Dr Proles Social Sciences

Abstract

The key findings of this study are as follows:
Ø There is no significant increase in the incidences of bullying in UK Educational Establishments, this finding supports the findings of Mellor (1990).
Ø Females are twice as likely to be victims of peer bullying than males.
Ø Males are more likely to experience physical peer bullying than females.
Ø 58.3 % of the sample reported being victims of peer bullying.
Ø Peer Bullying is more prevalent at Primary and Secondary levels of Education
Ø Psychological bullying is the most common type of Peer/Staff bullying experienced by both genders.
Ø 23.5% of the sample has been bullied by a member of staff.
Ø 61.7% of the sample has witnessed staff bullying.
Ø Males are more likely to experience staff bullying during Secondary education and this was more prevalent during the groups who left Secondary education during the 1970’s and 1980’s.
Ø 82% of those who participated in bullying have also witnessed staff bullying.
Ø Every female who participated in bullying witnessed staff bullying.
Ø Of the section of the sample that left Secondary education in the 1970’s, 75% of males were bullied during their Secondary education and 80% of females were bullied during their Primary education.

Introduction
This is a small quantitative retrospective study to gauge the numbers of undergraduate students at the University of Paisley who have been victims of bullying at different levels of education and the type of bullying they themselves have experienced or participated in. One of the biggest problems in studying bullying is that it ‘usually grows and stays hidden in the world of relations that are established between peers. The aggressors are able to hide behaviour, which they know to be undesirable, especially in front of adults, while the victims, ashamed of the situation to which they are habitually subjected, also fail to openly record their experiences’ (Source: http://www.gold.ac.uk/tmr/). Therefore given that the students are adults and their anonymity has been preserved, this retrospective study should have gained a useful insight into the extent of bullying in UK educational establishments and one, which could provide a valid basis for further studies into this subject area and perhaps provide a comparison with other studies
The topic of bullying in Scottish educational institutions is currently receiving a lot of interest from the media and from the Scottish Executive, as there is a perception that the problem has worsened in recent years. This study aims to test if that perception is correct.
Previous studies in the field of bullying include: Nature and Prevention of Bullying, (2001), a research project funded by the European commission and conducted in the UK by Goldsmiths College London and the University of Surrey Roehampton, in conjunction with 7 other European Universities. Its aims were to investigate the causes and nature of bullying and social exclusion in schools, in conjunction with methods of prevention, (source: http://www.gold.ac.uk/tmr/). This Study also included a section on Adult bullying and as a reflection of this, this study will includes questions relating to bullying within the University of Paisley itself and bullying by lecturing and teaching staff at all educational levels. The 1999 Report: Retrospective Methods for Assessment of Bullying Experiences by the University of Munchen, Germany states that ‘Due to the lack of adequate longitudinal studies, the effects of bullying on those who experience it has not yet been fully determined’, (Schäfer, Mechthild, (1999)). This report considers that ‘retrospective assessment can be a good second choice method for exploration of possible long-term consequences of bullying’ (Rivers, 1999; Eslea & Rees, in prep).
A retrospective study entitled ‘Bullying in Scottish Secondary Schools’ by Andrew Mellor (1990) compared the incidences of bullying in schools in Scotland with schools in Norway. The study was a response to a statement in The Guardian 28/09/89 that declared, ‘Britain is the Bullying Capital of Europe’ the findings of Mellor’s study called such reports into question (Mellor (1990), University of Glasgow), this study has been followed up by Mellor in a report called ‘Which way now?’ (Mellor, 1995, University of Glasgow), the report noted that bullying can continue into adulthood and attempts to examine the effectiveness of anti-bullying strategies in Scottish Schools region by region.
The report claims media exaggeration of the problem and as a reflection of this it was decided to use quota sampling so that an increase in bullying could be detected in the survey results. There is also a perception that certain types of bullying are more common to one gender than the other and thus the quota sample was designed to reflect a 50/50 gender division.
The Report of a Working Party chaired by Mechthild Schäfer, Universistät München, Germany entitled, ‘Retrospective Methods for Assessment of Bullying Experiences’ shows that several similar retrospective studies have been conducted Matsui, Tzuzuki, Kakuyama & Onglatgo, (1996), conducted a study among undergraduate students in two universities near Tokyo, Japan, - however this study employed qualitative methods.
Hoover, Oliver and Hazler, 1992 used a questionnaire that is similar to the questionnaire used in this study to assess bullying retrospectively among Mid Western American students aged 12-18, however this study has been criticised for not differentiating between single and repetitive incidences of bullying. The Hoover (1992) study did include open questions, which this Paisley study omits with a view to maintaining consistency of responses.
The Smith & Pyne, (1995); Schäfer, (1996); Schäfer & Madsen, (1998) studies compared the experiences of bullying of first year undergraduate students at two Universities, Munich and Sheffield, this study recorded responses on a 5 point Likert Scale and contained questions pertaining to the kind of bullying experienced physical, Verbal and indirect and it was with a view to this that it was decided to include the questions relating to Physical, Psychological and Indirect bullying in the Paisley Study.
The Eslea & Rees, (in prep) studies, was conducted among undergraduate students aged 18-42 yrs (study 1) and 18-55 yrs (study 2). Each study was conducted using questionnaires that sought to discover the optimum age for recollection of incidences of bullying, it was in relation to this that it was decided to ask question 2, section A. Paisley University has a good mix of both gender and age groups and therefore it was considered that such a question would detect if there has been an increase among the younger students who report being victims of bullying, when compared to the numbers of mature students who report being victims of bullying, but rather than asking age directly, framing the question in relation to the decade in which secondary education was completed also allowed the Paisley Study to gauge if the media perception of an increase in bullying is a valid one.
This study was based on the following Hypothesis:
Hypothesis
Incidences of bullying are increasing within UK Educational Establishments. (0ne-tailed)
Null Hypothesis
There is no increase of incidences of bullying within UK Educational Establishments.
The reason that this hypothesis was chosen was so that it could be compared with the findings of Andrew Mellor’s (1990) study that showed that media perception of an increase of bullying within educational establishments was invalid.
Method
The sample (see appendix i)
This study took the form of a small survey that provided quantitative results. The sampling method utilised is that of quota Sampling. The quota was obtained by use of verbal answers to the questions in appendix i. These questions were necessary in order to establish that the sample group has attended UK educational institutions and that they were within the target population of students. The students asked the initial 5 questions were obtained by way of opportunity sampling during breaks and lunchtimes, Monday to Friday of week ending 2nd April 2004, at the following points around the university campus, outside the library, at the CLT, in the smoking room, and by the Brough Hall/reception area at the front of the University and also in the class rooms prior to lectures, these were considered to be the times when possible participants would have some ‘free’ time to participate and these areas the places where groups of students congregate when not attending lectures and tutorials.

Any student who answered Yes to the first three questions was eligible to participate; all students who answered No to any question 1-3 were ineligible to participate. Once 15 males and 15 females from answer A to C, question 5 had participated that category was closed and after 15 males and 15 females from answer D to E, question 5 had participated that category was closed. It was decided to use this method in order to access a sample where comparisons could be made between gender and the decade in which the participants left secondary education, the division for this being those who left secondary education pre 1990 and those who left secondary education post 1990. Therefore the sample group consists only of UK citizens who are Students in year 1- 4 at the University of Paisley, and is split into two categories each with a 50/50 gender split. The sample group consisted of 60 participants, 30 in each group consisting of 15 male and 15 female participants (see table 1).

Table 1. The Quota
Pre 1990 Post 1990
Males - 15 Males - 15
Females - 15 Females - 15

The Questionnaire (see appendix ii)
The use of a questionnaire in this study provided a large amount of information relating to the topic of bullying at a small cost and within a short space of time. It also allowed for anonymity among the respondents, therefore any student who reported bullying another or being the victim of bullying at the University is unable to be identified, thus the fear of repercussion is diminished. It is hoped that the honesty of responses is greater than a study where the participants are named or assigned numbers.
It was decided to use only closed questions for the purpose of this study, thus providing quantitative results that could be easily compared and also to avoid the criticisms of the use of questionnaires in relation to bullying i.e. ‘Maintaining consistency of responses is complicated’, (Ortega, R, et al, revised 2001). The use of closed questions maintains consistency of responses although it doesn’t tackle a further criticism of questionnaires used in this type of study, that being ‘This type of instrument allows us just a superficial approach to the problem, because their limited number of questions doesn't give us the opportunity to go into some topics’, (Ortega, R, et al, revised 2001). To avoid this criticism it would be necessary to make use of a questionnaire in conjunction with in-depth qualitative research, however approaching the study in this way would be expensive and time consuming.
The Questions themselves were designed to provide information concerning the following; the gender of the victims of bullying, the decade in which the participant left secondary education, the form the bullying took and the type of bullying experienced, perpetrated or witnessed, the type of educational establishment in which the bullying occurred and who was doing the bullying. In order to decide how to frame the questions and what should be included and excluded in the questionnaire extensive use was made of the detailed, ‘ Final Report of the Working Group on General Survey Questionnaires and Nomination Methods Concerning Bullying’, (Ortega, R, et al, revised 2001).
The questions were initially piloted on several volunteer students to ascertain if there were any problems with the questions prior to the study, there proved to be no problem with the framing of the questions and so it was decided to proceed with the questionnaire in its original form.
The questionnaire included the Olweus (1993) and Whitney & Smith (1993), definition of Bullying as follows:
· is an aggressive act
· with an imbalance of power (the victim finds it difficult to defend himself or herself)
· some element of repetition (these things can happen frequently).
The form the bullying took was classified as individual or group with an option to choose both.
The types of bullying were categorised as physical (hit, kicked), or psychological i.e. verbal (threatened, nasty and unpleasant things said) or indirect (sent nasty notes, no-one ever talks to them), with an option to circle all that applied to the participant.
This was to make it clear to the participants, what each question was referring to and also to avoid the criticism of the Hoover et al (1992) study in which there was no distinction between single and repetitive incidences of bullying.
For the purposes of this study single incidents were not categorised as bullying.

The questionnaire took the form of closed questions set out in sections. Section A, dealt with the gender and decade that the participant left secondary education, these questions were set to ascertain the group the participant belonged to within the quota. Section B, dealt with Peer Bullying, if the participant answered no to the first question in this section they were directed to go to Section C, which was concerned with bullying by teachers, lecturers and members of staff in educational institutions.
If the participant answered no to the first question in section C then they were directed to go to section D, which was concerned with bullying the participant had witnessed.
Each section of the questionnaire was broken down into different categories of bullying and different types of bullying with the exception of section D, which asked 2 closed questions relating to bullying the participant had witnessed. Providing bullying helpline numbers for the participants concluded the questionnaire.

Administration
The survey was conducted Monday – Friday of week ending 2nd April 2004 at the University of Paisley during breaks and lunchtimes at the following places within the University Campus; the CLT, outside the Library, in the student smoking room, by the Brough Hall/reception area at the front of the University and also in the class rooms prior to lectures.
Immediately after establishing that a student was within the quota sample, the researcher asked the student if they would be willing to complete a questionnaire about bullying and informed that their responses will be anonymous. If any student who was eligible declined to participate then the selection of another student who was eligible took the same form as explained in The Sample section. The Students completed the questionnaire by circling the answers that were applicable to them, it took each student approximately 5 -10 minutes to complete the questionnaire. The researcher then collected the questionnaire and the data was entered into SPSS version 11.5 for analysis.

Data Analysis
The data collected was analysed using Descriptives, Frequencies and Cross-tabs. The statistical test applied to the results of the questionnaire is that of Chi Square, as the data collected took the form of nominal and ordinal data. These tests have provided the answers to the key questions this study is concerned with and the hypothesis as set out in the introduction and the appendices.

Ethical Issues
Bullying can be a sensitive topic for both the victims and the perpetrators, however the retrospective aspect of the study and the anonymity should have diluted these sensitivities. There is also the fact that it may for some, stir up memories best left buried, however this questionnaire does not deal with feelings or analysis of behaviour issues, leaving such matters to the field of Psychology. The questionnaire dealt only with matters that are of sociological interest such as the extent of bullying. Each participant in the study was provided with bullying helpline numbers, in case the student required to talk to someone in relation to their experiences of bullying.

