Institutionalised Dissent

This book provides a comprehensive analysis of a peculiar but now firmly established British institution— the Official Opposition— tracking its development since 1935. Despite its inherent importance to the conduct of politics and government, the Official Opposition as an institution remains poorly understood. The concept of ‘Loyal Opposition’ has become so entrenched in the Westminster parliamentary model that it is now taken for granted that the principal challengers to the government of the day are given significant official recognition by the state. Political dissent has become institutionalised and legitimised. Using previously unpublished archive material and candid interviews with former Leaders of the Opposition and their staff, the book examines the constraints and dilemmas facing the Official Opposition. Detailing the way successive opposition leaders have organised their staff and Shadow Cabinets, it highlights the practical difficulties they face in holding the government to account and preparing for government. The study concludes by arguing that the role of the Official Opposition is vital but ill- defined, that the inadequacy of its resources has impacted on its effectiveness, and that there are potentially serious challenges to it as a model. The book will be of key interest to scholars of British politics, British history, parliamentary and legislative studies, and government and democracy more generally.

The phrase 'English studies/culture studies' denotes a shift from the New Critical concept of the text and the reader--separable from each other and from their culture--to an affirmation that texts, writers, readers, and culture are intertwined. Teachers working within culture studies accept that they are working with multiple, expanding canons and with students who are increasingly aware of diverse ethnic heritages. Marxism, feminism, and cultural critique are major influences: so are ethnic studies programs and the British cultural studies movement.

A wide-ranging collection of studies on Enlightenment and religion in eighteenth-century England.

This special 35th anniversary edition contains the original, unchanged text that inspired a generation, alongside two new chapters that explore the book's continued significance for today's readers. The Preface provides a brief retrospective account of the book's original structure, the rich ethnographic, intellectual and theoretical work that informed it, and the historical context in which it appeared. In the new Afterword, each of the authors takes up a specific theme from the original book and interrogates it in the light of current crises, perspectives and contexts.

Intelligent Souls? offers a new understanding of Islam in eighteenth-century British culture. Samara Anne Cahill's ambitious study explores two separate but overlapping strands of thinking about women and Islam in the eighteenth century which produce the phenomenon of "feminist orientalism." One strand describes seventeenth-century ideas about the nature of the soul used to denigrate religio-political opponents, and the other tracks the transference of these ideas to Islam during the Glorious Revolution and the Trinitarian controversy of the 1690s.

This study deals with the internal socio-political changes that the traditional political structures have not been able to incorporate, the perspectives of the superpowers and surveys of the debate on European security in each of 11 states. The book begins and ends with a theoretical overview.

In this book, the author focuses on an important variant of Soviet dissent from 1963 through March 1985; to deepen understanding of the phenomena of political alienation and dissent; and to stimulate further study of political dissent in the USSR and elsewhere.

Brings together the ideas and experiences of some of Asia's outstanding politicians, intellectuals and social activists. Through in-depth interviews, provides an overview and critique of the present system and describes a vision of a new Asian society.