The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Politics (153 page)
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limited vote
An electoral procedure whereby each voter has fewer votes than there are seats to fill in a multimember district. The best-known examples are:
proportional representation
(although only C. L.
Dodgson
understood its properties correctly), but it was abolished in the United Kingdom because the Birmingham Liberals found what contemporaries saw as a way to evade its intentions: by dividing the city into three zones and asking their supporters in each third to vote for a different pair of their candidates, they ensured that all three seats were won by Liberals.
(1) the division of a number of large cities in Britain between 1867 and 1885 into three-member seats, with each voter having two votes; andThe limited vote is one route to
(2) the single non-transferable vote system in Japan, where each voter had one vote in a multimember seat.
proportional representation
(although only C. L.
Dodgson
understood its properties correctly), but it was abolished in the United Kingdom because the Birmingham Liberals found what contemporaries saw as a way to evade its intentions: by dividing the city into three zones and asking their supporters in each third to vote for a different pair of their candidates, they ensured that all three seats were won by Liberals.
Lincoln , Abraham
(1809–65)
US politician. He expressed his democratic ideals most famously at the dedication of a cemetery at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, site of the battle of the Civil War where the Confederate armies had been turned back from their northernmost point. Lincoln stated that ‘the world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here’, but expressed the hope that ‘government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth’. Lincoln's magnificent oratory may conceal more than it reveals. In particular he was not a principled opponent of slavery, but rather a principled defender of the Union. He was also a master of manipulation, being one of the most effective hammerers of the wedge between Northern and Southern Democrats, which led to the splintering of the Democrats in the 1860 presidential election and to Lincoln's election on under 40 per cent of the popular vote.
US politician. He expressed his democratic ideals most famously at the dedication of a cemetery at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, site of the battle of the Civil War where the Confederate armies had been turned back from their northernmost point. Lincoln stated that ‘the world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here’, but expressed the hope that ‘government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth’. Lincoln's magnificent oratory may conceal more than it reveals. In particular he was not a principled opponent of slavery, but rather a principled defender of the Union. He was also a master of manipulation, being one of the most effective hammerers of the wedge between Northern and Southern Democrats, which led to the splintering of the Democrats in the 1860 presidential election and to Lincoln's election on under 40 per cent of the popular vote.
lobbyists
The term ‘lobbyist’ derives from ‘lobby’, in the sense of areas adjacent to a legislative assembly where it is easy to meet members of the legislature. A lobbyist is one who is professionally employed to lobby on behalf of clients or who advises clients on how to lobby on their own behalf. Lobbying refers to attempts to exert influence on the formation or implementation of public policy. Lobbying as an activity is carried out by a variety of actors ranging from
interest groups
through the government relations divisions of large firms to foreign embassies. Those lobbyists functioning as professional intermediaries, such as political consulting firms or lawyers specializing in offering political advice, are sometimes referred to as contract lobbyists as distinct from ‘in house’ lobbyists employed by firms or interest groups. Lobbyists are to be found in large numbers in the United States, both at federal and state government level, but particularly concentrating their activities on the Congress. This older type of lobbying which depends on mobilizing networks of influence with legislators has been supplanted by a newer form of lobbying in which political campaign firms package issues, mobilize voters, and raise campaign funds.