Discussion & Results
This study is based on a quota sample of Students who are all Undergraduate students at the University of Paisley. The quota consists of 15 males and 15 females who left Secondary education prior to 1990 and 15 males and 15 females who left Secondary education post 1990. The quota itself appears to be skewed when broken down into the decades in which the individuals completed their secondary education, due to the fact that the decade 2000 is only in its fourth year. The percentage of the participants who left secondary education in each decade are as follows; 1970- 23.3%, 1980- 26.7%, 1990 – 31.7 and 2000- 18.3% (see appendix iii).
Table 2

Of this sample 58.3% reported being bullied by their peers at some stage in their education, of these 68.6% were female and 31.4% were male. This clearly shows that there are twice as many females who report being victims of peer bullying in this sample than males. Infact some 80% of the total female participants report being victims of bullying compared to 36.7% of the total male participants (see appendix iv).
This cross tab was then extended to include the decade that the participants left secondary education, the results of this showed that male victims of peer bullying were the highest in the pre 1990’s group at 54.6%, while for the female participants the victims of peer bullying were higher in the post 1990 group at 54.1%.
48.6% of pre 1990 participants report being victims of peer bullying compared to 51.4% of post 1990 participants, this shows a slight increase in bullying since 1990. Interestingly 63.6% of those who left secondary education since the year 2000 reported being victims of peer bullying and yet they consist of only 18.3% of the total sample and every female participant who left secondary education post 2000 reported being a victim of peer bullying compared to 33.3% of males in the same group, (see appendix v).
From the results of this survey it has also become apparent that bullying is most prevalent at the Primary and Secondary stages of Education, with only 1 female from the pre 1990 group reporting being peer bullied at both Primary and College levels of education.
A further Cross tab was then carried out using the following variables, decade of completion of secondary education* education level peer bullied*bullied by peers*respondent gender (see appendix vi). This provided clear information allowing comparisons to be made between genders and education levels at which peer bullying was experienced. In the 1970’s group 75% of males experienced peer bullying at secondary education level alone, compared to 0% of females in the same group, however 80% of females reported experiencing peer bullying at Primary school level for this group compared to 0% of males.
During the 1980’s secondary education peer bullying levels rose among females to 16.7% while the incidence of bullying at Secondary level for men fell to 50%, these figures rose to 100% for males who reported being victims of peer bullying in the 1990 group compared to a rise to 37.5% for females in the same group, during the 2000’s this has risen to 40% for females and fallen by half to 50% of male respondents. This shows a trend of increasing incidences of peer bullying at secondary level among females, while figures for male incidences of peer bullying vary greatly from decade to decade.
Overall the study shows that 9.1% of males have experienced peer bullying at primary school level, 72.7% have experienced peer bullying at secondary school level and 18.2% have experienced peer bullying at both levels, compared to 41.7% of females who have experienced peer bullying at primary school level, 25% who have experienced peer bullying at secondary school level and 29.2% who have experienced peer bullying at both levels.

61.7% of participants reported witnessing bullying by staff at some stage in their education and further cross tabs were carried out using the variables pertaining to witnessing bullying and participating in bullying, this test showed that 82% of those who participated in bullying had also witnessed staff bullying (see appendix viii). In order to ascertain whether gender had any bearing on these findings a further cross tab was used including the respondent gender variable 100% of female respondents who reported participation in bullying also reported witnessing staff bullying compared to 70% of male respondents. When the variables participation, the form of participation and gender were cross tabulated the results showed that males were likely to participate in both group and individual bullying equally (50%), among females however participation in group bullying was the most prevalent form of bullying at 71.4%. The victims of peer bullying reported being bullied in both group and individual forms at the following rates, 81.8% for males and 45.8% for females, only females reported being victims of individual bullies alone. Victims of peer bullying reported similar amounts of psychological peer bullying across both genders 90.9% for males and slightly higher at 95.8% for females. Physical peer bullying was experienced by 72.7% of males of reported being victims of peer bullying compared to 37.5% of females, there was very little difference between the genders experience of being victims of indirect bullying 63.6% males and 62.5% of females.

28.3% of the sample reported being bullied by staff of these 66.7% of males who were bullied by staff experienced this at the Secondary level of their education compared to 27.3% of females for the same criteria. 16.7% of Males reported being bullied by staff at college and 18.2% of females reported being bullied by staff at University (see appendix ix). This bullying by staff took the form of physical bullying for 23.5% of those who reported staff bullying and occurred during the 1970’s and 1980’s groups. The Psychological form of bullying by staff was the most common form of bullying at 94.1% of those who reported being bullied by staff and this was distributed across all of the decades of completion of secondary education.

Hypotheses testing
To test the Hypotheses the chi-square test was employed in combination with cross-tabs, the level of significance for Social Science being P> 0.05.
Hypothesis 1 is that ‘incidences of bullying are on the increase within UK educational Establishments’, the chi-square value for this is .790 with 3 degrees of freedom, and a significance level of .852, which is greater than the accepted level of significance 0.05 and therefore, hypothesis 1 can be rejected and the null hypothesis 1 accepted, (see appendix Viii) as there is an 85% probability that these results are those of chance. This finding supports the findings of Andrew Mellor’s study.

Criticisms

This study is limited in that the sample group is reasonably small and confined to one academic institution in one week in 2004 and thus generalisation of its findings may be difficult. The sample quota is also somewhat skewed because it is 2004 and therefore the participants who left education during the 2000’s are all from this 3-4 yr period.
The use of a questionnaire was a good method to use as an initial research tool, however the use of closed questions has limited the depth of information collected. For future studies a combination of both quantitative and qualitative methods would allow for greater insight into this topic. The questionnaire could have included a question asking in which regions the participants have attended academic institutions to enable regional variations in experiences of bullying to be gauged.

Future studies
As the basis for a future study, which encompasses many Universities this study should have validity. The study could also provide an interesting prelude to a study out with the academic institutions, whereby the extent of those people who are not, or have not attended university and were victims or perpetrators of bullying could be measured and then compared with those who are attending university.
S.McGonigal (2004)
References

Hoover, Oliver and Hazler, (1992),
Source: http://www.gold.ac.uk/tmr/reports/aim4_munchen1.html#HOOVER

Mellor, Andrew, (1990), Bullying in Scottish Secondary Schools, University of Glasgow
source: http://www.scre.ac.uk/spotlight/spotlight23.html

Mellor, Andrew, (1995), Which way now? University of Glasgow
source: http://www.scre.ac.uk/resreport/pdf/063.pdf

Matsui, Tzuzuki, Kakuyama & Onglatgo, (1996),
Source: http://www.gold.ac.uk/tmr/reports/aim4_munchen1.html#HOOVER

Ortega, R, Mora-Merchán, J.A, Singer, M, Smith, P.K, Pereira, B. & Menesini, E,
Revised (2001), Final Report of the Working Group on General Survey
Questionnaires and Nomination Methods Concerning Bullying
Source: http://www.gold.ac.uk/tmr/reports/aim2_seville1.html#SEV1B

Schäfer, Mechthild (1999), ‘Retrospective Methods for Assessment of Bullying Experiences’ The Report of a Working Party, Universistät München, Germany
Source: http://www.gold.ac.uk/tmr/reports/aim4_munchen1.html#HOOVER

Smith & Pyne, (1995); Schäfer, (1996); Schäfer & Madsen, (1998)
Source: http://www.gold.ac.uk/tmr/reports/aim4_munchen1.html#SMITH

Bibliography

Creswell John, (2002), Research Design: Qualitative, Quantitative and Mixed Method Approaches, Sage Publications Ltd.

Hoover, Oliver and Hazler, (1992),
Source: http://www.gold.ac.uk/tmr/reports/aim4_munchen1.html#HOOVER

Kinnear P.R, Gray D.C. (2000), ‘SPSS for Windows Made Simple’ Release 10,
Psychology Press Ltd, Hove.

Mellor, Andrew, (1990), Bullying in Scottish Secondary Schools, University of Glasgow
source: http://www.scre.ac.uk/spotlight/spotlight23.html

Mellor, Andrew, (1995), Which way now? University of Glasgow
source: http://www.scre.ac.uk/resreport/pdf/063.pdf

Matsui, Tzuzuki, Kakuyama & Onglatgo, (1996),
Source: http://www.gold.ac.uk/tmr/reports/aim4_munchen1.html#HOOVER

Ortega, R, Mora-Merchán, J.A, Singer, M, Smith, P.K, Pereira, B. & Menesini, E,
Revised (2001), Final Report of the Working Group on General Survey
Questionnaires and Nomination Methods Concerning Bullying
Source: http://www.gold.ac.uk/tmr/reports/aim2_seville1.html#SEV1B

Schäfer, Mechthild (1999), ‘Retrospective Methods for Assessment of Bullying Experiences’ The Report of a Working Party, Universistät München, Germany
Source: http://www.gold.ac.uk/tmr/reports/aim4_munchen1.html#HOOVER

Smith & Pyne, (1995); Schäfer, (1996); Schäfer & Madsen, (1998)
Source: http://www.gold.ac.uk/tmr/reports/aim4_munchen1.html#SMITH

This essay aims to analyse the nature and function of political parties and voting behaviour in Britain and explain the major policies of the political parties on a current political issue the Euro. This essay also aims to give an explanation of the political parties in Britain in relation to their functions within the democratic process and identify the factors that affect voting behaviour.

A political party is an organised group who on the whole share common political values and objectives, although there will always be extremists and mavericks within any party. Some of these people within a political party will become candidates and stand for election to become members of parliament. Candidates for election are chosen from within the ranks of a political party by the party hierarchy. The decisions on who may stand for election will be influenced by not only the loyalty, service and commitment the individual has shown to the party, but also how charismatic and persuasive and individual is and how they are likely to be interpreted and accepted by the general public. In the climate of strong media influence over the electorate everything has to be taken into consideration, from skeletons in the closet which may return to haunt the party, to dress and appearance, mannerisms and speech patterns as well as political allegiance and idealism.
A Political party will produce a manifesto which lays down its aims and objectives if elected into government. Political parties will usually use a particular issue as their main election campaign objective, normally something they are aware is an emotive issue to the general public such as the Health Service, Education or Taxation. A political party will hope that its perspective on a chosen issue will be shared by the majority of the electorate, so that they will win the election and become the Government. Once in Government, the political party can then set about controlling the budget of the country, deciding on matters of taxation, defence, health, education, infrastructure, trade, agriculture, law & order etc, and originating policies both foreign and domestic and introducing legislation.

In a true democracy every person would have a say on every decision, this is of course impractical and thus those who will eventually decide are elected by those entitled to vote, to be representative of their wishes. These individuals are grouped into political parties so that the electorate can make an educated guess as to how a particular candidate would decide on a range of issues, the theory being that we will vote for whomever we perceive as having similar views to our own regarding certain key political issues. It is important that there are many political parties so that the views of most people can be represented within the political spectrum.

In Britain there are many political parties, the major parties at Westminster being the Labour Party (New Labour), the Conservative party and the Liberal Party. It is the Conservative party who have dominated the seat of Government for much of the 20th Century, so much so, that Seldon & Ball entitled their 1994 study ‘Conservative Century’. Despite the lowest turn out of those eligible to vote since World War II, the general election of 1997 was hailed as a landslide victory for New Labour, one interpretation of the reasons behind such a large swing in favour of labour is that there were strong divisions within the Conservative party of the day, caused by differences in opinion on Europe and the single currency, the party was divided into Europhiles and Eurosceptics. The Conservative party consists of seven groupings (Politics UK, edition 4, 2001, Jones et al, P237), each group places stress on different issues within the political spectrum, while now sharing common ground in relation to party values on certain issues such as Law & Order and the Euro. Since the 1997 election defeat Norton Implies that on some hot political issues there are a number of party members who are likely to toe the party line rather than show a personal preference, Norton illustrates this in relation to the Euro in his Taxonomy of Conservative MPs, May 1997 (Politics UK, edition 4, 2001, Jones et al, P237). It can be presumed this is because the issue of Europe divided the party under John Major and is seen as a contributory factor in the Conservative general election defeat of May that year. Political parties with strong divisions do not tend to become Governments, the electorate do not appear to approve of divisions within political parties, therefore the parties will do their utmost to show the general public a united front at the expense of the personal views of the politicians.
A politician who is prepared to stand his ground as a man of principle is a rare beast in modern politics and is often forced to resign to protect his principles if he will not toe the party line e.g. Michael Heseltine & the Westland Affair.

The euro is a contentious issue for all political parties; the Conservative party policy on the Euro is that of the Eurosceptics. However rather that being totally anti-European in all matters, they regard a united fiscal policy as the road to rack and ruin for the British economy, arguing that a one size fits all interest rate would not be beneficial to British Industry or the British people and that a single currency would be detrimental to British Sovereignty. The Conservatives point to rising unemployment in areas such as Germany, and the ripple effects such changes in the individual economies of the member states of the EU would have on the UK if the UK were a participant in the single European currency. There is a Thatcherite element to the Conservatives argument, which is against centralised power within the EU.

The labour party’s position on the Euro is slightly less transparent than that of the Conservatives, they are clear that they might want to participate in a single currency, if the conditions are right for Britain, and the party is united on this stance! The decision on Britain’s participation was given a deadline of ‘within 2 yrs of the next Parliament,’, Party positions on the Euro). The Labour party want a series of economic tests, known as the Growth & Stability Pact 1998, to be carried out to their satisfaction before they make any decision. One can only presume that if the chancellor decides the conditions are right then the UK will join, providing he is given a mandate to do so by the electorate in a referendum on the Euro. There are voices of dissent within the Labour party on this topic, both Gordon Brown and Mr Hain have accused party members who are against joining the Euro of being anti-European, perhaps the party leadership will accuse them of being the party unfaithful if their protests divide the party, it is clear that the issue of the single currency could become as big a threat to the New Labour Government of Tony Blair as it was to the Conservative Government of John Major.

