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who_runs_this_place [2014/01/03 12:00]
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who_runs_this_place [2019/11/08 10:39] (current)
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| Who Runs This Place?: The Anatomy of Britain in the 21st Century by Anthony Sampson, 2005, London: John Murray | Who Runs This Place?: The Anatomy of Britain in the 21st Century by Anthony Sampson, 2005, London: John Murray |
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| | The London //Guardian// published a [[http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2004/mar/28/britishidentity.bookextracts|4,500 word extract of this book]] in 2004. |
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| The following "Veracity Index" published by MORI is often referred to: | The following "Veracity Index" published by MORI is often referred to: |
| ======Lawyers====== | ======Lawyers====== |
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| The legal profession is more complex and obscure to the layman than most, and requires more basic explanation of its intricacies. But as a whole, the political influence of the legal profession is in long-term decline. Forty years ago it had much greater collective power to block change than today. At the broad level, it is also worth noting the stark difference in public trust and appreciation between lawyers (who have long been seen as untrustworthy and unaccountable) and judges (who are perceived as vastly more trustworthy than, say politicians or ministers). | The legal profession is more complex and obscure to the layman than most, and requires more basic explanation of its intricacies. But as a whole, the political influence of the legal profession is in long-term decline. Forty years ago it had much greater collective power to block change than today. At the broad level, it is also worth noting the stark difference in public trust and appreciation between lawyers (who have long been seen as untrustworthy and unaccountable) and judges (who are perceived as vastly more trustworthy than, say, politicians or ministers). |
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| Solicitors naturally come under the most criticism from the public as they deal most directly with them. The number of solicitors in the UK has increased alarmingly by more than four times since the early 1960s. They are also the section of the profession most influenced by the American culture of enormous, escalating and illegitimate fees, particularly in the corporate sector but increasingly in billing government as the importance of human rights cases has grown. | Solicitors naturally come under the most criticism from the public as they deal most directly with them. The number of solicitors in the UK has increased alarmingly by more than four times since the early 1960s. They are also the section of the profession most influenced by the American culture of enormous, escalating and illegitimate fees, particularly in the corporate sector but increasingly in billing government as the importance of human rights cases has grown. |
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| > As Henry Fairline, the journalist who first popularised the word ['Establishment'], argued: 'Men of power need to be checked by a collective opinion which is stable and which they cannot override: public opinion needs its counter; new opinion must be tested. This the Establishment provides: the check, the counter and the test'. In fact the heads of Britain's established institutions were far from cohesive, and common backgrounds often concealed deep rivalries and differences. The old universities, the law lords, the Lords, the Commons and the Church all inhabited very separate worlds with different interests; and many people saw this diversity and pluralism as providing the sturdiest shield for British democracy, perpetuating an informal separation of powers... | > As Henry Fairline, the journalist who first popularised the word ['Establishment'], argued: 'Men of power need to be checked by a collective opinion which is stable and which they cannot override: public opinion needs its counter; new opinion must be tested. This the Establishment provides: the check, the counter and the test'. In fact the heads of Britain's established institutions were far from cohesive, and common backgrounds often concealed deep rivalries and differences. The old universities, the law lords, the Lords, the Commons and the Church all inhabited very separate worlds with different interests; and many people saw this diversity and pluralism as providing the sturdiest shield for British democracy, perpetuating an informal separation of powers... |
| > The law lords could deliver devastating judgements on the government's abuses of power, which no minister could suppress. The House of Lords, for all its natural conservatism, could still produce original and independent views to compel the House of Commons to think again. The prestige of the monarchy, with all its pomp and ceremony, prevented the prima minister from acquiring too much splendour. The 'wise men' of academia could provide a much longer historical perspective than short-term politicians. Civil servants were bound by their own professional standards to resist party-political corruption. | > The law lords could deliver devastating judgements on the government's abuses of power, which no minister could suppress. The House of Lords, for all its natural conservatism, could still produce original and independent views to compel the House of Commons to think again. The prestige of the monarchy, with all its pomp and ceremony, prevented the prime minister from acquiring too much splendour. The 'wise men' of academia could provide a much longer historical perspective than short-term politicians. Civil servants were bound by their own professional standards to resist party-political corruption. |
| > ---p355 | > ---p355 |
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| Whether ideal or not, these institutions were able collectively to represent alternative interests and provide a counterweight to the power of government and the prime minister, and the continued assault on 'the Establishment' that had largely succeeded in reducing these institutions' power by the 1970s created a vacuum that the 'anti-Establishment' voices had no idea how to fill (not wanting even to admit that the Establishment's power was in decline, too useful a rallying cry was it proving). | Whether ideal or not, these institutions were able collectively to represent alternative interests and provide a counterweight to the power of government and the prime minister, and the continued assault on 'the Establishment' that had largely succeeded in reducing these institutions' power by the 1970s created a vacuum that the 'anti-Establishment' voices had no idea how to fill (not wanting even to admit that the Establishment's power was in decline, too useful a rallying cry was it proving). |
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| > Blair was determined to reform old-fashioned institutions, but he seemed less sure of what to put in their place. He expelled the hereditary peers from the House of Lords, but opposed and elected chamber. He announced the abolition of the lord chancellor but had not worked out an alternative. He made an issue of top-up fees for students, but gave no clear picture of what kind of universities he wanted. The old guardians of institutions, with their self-serving rituals and resistance to self-regulation, were easy targets, like fox-hunters, for any politician in need of a popular vote. But working out a more democratic alternative was more difficult. | > Blair was determined to reform old-fashioned institutions, but he seemed less sure of what to put in their place. He expelled the hereditary peers from the House of Lords, but opposed an elected chamber. He announced the abolition of the lord chancellor but had not worked out an alternative. He made an issue of top-up fees for students, but gave no clear picture of what kind of universities he wanted. The old guardians of institutions, with their self-serving rituals and resistance to self-regulation, were easy targets, like fox-hunters, for any politician in need of a popular vote. But working out a more democratic alternative was more difficult. |
| > ---p359 | > ---p359 |
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