Political action committees (
PACs
) set up by corporations, unions, and other organizations to act as conduits for funds to candidates who favour particular policy positions, have grown considerably in numbers and expenditure in the United States. There were nearly five thousand such committees in 1988 spending $364 million. Although it is on a much smaller scale than in the United States, professional lobbying expanded in Britain in the 1980s at a rate estimated by the Public Relations Consultants Association of 20 to 25 per cent a year. This has led to concern about standards of lobbying, the possibility of the improper exercise of influence, and the question of some form of registration and code of practice for lobbyists. This concern has been reflected at the European Union level, where there has been a rapid expansion in professional lobbying activity, leading to an investigation by the European Parliament into the need for a code of conduct. The 1946 Regulation of Lobbying Act in the United States requires lobbyists to file reports identifying themselves, their clients, and individuals lobbied, as well as detailing contributions received and expenditures made. The force of the Act was considerably narrowed by the 1954 Supreme Court decision in
United States v. Harris
which narrowed its reach to direct contacts with a member of Congress by individuals or organizations whose principal purpose is lobbying. The Act is seen as unenforceable and having little practical effect, although lobbyists have been successfully prosecuted for bribery and corruption. Various proposals for reform to the US lobbying law have been made, but it is difficult to reconcile them with requirements for privacy and freedom of expression. Registers of lobbyists can also be used by lobbyists as a marketing device to emphasize that their activities are officially endorsed. Canada introduced a register in 1989 which is intended to identify each lobbying task. Lobbyists are divided into two groups, professional lobbyists, and employees lobbying on behalf of an employer. Professional lobbyists in Canada consider that by making their activities more transparent, the register has reduced levels of suspicion about their activities. The development of professional lobbyists may be seen as part of a more general professionalization of politics in which, for example, being a politician is seen as a lifetime career, with perhaps a period in the legislature being followed by work as a professional lobbyist.
WG
interest groups
through the government relations divisions of large firms to foreign embassies. Those lobbyists functioning as professional intermediaries, such as political consulting firms or lawyers specializing in offering political advice, are sometimes referred to as contract lobbyists as distinct from ‘in house’ lobbyists employed by firms or interest groups. Lobbyists are to be found in large numbers in the United States, both at federal and state government level, but particularly concentrating their activities on the Congress. This older type of lobbying which depends on mobilizing networks of influence with legislators has been supplanted by a newer form of lobbying in which political campaign firms package issues, mobilize voters, and raise campaign funds.
Political action committees (
PACs
) set up by corporations, unions, and other organizations to act as conduits for funds to candidates who favour particular policy positions, have grown considerably in numbers and expenditure in the United States. There were nearly five thousand such committees in 1988 spending $364 million. Although it is on a much smaller scale than in the United States, professional lobbying expanded in Britain in the 1980s at a rate estimated by the Public Relations Consultants Association of 20 to 25 per cent a year. This has led to concern about standards of lobbying, the possibility of the improper exercise of influence, and the question of some form of registration and code of practice for lobbyists. This concern has been reflected at the European Union level, where there has been a rapid expansion in professional lobbying activity, leading to an investigation by the European Parliament into the need for a code of conduct. The 1946 Regulation of Lobbying Act in the United States requires lobbyists to file reports identifying themselves, their clients, and individuals lobbied, as well as detailing contributions received and expenditures made. The force of the Act was considerably narrowed by the 1954 Supreme Court decision in
United States v. Harris
which narrowed its reach to direct contacts with a member of Congress by individuals or organizations whose principal purpose is lobbying. The Act is seen as unenforceable and having little practical effect, although lobbyists have been successfully prosecuted for bribery and corruption. Various proposals for reform to the US lobbying law have been made, but it is difficult to reconcile them with requirements for privacy and freedom of expression. Registers of lobbyists can also be used by lobbyists as a marketing device to emphasize that their activities are officially endorsed. Canada introduced a register in 1989 which is intended to identify each lobbying task. Lobbyists are divided into two groups, professional lobbyists, and employees lobbying on behalf of an employer. Professional lobbyists in Canada consider that by making their activities more transparent, the register has reduced levels of suspicion about their activities. The development of professional lobbyists may be seen as part of a more general professionalization of politics in which, for example, being a politician is seen as a lifetime career, with perhaps a period in the legislature being followed by work as a professional lobbyist.
WG
local government
A governing institution which has authority over a subnational territorially defined area; in federal systems, a substate territorially defined area. Local government's authority springs from its elected basis, a factor which also facilitates considerable variation in its behaviour both between and within countries.