The only major political party at Westminster that has clearly given support to Britain joining the single currency is the Liberal Party, they have made it clear that if a mandate to join is given by the British people they will join at the earliest possible date, this issue does not appear to have divided the Liberal party the way it has divided other major parties.

Prior to the 1980’s a large proportion of the electorate felt allegiance to a particular party based on their social class, status and how their parents had traditionally voted, however since the 1980’s partisan dealignment has occurred, with the electorate voting for a party based on how that party is prepared to act on a particular issue or range of issues.
A political party uses many ‘tools’ in a campaign to attempt to persuade voters who hold no allegiance to any particular party to see things their way and thus gain the vote. Central to any party’s’ campaign is the party manifesto which lays down the issues it classifies as being of major importance and then states how if elected to govern, the party will deal with the issues.
Television is a major source of influence when it comes to swaying the electorate, many party political broadcasts are thus very emotive and concentrate on the positive effect of a ‘yes’ vote for the party they are representing, however some party political broadcasts are less direct and will show only the bad points of an opposing party, to sway the voters not to vote for the opposition rather than directly asking the voters to vote for them.
Americanised televised political debates are also a growing method of influencing voters when electioneering, should a candidate make a major faux pas while on live television, they can be assured that they will be badly portrayed in the tabloids and broadsheets the following day. Therefore it is for this reason that political opponents do their best to outwit one another and ask questions which are open to misinterpretation and can often be classified as lightly veiled mud slinging, to openly embarrass their opponents, this may make for amusing television debate, but surely should not be construed as political campaigning on issues the public finds important, however such things do appear to influence voters.
Billboard campaigns are another method of attempting to influence voters, these have also been used as a method of underhand tactics in the past remember the evil eyes of Labour, and William Hague sporting Mrs Thatcher’s’ Hair, both of these campaigns had nothing to do with the policies of the parties who paid for the posters and everything to do with portraying the other party as something to be scared of.
Newspapers themselves often hold political allegiance and will therefore campaign on behalf of the party they see fit to hold office, reporting a positive image of the party they wish to see in Government and more commonly portraying negative images of the other political parties.
Senior party political candidates will tour the country campaigning on their chosen issues, attempting to localise those issues, knocking on doors and kissing babies in an attempt to cultivate a, ‘look I’m on your level, a man or woman of the people’ image. All of the major political parties in Britain use the media to capture voters attention and attempt to sway votes in their favour, they gauge how their campaigns are doing by commissioning polls and sometimes modify their messages and methods according to poll results. Media moguls can help sway the balance at the last minute if the polls are very close, as was the situation at a previous general election until The Sun newspaper chose to run the headline ‘Will the last person in Britain Please turn the lights off’ inferring that one particular party was so incapable of running the British economy that Britons would leave in droves. Political campaigning is becoming more of a personality contest than a process based on political issues.

These changes in campaign tactics have coincided with a change in voting behaviour, many people of all ages, especially those who have never felt allegiance to any particular party feel, quite rightly so that no one party is representative of their political views. Poor turnouts at polling stations are influenced by many things including the weather; if it is raining on polling day there will traditionally be a lower turnout. Many people feel alienated from Westminster geographically and do not see the relevance of happenings there, to their everyday lives. Public perception of Westminster as a place where even the politicians aren’t interested in what happens are fuelled by television broadcasts from the House of Commons where the chamber is almost empty except for a few MP’s. Many individuals believe that their votes don’t count, this is due in no small part to the first past the post system which has allowed two political parties to dominate British Politics for a century. Politics has long been dominated by the Conservatives and the Labour party, practically a two horse race and the party lines once clearly divided have become blurred in recent years, as both parties have moved from left and right towards the centre. Therefore many individuals believe it doesn’t matter how they vote they will only get more of the same with a different name. Many now perceive New Labour as being as right wing as the Conservative party, as the policies and ideologies of the two parties have become intertwined. The socialist policies of Labour have been dumped in favour of pursuing the vote of ‘middle England’ under the New Labour banner. The conservatives have attempted to portray themselves as being more ‘working class’ by boasting of stereotypical working class pastimes, such as consuming vast quantities of alcohol a la William Hague, rather than the public School boy images portrayed by former senior Tories. With the growth of membership of interest groups it could be argued that people have found a different way to make sure that their voices are heard in relation to the issues they feel strongly about and that rather than voting for one party on a range of issues, some of which relate to them and some of which won’t they will join specific interest groups which they feel are representative and use them to lobby MP’s with their concerns.
Politicians are so concerned about the decrease in those voting that they have set up a committee to investigate ways of encouraging voting, current suggestions by the committee include lowering the age of voting from 18 to 16, the argument being that if you can serve in the military at 17 you should be able to have a say in the Government of the country. Compulsory voting has also been suggested, this would entail a fine for those individuals eligible to vote who do not do so, this would however be an infringement of an individuals rights, as along with the right to vote must also come the right not to vote. Another suggestion is that incentives are introduced to encourage voting, one suggestion was that voters be given a free lottery ticket! The sad fact is that people in general are not interested in politics for many personal and private reasons. They feel disconnected from the system that is supposed to represent them and unless the political parties revamp their manifestos or come up with support for issues that people feel they have a connection with then those participating in the democratic process of voting will probably continue to fall.

In order for the UK to be true democracy everybody eligible to vote should vote, however the old maxim that you can please some of the people all of the time and all of the people none of the time is as true in today’s political system as it has ever been and unless by some miracle a perfect solution to this problem can be found the UK will cease to be a democracy, with a minority of the population electing the Government and the Government being unrepresentative of the peoples wishes. This situation occurred in Scotland previously when the electorate of Scotland voted for Labour Government and were saddled with Conservative Government because of the votes cast in England. This could become the case for the entire UK if those participating in voting participation falls much further.
S.McGonigal

This essay will evaluate a range sociological studies relating to crime and deviance. The studies used in this essay are as follows; Criminal Justice And The Production of Order And Control, Tony Jefferson and Joanna Shapland - 1994, Labelling And Its Consequences In A Closed Social System, Robert G.Leger – 1981,Understanding Crime Rates, Jan J.M.Van Dijk –1994 and Crime And The ruling Class In Seattle, Chambliss-1978. These studies are representative of at least two sociological perspectives. In order to evaluate these studies it is necessary to define crime and deviance, as the two are not necessarily the same, a definition of a crime is simply an act that breaks the established Laws of the country in which it was committed. A deviant act is an act that does not conform to established and accepted social norms and may not necessarily be an act that is illegal, but is an act that can be interpreted as antisocial. The nature/nurture debate rages in relation to crime and deviance as it does in most topics concerned with human beings and their interaction with one another and society. Early studies relating to crime and deviance theorised that there were definite reasons for people participating in crime, Cesare Lombroso put forward a theory that was popular in the 19th century, he believed that criminals were of a certain physiological make up and that they had somehow missed out on part of the evolutionary process being of a mesomorphic body type, this idea was given a revival in the 1940’s and 1950’s by Sheldon. In the 1960’s another physiological theory was given credence when British criminologists claimed to have discovered a ‘criminal chromosome’, the proof that an extra male chromosome was somehow linked to criminal predisposition was never established. From a psychological viewpoint Criminal activity has been blamed on everything from maternal deprivation to attention seeking behaviour and demonic possession. Today it is accepted that although there may be a genetic predisposition to criminal or deviant activity, no man or woman is a prisoner of his or her genes entirely.

Sociologists studying Crime and deviance tend to view the topic from their individual perspectives, a functionalist would ask “why do some people break the rules?” while a Marxist would ask “who makes the rules, and who benefits from their enforcement?” and interactionists would ask “How did this person become processed or labelled as a deviant and what are the consequences of attaching such labels?” (Source: Crime and Deviance Theory Map, http://www.hewett.norfolk.sch.uk/curric/soc/crime/devmap.htm) The theory of differential association puts forward the argument that criminal or deviant behaviour is learned by interaction with others in a deviant sub-culture in which the social norms are different from the social norms of the dominant culture, that is that it is a ‘ social environment that encourages illegal activities’, (p209, Giddens, 4th Edition). It is interaction with peer groups that encourages and develops deviant and criminal activity. Edward Sutherland is the sociologist accredited with the development of this interactionist theory. This theory denies psychological influences in crime by insisting that all criminal activity is learned through the socialisation process and is a choice of the individual, just as one person may choose to be a tradesman to earn money, so the criminal actively chooses to earn his/her living by illegal activity.

The control theory is the argument that it is lack of self-control in the individual, which leads to criminal activity, the individual is unable to integrate fully into society and therefore is unable to bond socially so that individual has little regard for the feelings of others and this propagates a likelihood of involvement in crime. This theory presumes that everyone would indulge in deviant or illegal acts if they had the opportunity, Hirschi argues that ‘individuals are fundamentally selfish beings who make calculated decisions about whether or not to engage in criminal activity by weighing the potential benefits and risks of doing so’, (p213, Giddens, 4th edition). Hirschi identifies 4 bonds which people develop with society attachment, commitment, involvement and belief and that people who are able to develop these bonds will be inherently law abiding members of society and it is when there are weak or tenuous links in these bonds between an individual and society, deviant or criminal behaviour is likely to occur. Other theorists point to the increase in crime opportunities in society as the cause of increased criminal activity and police forces and crime prevention strategies have taken this theory on board.

Marxist theories relating to crime and deviance use capitalism and private ownership of the means of production as the foundation for all criminal activity. The main Marxist theory is a theory of social control, the argument is that a capitalist society emphasises the greed factor and the dehumanisation of the workers within the capitalist model of production. If this were so then in a socialist society surely crime would not exist? Marxists point to the fact that law is created by the ruling classes and that the ruling classes define acts which are formed by the working classes and detrimental to the ruling classes are defined as criminal or deviant. Milton Mankoff’s argument is based on crime figures in the USA and Western Europe, he points that ‘street crime is largely and American phenomenon, despite the rise in muggings in European cities’ (p631, Haralambos, third edition). Mankoff’s argument points to the differences in social welfare benefits between the USA and Western Europe and suggests that these differences can explain why the USA has a much higher crime rate. Marxists argue that the laws lead to a false consciousness among the working classes; they come to believe that their interests are protected by laws that are created to benefit the ruling classes. Marxists also believe that crime acts as a diversion from working class exploitation and allows the ruling classes to exert greater controls over the working classes. However the Marxist perspective falls down because it relates crime to the economic infrastructure of society and ignores the fact that crime occurs within communist societies too.

The anomie theory suggests that criminal activity arises out of confusion between socially acceptable goals and achievable goals, this theory bolsters the unsubstantiated argument that crime is a capitalist problem, because on the whole society accepts the material goals of capitalism knowing that not every individual has the means of achieving those goals. It is Durkheim who developed the anomie theory, he suggests that crime is normal not deviant behaviour because crime exists in all societies and that a society without crime is one where social values and sentiments have become obscured. Therefore according to Durkheim Crime and deviance are essential to society because they reinforce collective social sentiments and values and furthermore they are innovating in that they introduce new ideas to society and they also serve the purpose of providing the boundaries between good and bad in society. Merton is an exponent of the anomie theory and uses it to express how deviance is natural to society because of the aspirations society gives the individuals within the society knowing that these aspirations are not achievable by all without resorting to deviant or criminal behaviour to attain them.

The labelling theory an interactionist perspective suggests that if you ‘label’ an individual as a deviant they will eventually accept their social stigma and will behave accordingly, this theory is based on an individual’s interaction with society, in simple terms ‘give a dog a bad name and it will wear it’. What constitutes a deviant act is ‘defined and framed by the wealthy for the poor, by men for women, by older people for younger people and by ethnic majorities for minority groups’ (p209-210, Giddens, 4th edition) Therefore it has been argued by theorists such as Becker (1963) that no act or behaviour is in itself deviant, but that it is society and the groups within society tat label an act as deviant. Howard Becker is a leading exponent of the labelling theory; it was his study into marijuana smokers in the 1960’s, which gave the labelling theory prominence. This theory has been criticised because it is argued that some deviant or criminal acts are common across all cultures, and not all societies consider the same acts deviant, therefore it becomes difficult to determine exactly what deviancy is when studying deviancy in multi cultural societies. Central to this theory are the deviant act or primary deviance and the public labelling and acceptance of that label by the perpetrator and the effect the label has on the behaviour of the perpetrator.
The labelling theory ignores the fact that prisons and courts are not full of people who are only there because someone placed a label on them and that people will actively choose to lead a criminal lifestyle regardless of labels society places on them. The theory presumes a weakness within the psyche of the human being, which enables society to mould personalities and behaviour by simply labelling an individual. This theory ignores the fact that labelling may have a reverse affect on deviant behaviour, some people who learn of a deviant label attached to them may infact alter their behaviour to get rid of the label.

The first study this essay explores will deal with the labelling theory.

