index (October 1962, April 1963, July 1964, August 1964); Gallup Political Index (January 1964, February 1964, March 1964, June 1964); Windlesham, , Communication and Political Power, p. 158Google Scholar; Eckstein, , The English Health Service, p. 144Google Scholar; Barnett, , Politics of Legislation, p. 116Google Scholar; Christoph, , Capital Punishment and British Politics, p. 117Google Scholar; Paulu, , British Broadcasting, pp. 375–80Google Scholar; Hanser, . Guide to Decision, p. 103Google Scholar; Gallup Political Index (November 1961, December 1961).

21 Snyder, , Politics of British Defense Policy, pp. 57–62.Google Scholar

22 Harrison, Tom, ‘British Opinion Moves Toward a New Synthesis’, Public Opinion Quarterly, IX (1947–1948), 327–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

23 Cantril, , Public Opinion, p. 276.Google Scholar

24 Harrison, , ‘British Opinion’, p. 339.Google Scholar

25 Snyder, , Politics of British Defense Policy, pp. 54–7.Google Scholar

26 Cantril, , Public Opinion, p. 187.Google Scholar

27 Cantril, , Public Opinion, p. 327.Google Scholar

28 Cantril, , Public Opinion, p. 399.Google Scholar

29 Beveridge, , Beveridge and his Plan; Cantril, Public Opinion, p. 362.Google Scholar

30 Parkinson, , Labour Party and Secondary Education, p. 81.Google Scholar

31 Windlesham, , Communication and Political Power, p. 155.Google Scholar

32 Epstein, , British Politics in the Suez Crisis, p. 169.Google Scholar

33 The claim of The Times to be the paper of ‘Top people’ is substantiated by a survey done in September 1963 by Research Services Ltd. called Britain Today which showed that 70 per cent of a Who's Who sample read The Times, 43 per cent read the Daily Telegraph, while the Guardian ranked below both the Mail and the Express, being read by only 19 per cent. Of course, not all Times readers are ‘Top people’, and in fact IPA National Readership surveys showed that in 1970 less than half the readers of The Times fell into the highest socio-economic AB category.

34 For The Times, the effort involved in examining all the letters was found to be too prohibitive, and so only the month most likely to generate correspondence (e.g. following the introduction of legislation, etc.) was considered. Another cause of omissions is the fact that the indexing of correspondence is highly variable even within a single journal, and some references may have been thereby overlooked. Since the correspondence is not related to specific questions, as in the case of public opinion polls, it was necessary to use a rather open-ended classification scheme. Thus letters on Commonwealth immigration were coded ‘pro’ or ‘anti’ immigrant rather than specifically on their attitudes on the Commonwealth Immigration Bill.

35 Epstein, , British Politics in the Suez Crisis, p. 167–70.Google Scholar

36 Abrams, Mark, ‘British Elite Attitudes to the European Common Market’, Public Opinion Quarterly, XXIX (1965), 236–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

37 Foot, , Immigration and Race in British Politics, p. 55–6.Google Scholar

38 Steel, , No Entry, p. 39.Google Scholar

39 Wilson, , Pressure Group, p. 114.Google Scholar

40 Lipset, Seymour, Political Man (Garden City: Doubleday, 1960), pp. 101–2.Google Scholar

41 Finer, S. E., Anonymous Empire (London: Pall Mall Press, 1966), p. 11.Google Scholar

42 Such as the fact that the Archbishop of York sent out a rather ambiguous diocesan letter against Steel Nationalization, that the TUC condemned the race riots in Notting Hill, or that USDAW was for Resale Price Maintenance. These and other casual involvements or statements of mild preference indicate only marginal concern by interest groups.

43 The problem of discovering what a group ‘really’ wants is increased by the existence of two distinct bargaining strategies. On the one hand a group may make exaggerated demands in the hope that it will thereby have some room for manoeuvre. Alternatively, a group may adopt a ‘realistic’ position and simply ask for what it thinks it is likely to be able to achieve given the existence of countervailing interests, even although it would actually like more. In this paper since no attempt has been made to consider a group's demands in detail, this problem is not so significant as the general position of a group on an issue is less ambiguous than such details.

44 Beloff, The General Says No.

45 In the eight issues with good case histories the average number of organizational involvements in each issue is thirty-five as compared with an average of twenty-seven for the other twelve issues.

46 E.g. Barnett, The Politics of Legislation; Lieber, British Politics and European Unity.

47 Richards, , Parliament and Foreign Affairs, p. 129.Google Scholar

48 Beer, Samuel, Modern British Politics (London: Faber, 1965).Google Scholar

49 Keller, Beyond the Ruling Class.

50 Bachrach and Baratz, ‘Two Faces of Power’.

51 Merelman, Richard, ‘On the Neo-elitist Critique of Community Power’, American Political Science Review, LXII (1968), 451–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

52 For example Aaronovitch, , The Ruling Class, pp. 134, 160–1.Google Scholar