Structure in Europe is generally multitier. In Federal Germany below the state-level Länder are commonly found two tiers of local government: the upper-tier Kreise and the lower-tier municipalities. Regionalized states such as Italy, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, and France echo such arrangements by having three levels of local government: the region; provinces or counties; and communes as the lower-tier basic authority. By contrast, many Scandinavian countries, Britain, and many of its former colonies eschew three-tier local government for two. In Britain the structure developed since 1888 is based upon lower-tier district authorities and upper-level county (in England and Wales) or regional (in Scotland since 1972) authorities. Indeed in the 1990s debate in Britain on restructuring has reintroduced the idea of having only one tier of local government. Cities, and rural areas with strong senses of community such as Rutland and the Isle of Wight, will have single-tier authorities, and other areas will have two tiers. From 1996, the whole of Scotland and Wales are to be divided into single-tier authorities. In the United States, beneath the state level there is one common tier of local government—the county—but the existence of a second tier of municipalities is piecemeal, entirely dependent upon petitioning by local residents. Often a state will have two-tier local government in some mainly urban areas but only one-tier local government in other mainly rural areas. Furthermore, specific functions such as education, responsibility for which has been concentrated in the tiered local government structure in Europe, have usually been placed under single-purpose elected local bodies in US states.
Organization of the elected executive in local government varies primarily between the mayoral system and the committee system. In the former, to be found in France and the United States, a mayor is most frequently separately elected as the political leader of a council (in some smaller US cities, the mayor is a figurehead and the city is run by an unelected ‘city manager’). In the latter, to be seen in Britain and Sweden, councillors are elected who then make decisions by committee. In Britain councillors are also commonly members of a party group, the majority party's leader then becoming the chair of the main policy and resources committee and effectively leader of the council. Organization of the non-elected workforce has been based upon the building up of large functionally defined departments of permanent staff. However, since the 1980s, local bureaucracies have begun to be broken up in preference for the public contraction of work privately supplied.
Local government expenditure generally accounts for a significant proportion of GDP—between (in 1988) 11 per cent in Great Britain and 30 per cent in Denmark ( see also
local government finance
). Large-scale expenditure in Scandinavia reflects the fact that costly social services, including social security, secondary education, and health care have been put in the charge of local government at the county/province level and public utilities such as water, gas, and electricity supply at the commune/municipalities level. In other countries this is not the case, but British local government, for example, retains significant responsibilities in education, planning and roads, environmental protection, and leisure service provision, and continues to expand its economic development role.
Local government's role in the political system has been considered primarily in terms of its relationship with central government. Observers from a liberal democratic standpoint have stressed two bases upon which such relationships have been formulated since the nineteenth century. First, local government has been considered important to the encouragement of political education and participation, and the basis upon which services could be provided according to local needs. Hence, relationships with the centre have been based on the partnership of free democratic institutions. Secondly, local government has been seen as rational from an administrative point of view as it allows for the efficient provision of public services at the point of service need under the direction of the centre. On this basis local government is seen as the agent of central government. France may be taken to typify the stress on both bases for the development of local government. Political participation has been maintained through the strong community identity underpinning commune local government, and a strong relationship between the operations of local government and the interests of the state has been maintained through the office of departmental prefect. Britain's leaning towards the utilitarian administrative efficiency purpose of local government is reflected in the fact that even its lowest-tier authorities may have bigger populations than some other countries' county/province level authorities.
Since the 1970s fiscal stress and changes in approaches to government have forced a reconsideration of relationships. Central governments have sought to control local government finance and expenditure, and where the community basis for local government has been weak, as in Great Britain, this has extended to the control of service policies. At the same time, in most countries the role of local government has been increasingly cast as that of the buyer of services on behalf of the public that can be provided best on a competitive basis by the private sector, and as a local governing institution which, having been overburdened, should have its responsibilities slimmed. In Britain local government has also lost many responsibilities to non-elected local
quangos
, created or encouraged by central government, so much so that the local political arena is increasingly conceptualized as local governance, in which local government is reduced to the status of one player among many.
British local government is expected to diminish into a contractor of services within a straitjacket of regulations imposed by central government. On the European mainland where local government is strongly territorially based, and in North America and Scandinavia where there is a greater concern to reinvent government than to privatize it, continued autonomy for local government will remain, perhaps not in the role of providing services directly, but in defining the local needs which other providers must meet.