Robert G. Leger, LABELLING AND ITS CONSEQUENCES IN A CLOSED SOCIAL SYSTEM, April 1981, is a study which shows how prisoners react to labels they are given by one another in an American prison system. Leger shows how the self-perception of the individual changes according to the label they are given and how their actions and personalities alter accordingly, in other words how people alter themselves to fit their label. The labels given to the prisoners’ in this study were Snitch, Punk, Hardrock and Wheeler-dealer. The roles of snitch and punk are the most stigmatised within the prison society studied and the reactions of those prisoners labelled snitch or punk exhibited signs of low self-esteem in addition to which these prisoners modified their behaviour to the behaviour expected of the stereotypical snitch and punk label. Snitches and Punks were perceived as being inferior within the prison system and thus acted out an inferior role, being within a closed society meant no escape from the labels or the stigmas attached to the labels. In the outside world it is presumed that when one social group attaches labels to an individual which that individual finds has unpleasant ramifications, the individual concerned may choose to integrate with a different social group to escape the label, this is impossible within the prison system. This study uses the labelling theory, which is an interactionist’s perspective, the research methods used to obtain the facts for this study are those of interviews and questionnaires that produced both qualitative and quantitative data and are therefore linked to the perspective. This study supports the hypothesis that individuals will alter both their behaviour and self-perception according to the labels given to them by society. This study however, cannot be generalised to prisoners in every prison environment because the study was only carried in an American medium security Prison among a very small sample group of prisoners, giving unequal responses from the different groups involved, the study is also dated as it is over twenty years old.

The next study that this essay will examine also uses an interactionist’s perspective. , Jan J.M. Van Dijk, UNDERSTANDING CRIME RATES, BRITISH JOURNAL OF CRIMINOLOGY, VOLUME 34, NO.2 (SPRING 1994). This study suggests that there is a relationship between both the rise in property crimes and the rise in the standard of living and that there is a constant relationship between victims of property crimes and those committing the offences, the relationship is such that both parties have choices which will affect the probability of a crime being committed. If this is true then according to Van Dijk no amount of rehabilitation or stiffening of sentencing will change the crime rates. Van Dijk suggests that eventually a state of affairs will transpire which will stabilise crime rates, as neither the criminal or the victim will be able to act without countermeasures being taken by the other. The study also poses a paradox that is, if affluence for some in an industrialised nation is to blame for property crime why do such crimes occur in developing nations where affluence among individuals is rare? In other words if the reason for property crime is that ‘the have-nots’ want to take what ‘the haves’ own because they have no other means of getting these material possessions then why when everyone is a ‘have-not’ do crimes of a similar nature still occur? This study has been generalised to several countries all of which are capitalist based industrial societies, it is valuable as it recognises the importance that poverty and affluence have on crime statistics within an industrialised society but it cannot explain why crimes still occur in underprivileged areas where property crimes are perpetrated by people of the same income and status level as the victims. The study also suggests that crime statistics are being kept at a level which is lower than it should be by state and police intervention and that if the money used to rehabilitate criminals or imprison them were to be used to increase security in homes and business that crime would eventually stabilise itself. The study used qualitative data, which, gives it a link to the interactionist perspective. This study also gives support to the Marxist perspective that crime is a product of capitalist societies.

The next study that this essay will examine is CHAMBLISS, CRIME AND THE RULING CLASS IN SEATTLE, (1978)(Haralambos, 4th edition, p383). This study investigates white collar crime in Seattle in the 1970’s as such the study is dated and cannot be generalised to other towns, countries or regions but it is still recognised as a valuable piece of research into white collar crime, it was one of the first to identify white collar crime, it was conducted over a ten year period and was very in-depth, however the study relied heavily on the truthfulness of those who were interviewed for the study. Chambliss undertook this study from a Marxist perspective and draws on the conflict between the different strata’s in society to demonstrate how white collar crime is portrayed and perceived as victimless, because the perpetrators of white collar crime are the big business’ that control capitalist governments. Chambliss chose to examine a syndicate’s relationship with local government and how the syndicate could easily launder monies from illicit business interests through legitimate business. Profit laundering from illicit trade such as the drugs trade is routinely carried out by banks, the UN fears that this laundering would criminalize key institutions in the global economy, another example of these global institutions routinely escaping the ‘long arm of international law’ are the Swiss Banks who held Nazi Gold and stolen Jewish wealth during the war. (source:http://www.esher.ac.uk/scextranet/sociology/whitecollarcrime.htm).___##1##___ White collar crime is however not a victimless crime as is portrayed and accepted by society, incidents of pollution such as the Bhopal disaster cost a great deal in terms of lives and the future health and life chances of generations of Indian citizens. Crimes such as those committed under the health and safety legislation cost a great deal in terms of Human Life and Injury every year and yet the ‘fines’ such as they are that are imposed on the corporations that perpetrate these crimes are mere pocket change , when compared to a fine for a traffic offence such as speeding which may entail a fine of 40-50% of an individuals income. The crime of corporate manslaughter is difficult to define and prove in a court of law and the punishment is lenient when compared to the punishment for house breaking or crimes against property where an individual is prosecuted. Chambliss points out in his study that it was the occupants of skid row who occupied most of the police time during his study with the occupants of the jails being those from the poorer elements in society, thus suggesting that the police were deliberately ignoring white collar criminals. Chambliss points to the members of a major crime syndicate in Seattle as being political leaders, law enforcement officers and key businessmen, those who make and enforce the laws, this being true it is unsurprising that the Law largely ignores their crime interests. Chambliss concludes his study by pointing to the fact that rather than crime being operated and organised by a ‘criminal class’ it is infact operated and organised by those in economic and political power and that the corruption that occurs within politics and the law is essential to global economies.

The final study this essay will examine is TONY JEFFERSON and JOANNA SHAPLAND, CRIMINAL JUSTICE AND THE PRODUCTION OF ORDER AND CONTROL, Criminological research in the UK in the 1980’s,(British Journal of Criminology, Vol 34, , No.3,(Summer 1994), P265). This study was carried out at a time when there was a great deal of interest in altering the criminal Justice system, changes in the treatment and sentencing of criminals were occurring at a fast rate under the Conservative Government of Mrs Margaret Thatcher, which advocated the short sharp shock treatment for offenders, authoritarianism and consumer approaches, such as public accountability. The Conservative Government., which liked to portray itself as the party of Law and Order commissioned the Scarman report at this time, which looked into the privatisation of prisons, the probation service and the police force and highlighted the discrimination that occurred frequently within these organisations and called for accountability of these organisations and a voice for the victims of crime. Racism issues in the treatment of offenders were given support at this time when the stereotypical view of the ‘Black Criminal’ became commonplace. This understanding of criminals was given credence by the figures resulting from police activities such as ‘stop and search’ and the prison population statistics, today however the pendulum appears to have swung in the opposite direction with figures relating to ethnic minority perpetrators of crime being difficult to obtain, while the ethnic minority victims of crime figures are readily available in government statistics. This study used surveys and statistics as it’s principal methods of research and was undertaken using a conflict/structuralist theory, the study makes use of primarily quantitative data and therefore a link between theory and research method exists.
The study can be criticised as being dated and although it can be generalised to most of the UK it cannot be generalised globally as it is confined to a particular country under a particular Government and the policies that the Government sought to introduce. However Tony Jefferson and Joanna Shapland continue to be a major force in the study of the Criminal Justice system not only in the United Kingdom, but also in countries as diverse as France and Argentina.

These studies have contributed to the understanding of criminal and deviant behaviour worldwide. They have shown that there appears to be a relationship between the values a society holds dear and the types of crimes perpetrated, they also show clearly that what may be a crime or deviant act in one society may not be in another. It is society itself, which holds up goals and achievements, which are not attainable by everyone through legal or acceptable channels, and thus it is society that creates crime and deviance. The labelling theory and interactionist perspective work well with the conflict theories on this topic each argument giving some support to the other, showing that at the root of most of the ‘evil’ in society is money. S.McGonigal (2001)

THE BRITISH JOURNAL OF CRIMINOLOGY

VOL.21, NO.22, (APRIL 1981) – LABELLING AND ITS CONSEQUENCES IN A CLOSED SOCIAL SYSTEM – ROBERT G. LEGER.

VOL.34, NO.2 (SPRING 1994) –UNDERSTANDING CRIME RATES – JAN J.M. VAN DIJK

VOL34, NO.3 (SUMMER 1994) – CRIMINAL JUSTICE AND THE PRODUCTION OF ORDER AND CONTROL – TONY JEFFERSON AND JOANNA SHAPLAND.

MARX, DURKHEIM, WEBER, FORMATIONS OF MODERN SOCIAL THOUGHT, (2001), KEN MORRISON, SAGE PUBLICATIONS LTD, 6 BONHILL ST, LONDON,EC2A 4PU, ISBN 0 8039 7563-5

SOCIOLOGY, 4TH EDITION, (2001), ANTHONY GIDDENS, POLITY PRESS, 65 BRIDGE STREET, CAMBRIDGE CB2 1UR, ISBN 0-7456-2311-5

SOCIOLOGY THEMES AND PERSPECTIVES, THIRD EDITION, (1990), M. HARALAMBOS & M. HOLBORN, UNWIN HYMAN LIMITED, 15-17 BROADWICK STREET, LONDON W1V1FP
ISBN 0 04 444 8181 0, (CHAMBLISS STUDY TAKEN FROM , CRIME AND DEVIANCE, P383, FROM 4TH EDITION OF THIS BOOK).

WEBSITE ADDRESSES
HTTP://WWW.ESHER.AC.UK/SCEXTRANET/SOCIOLOGY/WHITECOLLARCRIME.HTM

HTTP://WWW.HEWETT.NORFOLK.SCH.UK/CURRIC/SOC/CRIME/DEVMAP.HTM

The aim of the essay is to describe the nature and activities of two contrasting interest groups indicating the type of group and their contribution to the democratic process.
Interest groups are defined as ‘a collection of like-minded individuals who are organised with a view to influencing government decisions in their favour’ (class handout, 10 Pressure Groups). James Madison’s definition of interest groups is, ‘a number of citizens, whether amounting to a majority or minority of the whole, who are united and actuated by some common impulse of passion, or of interest, adverse to the rights of other citizens, or to the permanent and aggregate interests of the community,’(10 Pressure groups, The Federalist No.10).
In a pluralist society it is important that interest groups exist because they allow people to have a direct voice for their specific concerns and interest within the democratic system. There are several different types of interest groups; Private interest groups are normally referred to as such because they have a very narrow self-interest usually concerned with lobbying the Government for contracts or similar types of concerns.
Insider groups such as the B.M.A. and trade unions, usually lobby government from within and give advice on Government policies concerning their specialised interest on a regular basis. The Government will often consult an insider group when forming new policies relating to a specific field. Outsider groups are those whose interests cover a less defined area such as the WWF, which campaigns on animal welfare issues and issues of ecology, they are not consulted by Government and have no direct input into the making of policies concerning the issues they represent. There are grey areas where some groups will fit into more than one category such as the CBI, it is concerned with lobbying the Government for contracts and as such is a Private –interest Group however, they can also be considered an insider group as they will advise Government on policy making decisions, being representative of directors and management in the UK. The type of interest groups represented within a political system depends entirely upon the society in which they are formed, one would not expect to find the League Against Cruel Sports in a developing nation where famine and other areas are of much greater immediate concern to the populous, however some organisations are world wide such as CND, Greenpeace, Oxfam, WWF etc there are quite literally thousands of interest Groups and pressure groups world wide lobbying Governments on every topic from Fisheries and Agriculture to Nuclear Weapons and the environment, from small business interests to large multi-national conglomerate interests. Some groups lobby on a national scale while others lobby on a global scale. Interest groups all participate within the democratic political system but differ from political parties in that they have no political ambition as such but are merely a one cause or set of causes based group, they have no interest in forming a Government.

This essay will now look at two opposing interest Groups, the Countryside Alliance and the League Against Cruel Sports. These Groups oppose one another over the issue of Fox Hunting among other issues. Fox Hunting has been a controversial issue for many decades, surveys conducted among the general public in the UK have shown that the majority would have Fox Hunting banned. Fox hunting is seen as elitist, the participants often come from the upper-classes, while most of the jobs concerned wit hunting are carried out by those in the countryside who are working class. The Countryside Alliance argues that Fox Hunting is necessary to keep the number of foxes at a controllable level within the UK and that many who live in the countryside are dependant on the sport for their livelihoods, they argue that hunting kills less foxes than road traffic and is not as cruel as gassing or alternative control measures. The League against cruel sports, which was formed in 1924 to campaign for the abolition of cruel sports, argues that far from being a method to control the population of foxes fox hunting is a vicious and cruel blood sport. They also argue that there are alternatives to employment within the industries of the countryside and that the countryside alliance makes their case by placing too much importance on economics and no importance on animal welfare when discussing their actions. The internet is a valuable tool for interest groups to communicate with their members and to publish there work, both of these opposing sides have web sites where current information concerning their progress can be found and where members and non members are encouraged to donate to their campaigns and sign petitions. On the web sites are copies of reports such as the Burns report which gives facts and figures on the incidents of Hunt Havoc such as when the laws of trespass have been broken, hound deaths, pet deaths, other wild animal deaths, injuries caused to livestock and many other incidents which all back up their case for the complete ban of Hunting in the UK. On the Web site of the Countryside alliance there is a copy of a letter to the Rt Hon Alun Michael MP, informing him of just how a ban on hunting would affect those who live in the countryside. In their letter they claim to have the support of several organisations such as the NFU, the CLA, NGO and USCW among others. They too use the Burns report but interpret its finding somewhat differently from the League Against Cruel Sports, according to the Countryside alliance the Burns report legitimises hunting on the grounds of animal welfare. It is MP’s such as Alun Michael who will have to read the Burns Report and make decisions on the future of Hunting in the UK based on its findings, the Countryside alliance make no bones about the fact that they will continue to try to get the bill overturned even after it has royal assent.

These organisations like many other interest groups are not averse to using the media to promote their cause or public awareness of their cause, charities are particularly prominent on television where they ‘advertise’ for donations. These advertisements are paid for and are not really influenced by the editorship of the owners of the mass media.

The Mass media is important to interest groups and democracy as it has a duty to keep the public informed of events and matters of interest, however what is portrayed or reported and just how it is done, how much importance is placed on a news item for instance is very much the concern of the editors and owners of the large multi national corporations which control the Media. Interest Groups have realised this and in the past have used the media to their advantage by upping their antics in order to make their stories more news worthy a classic example of this was the way the friends of the Earth used the media reports to influence public opinion and force the Government to act regarding the Brent Spar oil platform. Rupert Murdoch owns Newspapers and Sky television and can therefore exert a great deal of control over what we read and watch. He can therefore choose to ignore some subject matter while giving other subject matter prominence. His business is but one of four conglomerates that control Newspapers in the UK. If for example Mr Murdoch were to have a keen interest in Hunting it is highly likely that his newspapers would give prominence to the Countryside alliance and their campaigning while only skimming on the works of the League Against Cruel Sports, thus introducing bias into the reporting of the news. This is often the case at election campaign time when Newspapers clearly show their allegiance to a particular party. This becomes more of a problem if one man controls a large proportion of the media, e.g. if one person were to own National newspapers, regional newspapers, local newspapers, television and radio stations and news reporting sites on the world wide web, he could exert enormous control over how we perceive a particular issue or range of issues, he could infact force his own opinions on the general public as if they were news and fact. The BBC is assumed to be an impartial broadcasting network, it receives a subsidy from the public purse to broadcast and is funded by the money from television licensing, according to The Economist (January 12th, 2002, p 34, Britain), it is winning the ratings war against commercial television. However because it is the Chancellor of the Exchequer who decides on the amount of subsidies the BBC is given and the Chancellor of the Exchequer has an affiliation to a political party, can we be sure that the BBC is really as impartial as we are led to believe? Surely the directors of the BBC would be worried that their subsidy would be cut if they were to consistently show the Government in a bad light in their current affairs and news programmes.
Interest Groups are on the whole peaceful groups who are involved in low level activity, but low level activity is not headline grabbing or no the whole news worthy material and so some groups take more direct action such as the protesters at Greenham Common or those at Faslane, there are infact now so called ‘proffessional protestors’ who spend most of their time involved in demonstrating on behalf of their chosen interest groups, such as those who demonstrate against the building of new roads on the grounds of conservation, such as the demonstrators at the Newbury Bypass. Some interest groups advocate all out anarchy, these are usually groups who form to raise awareness and protest on a particular issue such as the Anti-poll Tax protestors who took part in and instigated riots in London during the Thatcher era. Other interest groups will go even further than peaceful or violent protest, they advocate acts of terrorism, examples of such groups are the Animal Liberation front and Anti Abortionists who will use terrorist actions such as car and letter bombs to raise their public profiles. Many protestors are viewed as being of a stereotype, a man or woman of the Marxist persuasion who dresses like a New-age traveller. There are exceptions in Scotland it is not unusual to see Mr Tommy Sheridan MSP gracing the front of a newspaper complete with suntan, smile and suit, not everyone’s idea of a typical protestor and it can be argued that he is protesting as much to raise his own public profile as he is to raise the profile of CND and Nuclear Arms in Scotland. Mr Sheridan is however adept at making full use of media attention whatever profile he is more interested in raising and the general public is now more aware of the Faslane Protests because of his involvement. Celebrities are often solicited by Interest Groups in order to raise their public profile and create an image of association that can make them more newsworthy, Charities often ask for members of the royal family to give them patronage, which increases their public perception.

All in all interest groups have a wide range of tools with which to attract the medias attention, both legal and illegal. Once an interest group has the attention of the media it can usually count on increased public support for it s cause and thus bring more pressure to bear on the Government to initiate or change existing legislation in their favour, although those radical interest groups which carry out acts of terrorism can normally be assured of greater media attention and less public support, they tend to become alienated supported only by the lunatic fringe of left or right wing radicals.

Without interest groups our society could not call itself a true democracy, as there are too many different issues for any political party to be representative of them all. It is also impossible for anyone political party to please everyone all of the time, it can please some of the people some of the time and probably none of the people all of the time. On the whole most political parties aim to achieve policies, which are middle of the road, not too radical so that they will attract votes from a large proportion of the electorate and for those issues where the views of the political party are not extreme enough there are interest Groups. S.McGonigal (2002

The purpose of this essay is to explain the distinctive features of the Scottish political system, in order to do this effectively it will explore the historical background to the Parliament, how the process of devolution occurred, how the voting system in Scotland differs from that of Westminster. The essay will also consider the devolved powers of the Scottish Parliament, the reserved powers of Westminster and the position of Scottish MP’s who sit in Westminster.

The Parliament in Scotland can be traced back to the 12th Century, when it consisted of groups who offered military, financial and advisory support to the Monarch.
Scotland developed it’s own legal system out of the code Napoleon a system of laws that were developed all over Europe in the 18th Century, although Scottish Law goes back centuries before this date. The first Scottish Parliamentary records are from 1326, the parliament consisted of Lords and burgh commissioners. The Burgh Commissioners, Clergy and Lay magnates became known as ‘tres communitates’(Source: The Scottish parliament, fact file 2, Scottish Parliamentary Public Information Service, Edinburgh, May 1999) Parliament in these days was very much influenced by the Sovereign because of the belief in the ‘divine right ‘of Kings Parliament sat wherever the King was in residence and could be called at 40 days notice. Parliament was usually called to raise funds and men for fighting wars, those who assisted the king in his ventures could gain his favour and thus have the ‘Kings ear’ in future political matters. Until 1560 the Scottish Parliament required royal assent to make legislation become law. It was Mary Stuarts decision to forbid the Parliament to discuss religious matters that lead to the ‘reformation Parliament’, which, was formally ratified in 1567.

Prior to 1603 Scotland was a totally independent nation with it’s own Royal dynasties such as the Bruces and the Stuarts, it’s own traditions, its own political alliances such as the infamous ‘Auld Alliance’ with France, its own unique legal system, it’s own church and education system, its own right to trade, its own languages and it’s own definite culture, many of these still remain as a defiance to the historical unions and ideologies imposed on this once separate Kingdom of Scotland by it’s Southern neighbour, England.

In 1603 the daughter of Henry VIII, Elizabeth I, known as the virgin Queen died childless, she was a Tudor and a ruler of one of the most powerful nations in Europe at this time. Elizabeth I had no direct heirs to the English crown, but was a distant cousin to James VI, the King of Scotland, his Great Grandmother Margaret Tudor, sister of Henry VIII, had been married to James IV of Scotland who died at Flodden Field in 1513, In 1516 Margaret Tudor returned to England with her second husband the Earl of Angus, leaving behind her baby son James V. John Stuart duke of Albany became regent until James V was old enough to take control of the Scottish throne. James V was married to Mary of Guise and their daughter Mary became Queen when she was only six days old, as a child she was initially married to the French Dauphin, later Francis II, the young King died at a very young age and Mary returned to Scotland. Mary Stuart married Lord Darnley and they produced Mary’s only surviving heir James VI a Stuart. Mary abdicated from the Scottish throne in favour of her young son at Carberry Hill, 15th June 1567. Once James became old enough to rule Scotland himself he set about reinstating his ‘Divine Right’ and took control of the Parliament, refusing to call Parliament in its entirety, preferring to seek only the counsel of his supporters.
In 1603 the English Lords were in turmoil because there was no direct heir to the English Throne however, the shrewd Elizabeth I had named Mary Stuart’s Son James VI of Scotland as her successor and so James VI of Scotland was Crowned James I of England, and thus the Crowns of England and Scotland formed a new united kingdom.

After the union of the Crowns Scotland continued to keeps it’s own culture, church, Laws and Parliament, Scotland merely shared a Monarch with England with the exception of the period, when England was ruled by Oliver Cromwell, from 1652 to 1660 when the Scottish Parliament was disbanded and Scotland had 30 MP’S in Westminster.
In 1707 The Act of Union merged the Parliaments of Scotland and England, this act contained safeguards to protect certain Scottish interests including Laws, Church and Education. The Act of Union allowed for 45 Scottish MP’s to sit in the House of Commons and 16 Scottish Lords to sit in the House of Lords, Scottish interests were administered by a Secretary of State for Scotland until 1746, when as a result of the Jacobite Rebellions the post was abolished.

In 1800-1801 the Union with Ireland increased the notion of a United Kingdom, during the 19th Century there was increased demand for home rule in Ireland, which, through organisations such as the United Irishmen and the United Scotsmen increased demand for internal Government within Scotland. Robert Burns,’ Such a Parcel of Rogues in a Nation,’ illustrates how high feelings were running in Scotland at this time the parcel of rogues were the 31 Scottish commissioners who sold out to England, and were well rewarded with money and land for their treachery. This hatred of English rule or the threat of it, goes back to the Declaration of Arbroath, April 1325, in which Scottish Nobles declared that even if only one hundred Scotsmen were left they would never allow Scotland to be subjected to English rule (source: English translation of the original Latin text). These Members of Parliament were unrepresentative of the people of Scotland, they were large-scale landowners. It was 1874 before a working class Scot held a seat in Westminster, his name was Alexander MacDonald and he represented the English seat of Stafford. There have been eight Scottish prime Ministers at Westminster since the Act of union

The Earl of Bute, 1762-63
The Earl of Aberdeen 1852-55
AJ Balfour 1902-05
Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman 1905-08
Andrew Bonar Law 1922-23
James Ramsay MacDonald 1924, 1929-35
Sir Alec Douglas Home 1963-64
Tony Blair 1997 –present day

In 1885 the post of Secretary of State for Scotland was reinstated , however it was not until 1926 that a separate Scottish office was established and the post of Secretary of State became a cabinet position. The Scottish office then dealt with many different matters, which were specific to Scotland and has continued to do so up until today. However many people within Scotland were discontent with being ruled by Westminster and there were murmurs of discontent from voters some of whom wished to see a devolved Scottish parliament with or without tax raising powers and some of whom wanted complete independence from Westminster. The Scottish National Party was Founded in 1934 and scored its first bi-election victory in 1945 due to a grass roots support. During the 1980’s and 1990’s work by the SNP put the need for a Scottish parliament at the top of the Political agenda, many supporters of the SNP see the current Scottish Parliament as a distraction from the main objective of independence and believe that its creation has managed to extinguish some of the flames of desire for independence among otherwise nationalist voters who were less extreme in their beliefs.

The 1978 Scotland Act must be explained at this juncture so that the 1979 referendum on devolution can be understood. The Act states that 40% of all those eligible to vote, that is 40% of the Scottish electorate must support devolution in a referendum before Devolution would take place.

In order to consider why the campaign for devolution did not die at this point it is important to consider the distinct differences that there are between Scotland and England, to do this essay will now explore some of the differences.