JBr
Structure in Europe is generally multitier. In Federal Germany below the state-level Länder are commonly found two tiers of local government: the upper-tier Kreise and the lower-tier municipalities. Regionalized states such as Italy, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, and France echo such arrangements by having three levels of local government: the region; provinces or counties; and communes as the lower-tier basic authority. By contrast, many Scandinavian countries, Britain, and many of its former colonies eschew three-tier local government for two. In Britain the structure developed since 1888 is based upon lower-tier district authorities and upper-level county (in England and Wales) or regional (in Scotland since 1972) authorities. Indeed in the 1990s debate in Britain on restructuring has reintroduced the idea of having only one tier of local government. Cities, and rural areas with strong senses of community such as Rutland and the Isle of Wight, will have single-tier authorities, and other areas will have two tiers. From 1996, the whole of Scotland and Wales are to be divided into single-tier authorities. In the United States, beneath the state level there is one common tier of local government—the county—but the existence of a second tier of municipalities is piecemeal, entirely dependent upon petitioning by local residents. Often a state will have two-tier local government in some mainly urban areas but only one-tier local government in other mainly rural areas. Furthermore, specific functions such as education, responsibility for which has been concentrated in the tiered local government structure in Europe, have usually been placed under single-purpose elected local bodies in US states.
Organization of the elected executive in local government varies primarily between the mayoral system and the committee system. In the former, to be found in France and the United States, a mayor is most frequently separately elected as the political leader of a council (in some smaller US cities, the mayor is a figurehead and the city is run by an unelected ‘city manager’). In the latter, to be seen in Britain and Sweden, councillors are elected who then make decisions by committee. In Britain councillors are also commonly members of a party group, the majority party's leader then becoming the chair of the main policy and resources committee and effectively leader of the council. Organization of the non-elected workforce has been based upon the building up of large functionally defined departments of permanent staff. However, since the 1980s, local bureaucracies have begun to be broken up in preference for the public contraction of work privately supplied.
Local government expenditure generally accounts for a significant proportion of GDP—between (in 1988) 11 per cent in Great Britain and 30 per cent in Denmark ( see also
local government finance
). Large-scale expenditure in Scandinavia reflects the fact that costly social services, including social security, secondary education, and health care have been put in the charge of local government at the county/province level and public utilities such as water, gas, and electricity supply at the commune/municipalities level. In other countries this is not the case, but British local government, for example, retains significant responsibilities in education, planning and roads, environmental protection, and leisure service provision, and continues to expand its economic development role.
Local government's role in the political system has been considered primarily in terms of its relationship with central government. Observers from a liberal democratic standpoint have stressed two bases upon which such relationships have been formulated since the nineteenth century. First, local government has been considered important to the encouragement of political education and participation, and the basis upon which services could be provided according to local needs. Hence, relationships with the centre have been based on the partnership of free democratic institutions. Secondly, local government has been seen as rational from an administrative point of view as it allows for the efficient provision of public services at the point of service need under the direction of the centre. On this basis local government is seen as the agent of central government. France may be taken to typify the stress on both bases for the development of local government. Political participation has been maintained through the strong community identity underpinning commune local government, and a strong relationship between the operations of local government and the interests of the state has been maintained through the office of departmental prefect. Britain's leaning towards the utilitarian administrative efficiency purpose of local government is reflected in the fact that even its lowest-tier authorities may have bigger populations than some other countries' county/province level authorities.
Since the 1970s fiscal stress and changes in approaches to government have forced a reconsideration of relationships. Central governments have sought to control local government finance and expenditure, and where the community basis for local government has been weak, as in Great Britain, this has extended to the control of service policies. At the same time, in most countries the role of local government has been increasingly cast as that of the buyer of services on behalf of the public that can be provided best on a competitive basis by the private sector, and as a local governing institution which, having been overburdened, should have its responsibilities slimmed. In Britain local government has also lost many responsibilities to non-elected local
quangos
, created or encouraged by central government, so much so that the local political arena is increasingly conceptualized as local governance, in which local government is reduced to the status of one player among many.
British local government is expected to diminish into a contractor of services within a straitjacket of regulations imposed by central government. On the European mainland where local government is strongly territorially based, and in North America and Scandinavia where there is a greater concern to reinvent government than to privatize it, continued autonomy for local government will remain, perhaps not in the role of providing services directly, but in defining the local needs which other providers must meet.
JBr
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