1. Religion – In Scotland there are two main churches, the Church of Scotland and the Roman Catholic Church. In England the main Church is the Church of England and it’s position is enshrined in English/British politics, Bishops sit in the House of Lords and the Queen is the Head of the Church of England and Defender of the Faith, a title which was initially bestowed on English Monarchs by the Pope in reference to the Monarchy’s position within the Catholic Church prior to the reformation.
2. Education – the examination awards in Scotland and England are different. In England an honours degree course is three years long and in Scotland the duration of an honours degree is four years. The systems prior to Higher Education are different too, in Scotland there are Standard Grades, Intermediates, Highers and Advanced Highers, while in England there are GCSE O’Levels and A’Levels.
3. Legal system – In Scotland there are district, Sheriff and High courts, it is the office of the Procurator Fiscal that deals with prosecutions and Scotland has a Not Proven verdict which means that a person can be tried later for the same offence should new evidence come to light. In England there are two courts the Crown Court and the Magistrates Court, it is the Crown prosecution Service that deals with prosecutions and there are only two verdicts Guilt or Not Guilty which means that under the Double Jeopardy Laws a person can not be tried again for the same crime no matter what evidence may come to light later.
4. Sports – both Scotland and England have their own sporting teams.
5. Culture – Scotland has the Bagpipes and England has it’s Morris Dancers. Many Scots do not like to be referred to as British but most English see being British the same as being English.
6. Language – Scotland and England have different accents and Scotland has its own language, Gaelic.
7. Media – Scotland has it’s own regional stations, programmes and Newspapers, which reflect Scottish interests and Scottish Culture

The differences listed on the previous page are in no way complete, Scotland has other differences too, which have contributed to the demand for devolution. The Path to devolution has been a rocky one indeed, at an initial referendum on the question of political power being devolved to Scotland, which took place on 1st of March 1979, only 33% of the electorate turned out to vote, of those who voted 52% supported devolution and so due to the requirements of The Scotland Act devolution did not take place. The failure of this referendum may well have pleased the Conservative Party who were elected into Government in May 1979, as the Conservative Party of the time feared that devolution of powers to Scotland would result in the eventual break up of the United Kingdom. Those who desired independence or devolution did not give up at this hurdle but continued to campaigns for a greater say in Scottish affairs, a Scottish Government of some kind either devolved or independent and opinion polls over the years suggested that the desire for some form of self-Government in Scotland was growing. The farce of the 1987 General Election showed just how little say Scotland actually had in it’s own Government, Scotland voted NO unanimously to a Conservative Government, and yet the Conservatives were returned to power at Westminster. This was seen by some as an affront to Scotland, She had a Conservative Government imposed upon Her that She did not want, the Conservative Government had no mandate to Govern in Scotland. In all probability the results of this General election are what fired the devolution campaign on to greater heights and on the 11th September 1997 a second Devolution referendum was held this time 60.16% of the electorate turned out to vote, 74.29% voted yes there should be a Scottish Parliament and 63.48% voted that it should have tax varying powers. In May 1999 the electorate turned out to vote for their MSP’s.

The new Scottish Parliament it was decided, would consist of only one chamber as opposed to the bi-cameral system at Westminster. It was also decided that a new voting system would be used, the voting system is a combination of the list system used for the European Parliamentary elections and the First –Past- the Post system used at Westminster. This system is seen as fairer because the First-Past the Post system favours the two main parties within the British political system, while the List system enables smaller parties and Independents to gain seats. This system of proportional representation is known as the additional member list system. This system has been blamed for creating confusion at the ballot box and because after the elections voters were unsure of which MSP to turn to for assistance. The MSP’s elected through the First-Past the post system are now familiar faces to many people but few people know who their list MSP’s are. Protocol dictates that list MSP’s must tell the constituency MSP when they have been consulted by one of their constituents on a matter.

On the 1st of July 1999 the Scottish Parliament assumed it’s new role of tending to the devolved matters, these are matters devolved to the Scottish parliament as opposed to Reserved matters, power over which is reserved to Westminster.
Devolved Matters
Health
Housing
Social work
Education & Training
Local Government
Planning
Economic development
(Devolved matters continued)
Tourism
Law & Courts
Home Affairs
Police
Fire Service
Environment
Agriculture, Forestry & Fishing
(This list is not extensive).

Reserved Matters

Defence
National Security
Economics & other fiscal & monetary matters
Immigration
Energy
Trade & Industry
Transport (although some aspects have been devolved).
Employment
Social Security
Equal opportunities
(This list is not extensive).

There are areas of potential conflict between reserved powers and devolved powers for instance, police matters are devolved however if the Scottish parliament wanted to increase the amount of Police on the streets of Scotland substantially they would have to deal with Westminster because the funding for the Police force is the remit of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. It is in matters such as this that the Scottish office and the Secretary of State for Scotland come into play, it is their job to oversee Scottish interests where the Reserved matters are involved, it is for this reason that it is important that Scotland continues to send MP’s to Westminster. They are there to ensure that Scotland has a voice pertaining to the Reserved matters.

Within the Scottish parliament there is no second chamber to scrutinise legislation and so a committee structure was implemented, which differed from that which operates within Westminster. There are Standing committees, which are permanent bodies it is their job to scrutinise legislation pertaining to certain matters and to examine how the proposed legislation will affect Scottish Law and European Law and to decide if alterations need to be made to the Law or the Legislation. The Standing Committees are the procedures committee, the standards committee, the finance committee, the audit committee, the European committee, Public Petitions committee, Equal Opportunities committee and the subordinate legislation committee, the matters which they have within their remit are called competent matters. There are other committees, which are organised to deal with specific matters as and when they arise these are called Subject committees. The committees system exists not only to scrutinise legislation but also to allow greater public involvement in Parliamentary activities and to hold the Scottish Executive to account. Committees may consider policy, financial arrangements and administration, propose legislation and law reforms and examine, discuss and research European Legislation and international conventions and agreements, which effect Scotland. Each committee is chaired by a convener and can consist of anything from 5 to 15 MSP’s.

Having a system such as exists today ensures Scotland has greater control over her affairs, and yet can still remain part of the United Kingdom. However it places the SNP in a peculiar position, they are in opposition in a Parliament, which many within their ranks see as a compromise of their political objective of independence. Many within Scotland view the Scottish Parliament as the first step towards independence while others view it as a final outcome. Whether the Parliament as we know it today will grow and gain greater autonomy and eventually lead to independence is a question that only time will answer, but the politics of Scotland have been given a new lease of life since the conception of the Scottish Parliament and it is a sad fact that Donald Dewar did not live long enough to experience the colourful new ideas that have been discussed and implemented in a political system and a Parliament he once thought only a dream.
S.McGonigal(2001)

This essay will explore and attempt to analyse some of Woodrow Wilson’s Fourteen Points and their importance in relation to the end of the First World War.
The reasons for selecting this source are because it is a primary source and that it is of major importance in explaining how the minds of the Worlds political leaders were working at that point in time. Although The 14 Points are attributed to Wilson it is highly unlikely that it is all Wilson’s work, in all probability it is an amalgamation of the work of Wilson, his political and military advisors and perhaps some input was given by the political leadership of the allies. In the first paragraph of the source it becomes clear that the lengthy Brest –Litovsk parley’s were not comprehensive enough for Woodrow Wilson or his allies, Wilson is clear that Germany and her allies has set up a challenge to the other European Nations and their allies to make their terms of Peace known and in his 14 points that is exactly what Wilson has set out to achieve. Wilson considered the talks at Brest –Litovsk to be an atrocity to other nations. Although the treaty of Brest Litovsk did not take place until 3 March 1918 the talks or parley’s had already taken place before Wilson made his 14 points as a step towards peace.

This quote “ We entered this War because violations of right had occurred which touched us to the quick…” refers to the different moves and countermoves made in the War by Germany, seemingly as an effort to drag America kicking and screaming into the conflict.

America had avoided all attempts to drag her into the war, She maintained the view that events, which were taking place in Europe were not Her business, but Germany’s policy of unrestricted submarine warfare appeared to be aimed specifically at American registered merchant vessels using the Atlantic to Trade with Britain and her allied nations. The sinking of the Lusitania, with the loss of all hands was a prime example of how the Germans were bent on antagonising and baiting the American nation into joining a War it wanted no involvement in. the Lusitania was a British Merchant vessel sailing under an American flag carrying passengers and armaments across the Atlantic. It was sunk by a German submarine and the German submariners were hailed as hero’s for their part in this atrocity, the German government issued medals commemorating the sinking of the ship, on one side of the medal was a picture of the Lusitania sinking on the other side was a picture of civilian passengers entering hell. Due to the fact that American civilian passengers lost their lives, the American public put pressure on Woodrow Wilson to enter the War against Germany and her allies. The other issue, which was of major importance in American involvement of the War, was the Zimmermann Telegram.
The following text is a translation of the telegram intercepted by British Intelligence, which was sent by Zimmerman to the Imperial Minister in Mexico, it offers an alliance between Germany and Mexico and appears to be a request by Germany for Mexican support for an invasion of the USA. An action, which can only be interpreted as hostile and an attempt to either pre-occupy the USA with her own small war or to drag the USA kicking and screaming into the conflict in Europe.

Most Secret

For Your Excellency's personal information and to be handed on to the Imperial Minister in Mexico
We intend to begin unrestricted submarine warfare on the first of February. We shall endeavour in spite of this to keep the United States neutral. In the event of this not succeeding, we make Mexico a proposal of an alliance on the following basis: Make war together, make peace together, generous financial support, and an understanding on our part that Mexico is to reconquer the lost territory in Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona. The settlement detail is left to you.

You will inform the President [of Mexico] of the above most secretly as soon as the outbreak of war with the United States is certain and add the suggestion that he should, on his own initiative, invite Japan to immediate adherence and at the same time mediate between Japan and ourselves.

Please call the President's attention to the fact that the unrestricted employment of our submarines now offers the prospect of compelling England to make peace within a few months. Acknowledge receipt.

Zimmerman

(Source: THE ZIMMERMANN TELEGRAM, Barbara Tuchmann, 1966, Balantine Books)

Foreign Minister Zimmermann's telegram of February 1917 was intercepted and decoded by British Naval Intelligence, who had managed to break the German diplomatic code. While ensuring that British involvement in the interception and deciphering of the text was kept under wraps, the British turned handed over the contents of the text to American Ambassador Walter Hines Page in London on February 24. It was feared that if the American people knew the source, which had interrupted the passage of the telegram they would consider it to be a fake and an action by Britain and her Allies to Involve America in the War. The telegram was authenticated by Zimmermann himself he publicly acknowledged the message on March 2.
February 26, 1917, Acting Secretary of State Frank Polk gave President Woodrow Wilson the decoded text (as above), of a secret message sent by German Foreign Minister Arthur Zimmermann to the German Minister in Mexico proposing a German military alliance with Mexico and Japan against the United States. Zimmermann offered the Mexican Government the possibility of German assistance to regain New Mexico, Arizona, and California.
The President was unprepared for this threat to American security.
The next day he proposed to Congress the arming of U.S. ships against German attacks, and on March 1 he announced the discovery of the secret German machinations. Arthur Link, President Wilson's biographer, wrote that "No other event of the war ...so stunned the American people." The American Congress and public reaction to the Zimmermann telegram was a major turning point in the attitude of Americans towards joining with Great Britain and her Allies against Germany America entered the War in April 1917.
(source: US State Department on-line Document Archives).

This essay will now examine some of Wilson’s 14 points, points 1 to 5, point 6, point 8 and point 12.
POINT 1
Point one asks for a policy of openness in all diplomatic and Governmental actions, which could lead to peace. An early day plea for public accountability of diplomatic and governmental actions.
POINT 2
Is a demand for all nations and their naval vessels to have complete freedom on the seas outside of territorial waters, allowing freedom of movement of goods and people around the world, for trade and other purposes without the threat from submarines or Warships.

POINT 3
To make this point Wilson uses a carrot & stick approach, he is requesting a
freedom to trade for all nations, laissez faire. There will be no trade
sanctions against all nations who sign up for peace but for those who do not
economic sanctions will be imposed.

POINT 4

This is a demand for unilateral disarmament, to a level, which is suitable for defence of territory and borders of each nation. However Wilson is unclear on who decides what level of armament is suitable for defence and what level can be interpreted as a level of attack. He makes no attempt to clarify this or to allow for the interpretation that attack is the best form of defence.

POINT 5

In theory all the colonies of the World should have had a choice as to whether they wanted independence from their Imperialist masters at the end of the war. More specifically Wilson could have been referring to German interests in Africa such as German Togo land when the Germans lose the war do the people of German Togo land want to be German? Although this point is a nice idea such moves can often result in further conflict to see an example of this in today’s world we need only look to the troubles in Palestine, which have occurred due to the creation of a Jewish state.

POINT 6

Wilson is looking specifically at Russia in this point and at her territories. He is telling other nations ‘hands off’ Russian territory. However Russia has accrued various territories, which were not originally hers and Wilson does not make it clear as to which territory he is referring. He also does not relate this point to the previous one, which should allow the indigenous populations of Russian held territories decide if they wish to have their independence. Wilson is recognising Russia as a member of the League of Nations and is saying ‘treat Russia according to her needs not your own’. He is not trying to break up empires.

POINT 8

This point is a direct reference to the territory of Alsace-Lorraine; according to Wilson the conflicts over this territory are responsible for over fifty years of turmoil within Europe. He has decided that the territory must be restored to France in order to bring back peace to the region. Wilson did not give the people of this territory the same rights as he gave to other peoples in point 5. This is presumably because he interprets the region as belonging to France originally and presumes that the people within the territory consider themselves to be French, however at this point in time there would have been generations of people who had been born into and lived all their lives as Germans.

Point 12

In this point Wilson opens the Dardanelles to the whole world, allowing freedom of access to the Black Sea for all nations, without this point Russia’s Black Sea Fleet are of little consequence on the worlds seas because they are confined within an inland sea. This point is aimed at hurting the Turkish Empire, removing all those territories, which are not Turkish speaking and effectively finishing off the ‘sick man of Europe’. Turkey is to pay heavily for taking Germany’s side in the War. The regions of the Turkish Empire are to be given autonomy. His point is support for the Arab and Greek speaking areas of the Turkish Empire to rise up and overthrow their Masters, who for a long time have treated the ethnic minorities within their Empire with contempt and have practiced abominations of Human rights and ethnic cleansing.

The other points consider borders and ethnic populations and point 13 suggests the creation of an independent Polish State. Wilson drew up these points without having a clear knowledge of the peoples, lands, languages and Natural territorial boundaries within Europe or the effects this design for peace would have.

In the remainder of his speech on the 14 points Wilson was bent on assuring Germany and her people that there would be no compromise, that the Worlds would not allow Germany to attempt to become Masters of the world but that if they signed up to this peace accord and abided by the agreement the World would allow Germany to participate in trade and reinstate full diplomatic conventions to her. Wilson reassures Germany that she will be responsible for her own internal and external affairs without intervention from other nations, if she takes her place in the League of Nations and decides who is to run Germany, her politicians or her imperialist military leaders. Wilson wants to know if the German spokesmen are representative of the people of Germany or are they only representative of the Military aspirations of the Kaiser and his imperialist Generals.

This source is of great value in understanding how the nations of the world viewed Germany and her allies. Wilson makes no bones that her imperialism will not be tolerated. He wishes for all nations to be treated fairly and makes no allowances for human nature and it’s vices within his speech he wants a world with free trade living in peace and harmony, where every nation has a say in world affairs and no one over steps those boundaries. The colonialists and the imperialists have little place in the post war world Wilson hopes his 14 points will make possible. It is indeed a wonderful idea but one, which all too soon was to become but a distant memory, in just over 2 decades the world would be embroiled in another conflict, one which would see the use of weapons of even greater mass destruction change the face of warfare for ever.
Wilson neglects to address the flaws in human nature, which permeate the leadership in societies from time to time and paints a ‘sign the peace agreement and everything will be rosy’ picture of humanity on a global scale. Wilson also failed to address what would happen if the leadership of Germany did not alter its attitude with regard to it’s plans for world domination, he left Germany free to stash those policies away somewhere close to hand, so that later, with a better army and greater military resources the Nazi Party could pick up those ideas and run with them again.
S.McGonigal (2001)

Time Line of events leading to WW1

1871- unification of Germany, and the formation of the German empire.
1879- Germany and Austria-Hungary form a defensive alliance. .
1882- Triple Alliance formed by Germany,
Austria-Hungary and Italy
1887-Renewal of Triple Alliance Britain, Austria-Hungary and Italy conclude Mediterranean agreements in an effort to maintain peace in the Mediterranean and near east. Germany and Russia enter into reinsurance treaty.
1890-Bismarck leaves office of Chancellor
1894- Defensive alliance signed by France and Russia 1898 - Basis for a powerful German battle fleet
1900 established by new German Navy Laws.
1902- Anglo-Japanese alliance concluded.
1904- France and Britain agree entente
1905-First Moroccan crisis
1906- January Moroccan crisis settled at Algeciras conference. Britain and France hold Military discussions concerning the possibility of a British expeditionary force being sent to France in the event of a military conflict.
February existing naval vessels are made obsolete by the launch of a new powerful gun ship the Dreadnought, intensifying naval rivalry between Germany and Britain.
1907-Britain, Russia and France form triple entente. 1908-Annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina by Austria-Hungary.
1911- Arrival of German Gunboat panther at Agadir causes second Moroccan crisis. Italy annexes Tripoli in Libya and declares war on Turkey.
1912-First Balkan War
1913-Second Balkan War.
1914-23 June Archduke Franz Ferdinand assassinated at Sarewejo.
5 July Germany gives Austria-Hungary assurances of support in event of military action against Serbia.
23 July Ten-point Ultimatum issued by Austria-Hungary to Serbia.
24 July Serbia assured of support from Russia in event of military action by Austria-Hungary.
25 July Austria-Hungary mobilises its forces against Serbia when Serbia refuses to accept all ten-points of its ultimatum.
28 July War declared on Serbia by Austria-Hungary.
30 July Russia mobilises its military forces.
1 August Germany declares war on Russia, France begins mobilisation.
3 August Germany invades Belgium after declaring war on France.
4 August Germany declares war on Belgium. Britain declares war on Germany.
5 August Austria-Hungary declares war on Russia
10 August France declares war on Austria-Hungary.
12 August Britain declares war on Austria-Hungary.

The objective of this essay is to reach a measured conclusion as to German responsibility for the outbreak of The First World War. In order to achieve this objective the essay will consider conflicting evidence using several sources, those being, Fritz Fischer’s views on the conduct of the German Government immediately prior to the outbreak of war, Jagow’s communication to the German Ambassador in London 18th July 1914, Paleleogue’s account of the discussions on the 29th and 30th July 1914 and Goschen’s report to Sir Edward Grey of his meeting with the German Chancellor. This essay will of course consider other evidence in order to make an educated attempt at assessing where, if anywhere the responsibility for the First World War lies.

A primary source which shows quite clearly that post First world War Germany denied responsibility for the first World War is a message from Field Marshall Montgomery ‘TO THE POPULATION OF THE BRITISH AREA IN GERMANY 10TH JUNE 1945 – “You have wondered, no doubt why our soldiers do not smile when you wave your hands, or say ‘Good morning’ in the streets, or play with the children. It is because our soldiers are obeying orders. You do not like it. Nor do our soldiers. We are naturally friendly and forgiving people. But the orders were necessary; and I will tell you why.
In the last war of 1914, which your rulers began, your army was defeated; your generals surrendered; and in the Peace Treaty of Versailles your rulers admitted that the guilt of the beginning of the war was Germany’s. But the surrender was made in France. The war never came to your country; your cities were not damaged, like the cities of France and Belgium; and your armies marched home in good order. Then your rulers began to spread the story (legend) that your armies were never really defeated, and later they denied the war guilt clauses of the Peace Treaty. They told you that Germany was neither Guilty nor defeated; and because the war had not come to your country many of you believed it, and you cheered when your rulers began another war.’
(MEMOIRS, Field Marshall The Viscount Montgomery of Alamein, K.G. (1958), P340), if as Field Marshall Montgomery states in this address the German Government denied the War guilt clauses contained in the Versailles peace treaty so soon after the war, it can be assumed that the German Government either hoped to deceive the German people or they felt that far from being guilty of causing the war they were pushed into a situation from which there was no way out other than war. However the fact that the German Government claimed that the German Army was undefeated leads to the assumption that the German Government was in the business of deception and not a hapless victim of circumstance.

Prior to the retrieval of documentation from the Imperial German Archives in Potsdam in the 1960’s there were two popular views concerning the reasons for the First World War, A.J.P. Taylor suggested in his book (1954), ‘The Struggle for Mastery in Europe,’ that German was seeking Continental Supremacy prior to 1914, which frightened ‘Britain, France and Russia into a defensive alignment in a desperate bid to contain German Political and economic power’ (The Origins of the first World War, Ruth Henig, p44). According to A.J.P. Taylor it was a breakdown of the balance of power system within Europe, which led to the First World War. According to an Italian historian Albertini it was Germany’s support for Austria-Hungary which played a major role in causing the First world War, Albertini presumes that if Grey had given Germany earlier warning of the likelihood of British intervention in any military action involving France or Russia, Germany may not have been so eager to mobilise when Austria-Hungary declared War on Serbia, Albertini therefore squarely blames the mobilisation plans of Germany for causing the First World War.

The Fischer thesis, a secondary source, was very contentious when it was first published but it was gradually found to be more acceptable, Fischer unlike other historians of the 50’s and 60’s had access to the Imperial German Archives in Potsdam. Fischer points to the build up of arms within the major countries of Europe which he perceives as giving Germany the option of either winning a war and becoming a major world power or Germany simply falling into decline, Fischer draws from Bernhardi’s thesis to make this point and he also shows how Bernhardi a retired German Military officer had an interesting interpretation of the theories of Darwin, like later German officers of the Nazi era he believed in Darwinism and thought of war as a natural method of population control in which the survival of the fittest is a proven fact. Nazi’s would later use Darwin to explain why they were exterminating the Jewish race. The idea that a Major new power would emerge during the 20th Century had been circulating the educational establishments of Europe since the 1800’s and as Germany was a large new state it was understandable that people would consider Germany to be that power, it probably did not occur to the inhabitants of industrialised Europe to look across the Atlantic to North America to find a new dominant power for the 20th century. It is also understandable how the German politicians could look at the predictions of a major new power in the world and somehow attempt to make the prediction apply to Germany out of fear of becoming the new ‘sick man of Europe’ through it’s alliances and attachment to Austria and the Austro-Hungarian empire.
According to Fischer there was a widely held view within the German hierarchy that war with Russia was inevitable because Russia was intent on reforming and reequipping it’s military and the German hierarchy believed that it suited Germany’s position better if that war occurred prior to 1917, because after this time they believed that Russia would have completed its military reforms and Germany would not be in such a good military position. Germany and Russia were both like imperialist vultures circling the rotting carcass of Turkey, the sick man of Europe and were destined to become entailed in conflict over the remains. According to the German hierarchy, Germany would undoubtedly win any conflict with Russia if they could enter into a war with her pre 1917, and it is this theory that Fischer picks up on and develops into his first point that one reason for German responsibility for World War One was Military pressure. Fischer’s second point was that of German expansionist plans, he divides this point up referring to MittelEuropa, quite literally middle Europe and MittelAfrika, middle Africa. Fischer recognises that Germany’s geographical position within Europe was central to the German plans for expansion, the German Hierarchy’s presupposition that the Russian Empire would gradually be conquered by Germany and that France would eventually lose valuable territory which incorporates a great deal of the country’s industrialised economic base, if these event occurred as the German Hierarchy hoped then Germany would have been a very powerful world force. The idea of this new German super state within Europe was so appealing to Germany that it was adopted and promoted by the Pan German League, war was seen as a necessary action to achieve these aims, German defeat was not even a consideration, her triumph in any military action was seen as a foregone conclusion.
Fischer again points towards Germany’s want for war to achieve its expansionist aims in Africa. Germany was a European country in its infancy, she did not, like other major powers in the region, have colonies or a vast trading empire, but that did not mean that Germany didn’t want colonies or an overseas empire it was just that she entered the imperialist race long after other nations had divided the map up among themselves. They had however managed to gain three German colonies within Africa, South West Africa, German East Africa and Cameroon but were discontent. Germany felt that she should have more of the African continent and she presumed that if she could annexe Belgium then the Belgian Congo would undoubtedly be hers and she could then force further negotiations in Africa with the British a major power in Africa as in Europe. Further German expansionist aims were directed toward the decaying Ottoman Empire, the Berlin to Baghdad railroad had already established German influence in the area and Germany set about building on this influence so as to remove British and French Influence from the region. Finally Fischer focuses on the social and political concerns within the new Germany, the conservative elements of the ruling classes were concerned with the growth of socialism and trade unions within her borders and she wished to find a way to stop this growth and focus the attentions of the people elsewhere….War it appeared was a perfect distraction from socialist politics and also war could provide the radical means of ridding Germany of socialist influences for once and for all. Fischer shows how the voices of reasoning within Germany were persuaded to silence by promises of the huge benefits of war, bringing Germany to its rightful place on the world political and economic stage.

The next piece of evidence this essay shall consider is a primary source which appears to show that Germany was intent on war is one which has become known as ‘A Scrap of Paper’ this was correspondence between Sir E.Goschen the British Ambassador to Berlin and Sir Edward Grey 4th August 1914, which reported the interview between Goschen and Chancellor Von Bethman-Hollweg after the Germans had violated Belgium’s neutrality and invaded, in the account given by Goschen he was at pains to point out to Bethmann-Hollweg the seriousness of such a violation, however Bethmann-Hollweg appeared to have ignored all warnings of just how serious the situation had become and made excuses for Germany’s invasion of Belgium and it’s refusal to withdraw basically saying that speed was of the essence to Germany in its conflict with France and infact that German withdrawal from Belgium was now impossible. It is apparent from the details contained in the source that Germany was unconcerned by the serious situation she was creating in Europe, she seemed to be creating a situation which would involve all of the European super powers deliberately, actively pursuing all out war in Europe. Bethmann-Hollweg attempted to minimise the graveness of the situation Germany had created by telling Goschen that neutrality was just a word and Britain should not concern itself with such minor things. Would Britain actually go to war with Germany over a scrap of paper, Bethmann-Hollweg did not appear to believe so and if he did perhaps he and his countrymen did not care or perhaps they just underestimated Britain’s resolve in maintaining it’s status as a world power, Bethmann –Hollweg actually infers that should Great Britain react to German invasion of Neutral Belgium it will be Great Britain who is held responsible for the war which follows. He attempts to paint Britain as the instigator of war with Germany by reiterating German-British friendship. If Bethmann-Hollweg is to be believed then German had no choice she was pushed into a situation by France and Russia, which left her no alternative, and just when she feels able to control the situation a little, another of the triple entente gang begins harassing her into conflict.

The next piece of evidence this essay will consider is that of Maurice Paleologue, it is taken from his memoirs entitled ‘An Ambassador’s Memoirs’, (Maurice Paleologue, volume1, ChapterII, July 24-August 2, 1914), this is an account of Sazonov’s, Buchannan’s and Paleologue’s attempt to bring Britain to mobilise her forces in support of France and Russia and of the uneasy last ditch efforts to avoid war by attempting to negotiate a peaceful solution with Austria-Hungary and Germany. Sazanov states quite clearly in this account that he believes that the policy of Austria-Hungary and Germany is that which will lead to all out war and Paleologue concludes that if Germany has already decided to go down the road to war then that is what will happen, but that the triple entente powers should still attempt negotiation, while bearing in mind that war appears to be the preferred choice of Germany. Buchannan states that for England to remain neutral at this juncture would be suicidal for the nation and the ministers are in agreement that Germany would be unlikely to attack the triple entente if they stand firm. It appears with the benefit of hindsight that the ministers’ underestimated Germany’s resolve for war in order to achieve her territorial and economic aims. Germany kept up pretence of wanting to avoid war by inferring that although some conflict was unavoidable because of Germany’s support for Austria-Hungary, it would be better if the military action were confined to the affected locality without third party intervention and furthermore that if a third party was to intervene then Germany could not be held responsible for the consequences. Germany wanted to uphold its alliance and expected Britain, France and Russia to for go theirs. Even prior to the start of the Great war Germany was denying it’s guilt in being the instigator of war on a European or World scale, indeed Pourtales’ outburst on July 28th, 1914 proclaimed that Germany was a peace loving nation and had kept the peace in Europe for 43 years furthermore he was indignant at the accusation that Germany desired war and stated that, “’History will prove that we have right on our side and our conscience has nothing to reproach us for.” It is difficult to understand how Pourtales could believe his own words; with all of the evidence this essay has examined so far, all accusatory fingers relating to the guilt of the First World War must indeed point to Germany. There is however a lingering thought that perhaps in the mind of Germany herself she was acting out of loyalty to an ally, Austria-Hungary and had the alliance between Germany and Austria-Hungary not existed she would never have been pushed into a war by a dispute that did not involve her directly.
Once mobilisation of Germany’s forces had begun a domino effect had been started with forces being mobilised all over Europe in order to uphold alliances. The gravity of the situation did not escape the ministers or the Tsar they agreed that there was no alternative to war and that the cost in human lives would be astronomical. It is quite clear in this account that the powers of the triple entente did not want war and tried very hard to avoid it by giving Germany and Austria-Hungary many opportunities to avoid war, this was never clearer than when Russia suspended mobilisation of her forces after Kaiser Wilhelm contacted the Tsar with a tale of Germany’s plans to sort the situation out through diplomacy, a tactic to delay Russia from mobilising in time to assist Serbia. Germany’s response to any requests to think again before further military action was taken was its too late, can’t be helped but if you join in it will become your responsibility, you are bullies and are not giving us a choice. When in fact Germany had been given every opportunity to refrain from war mongering.

The next source that this essay will consider as evidence is also a primary source, that of Jagow’s communication to the German Ambassador in London, 18th July 1914. Jagow appears to believe that as long as Austria-Hungary is strong then Russia will not act, he seems to think that Russia will back down when faced with the threat of Military Action because her forces and fleet are not yet ready for military action and will not be for a few more years. He like other German Ministers recognises the importance for Germany of localising the conflict and persuading the other members of the triple entente not to honour their alliance. He emphasises the importance of British involvement to the outcome of the situation and does not blame his country but states that “If the fight offers itself,” Germany will not flinch. He uses the alliance with Austria to justify Germany’s position with regard to involvement in military action. This piece of evidence is important as it reinforces the arguments introduced previously, Germany’s need for war prior to Russian forces becoming modernised, her manipulative attempts to place the guilt for war into the hands of other nations and her expansionist aims under the guise of assisting Austria-Hungary.

There are other elements which must be taken into consideration before deciding on just who was responsible for the First World War one of them is Kaiser Wilhelm II a document which shows quite clearly the state of mind of one of Europe’s most powerful men entitled June-July, 1914 German dispatches and the Kaiser’s notes. The Kaisers notes in the margins in response to the dispatches show that the Kaiser appears to be suffering from paranoid tendencies where the triple entente was concerned and he was the man at the helm of Germany’s political and economic ambitions. Another element, which must be given consideration is that there were so many diplomatic and territorial disputes pertaining to the Balkans and the decline of the Ottoman Empire that it almost seems that, a war on some scale within Europe was inevitable.

However this essay must conclude that the responsibility for the first World War lies with Germany, her expansionist policies combined with her domestic troubles, a strong belief in Darwinistic theories of the survival of the fittest and a leader who was bent on building the biggest army and the biggest naval fleet in Europe, was a powder keg waiting for a spark to ignite it and that spark was provided by the conflict between Austria-Hungary and Serbia. It was the alliances both formal and informal between other powers in Europe, which increased the conflict to ‘World War’ status, the very alliances that were supposed to assure peace in the world. The irony is that post World War 1 these policies were merely put on the back burner in Germany until the Nazi’s took them up again and caused another war.
S.McGonigal (2001)

Bibliography

Christopher Primrose, 2001

Memoirs, Montgomery Of Alamein, 1960, Companion Book club edition, published by William Collins, Sons & Co, Ltd, Watford, Herts.

The Origins of the First World War, Third Edition (1993), Ruth Henig, Lancaster Pamphlets, Routledge

This essay will evaluate a range of sociological studies relating to race and ethnicity. The studies used in this essay are as follows; Who are the real racists? (E. Ellis Cashmore, New society, 13 June 1986), Unemployment and Racially Motivated Violence, (Mark Bainbridge, Brian Burkitt and Marie Macey, Research Roundup, Sociology Review, November 1994), Dark Strangers, (Sheila Patterson, Haralambos), The Underclass in Birmingham, (John Rex, Sally Tomlinson, Haralambos).
These studies are representative of at least two sociological perspectives.
In order to evaluate these studies it is necessary to define race and ethnicity, as the two are not necessarily the same, a definition of race is the biological group into which a person is born people of the same race have physical characteristics in common such as hair colour, eyes colour, skin colour, within a race there may be many variations. Anthony Giddens describes race as ‘ a set of social relationships which allow individuals and groups to be located, and various attributes or competencies assigned, on the basis of biologically grounded feature’, (Giddens, 4th edition (2001), p696). A definition of ethnicity is the culture/religion of the social group to which a person belongs, the cultural heritage of a person from a particular society shared by others within that society. Thus ethnic groups may not consist of only one race and the members of one race may have different ethnicities, e.g. members of the Caucasian race come from many varied ethnic groupings. Anthony Giddens defines ethnicity as,’Cultural Values and norms which distinguish the members of a given group from others. An ethnic Group is one whose members share a distinct awareness of a common cultural identity, separating them from other groups around them. In virtually all societies ethnic differences are associated with variations in power and material wealth. Where ethnic differences are also regarded as racial, such divisions as sometimes especially pronounced’, (Giddens, 4th edition (2001), p688). There is one more sociological term which must be clarified before this essay can examine theories or case studies, that term is ‘ethnic minority’, this term is often mis-interpreted as having a numerical definition, the term minority is used to distinguish between those groups which are disadvantaged compared to the general (majority) population. In inner cities the Ethnic Minority may infact be the majority of the population but is still referred to as a minority because the group is disadvantaged due to its ethnicity when compared to the entire population of a particular country. Another interpretation of an ethnic minority is that of a group which, has experienced prejudice or discrimination at the hands of a majority population. Often members of an ethnic minority will encourage endogamy to keep their cultural and ethnic heritage intact.

This essay will now explore the theories common to the study of race and ethnicity.

One theory, which is commonly used to give a sociological explanation of race and ethnicity is the Dual Labour Market Theory or Underclass theory which should not be confused with Charles Murray’s Black Underclass Theory, which is considered to be right wing and according to labelling theorists stereotypes an entire group of society, the black population in America as an underclass who have developed a culture of dependency. The Underclass Theory that this essay is concerned with is that of John Rex a Weberian sociologist, his theory differs from that of Murray because he focuses on the economic racism and exploitation of different races in western society. This theory divides the labour market into two distinct groups the primary labour market, which consists of well paid jobs with a good benefits package, good training, promotion prospects and job security and the secondary labour market which consists of low paid, low skilled jobs with little job security and very limited scope for training or promotion. Rex points to the fact that there are a high percentage of blacks and Asians working within the secondary labour market and that these groups appear in a much lower percentage than whites in the primary labour market. Anthony Giddens (1973) showed that ethnic minorities were in a disadvantaged position within the labour market in the UK because they lack skills and qualifications and face discrimination and prejudice. A study by Gillborn & Gipps (1996) would appear to support Giddens (1973) because it shows that afro-Caribbean junior school children are less likely to achieve well in school than their white peers. Other studies support this evidence and show that perhaps language barriers are responsible for under achievement in schools, which would explain the high percentage of ethnic minorities within the secondary labour market. If children from ethnic minorities cannot achieve qualifications at schools and colleges because their pre-school level of understanding of the English language places them in a disadvantaged position right from their first day in the education system, how can they then be expected to compete in the primary labour market with adults who have managed to attain qualifications in the same educational system.

The second theory this essay will examine is that of the Marxist feminists a leading exponent of this theory Sheila Allan believes that only by generalising the theory from black women to all women, can the position of black women in the labour market be understood. Marxist feminists use statistics to show how little difference there is between the position and earning power of women of any race within the labour market, when compared to the positions and earning power of men. When examining a woman’s position in the labour market the colour of her skin or her ethnic origins make very little difference to her opportunities. The secondary labour market is dominated by women of all races and ethnic origins who make up the true reserve army of labour within a capitalist society. Marxists also argue that there are very few women within high status occupations regardless of ethnic or racial origins.

The next theory to be examined is the Marxist theory. Marxists believe that it is capitalism, which creates racial problems because, immigrants were encouraged to come to the UK in the 1950’s to fill the jobs that nobody wanted to do and once unemployment started to rise the immigrants were accused of stealing jobs from UK nationals. The capitalist society expects the immigrants to be a reserve army of labour, which can be exploited as and when the need arises, Marxist argue that in the past slavery was a form of the exploitation of labour and that colonisation and racism are tools by which, races and ethnic minorities are further exploited. When there is high unemployment the competition for jobs between different races and cultures becomes greater and thus racial hatred increases as ethnic minorities are blamed for taking up valuable resources, which the host population believe are rightfully theirs.

The last theory to be examined is the Immigrant-Host relationship.
This theory deals with the process of immigration and how it affects the host community and the immigrant population. This is a functionalist theory and it assumes that assimilation of the immigrant population into the host community is desirable; this theory also presumes that the host community is a fully culturally integrated and homogenous population. The basis of this theory is that every society has its own social norms and values, which are based on a general consensus and if a group whose social norms and values are distinctly different from those of the host community attempts to integrate racial and ethnic tensions are increased. It illustrates how often the host community is unwilling to alter its behaviour in order to allow the culture of the immigrant population to be integrated with it’s own culture. This theory has opened up many debates on the issues it raises about immigrant populations because it assumes a consensus of the desirability of assimilation by the host population, thus devaluing cultural diversity, it ignores the cultural diversity that may already exist within the host community and attaches little importance to racism and it’s effects on both the immigrants and the host community. According to this theory there can be several outcomes to immigration, complete rejection where two groups refuse to compromise and integrate preferring to attempt to oust each other, assimilation where the immigrant population adapt and disappear into the host society by adopting the culture of the host community. Integration where the immigrant population retain their cultural identity but adapt to the culture of the host nation and self segregation where the immigrant population cuts itself off from the host culture refusing to make any adaptations, an example of this is colonialism.

The first study that this essay will examine is ‘Who are the real racists?’ (E. Ellis Cashmore, New Society, 13 June, 1986), uses the structuralist theory of the immigrant host relationship. This study covered for areas in the West Midlands, Newtown a working class council estate, with a high rate of unemployment, Edgbaston an affluent inner city residential area, with low unemployment, Chelmsley Wood, a city overspill area with higher unemployment than Edgbaston but lower than Newtown and Solihull one of the most affluent areas of the West Midlands with the same rate of unemployment as Edgbaston. The study was conducted over a period of two and a half years and consisted of unstructured interviews of 200 inhabitants from the four areas. There is a link between research method and perspective. The study shows how there are different forms of racism distributed through the different social strata’s, surprisingly Cashmore found that the least racist group of all came from the youths of the inner city council estate, where unemployment was highest and where extreme right wing groups traditionally recruit, this area is the area most likely to be expected to have a zero-sum attitude towards immigrants because of the scarcity of resources. However Cashmore concluded from this study that ‘racism is pervasive’ among whites, that is that it exists in some shape or form throughout every social strata of the white population. Blatant racism as associated with right wing extremists such as the British National Party is obvious but racism doesn’t have to be blatant to exist. In Cashmore’s study the resident from the ‘cocooned’ environment of Edgbaston admits to being blinkered, he doesn’t have to confront immigrants because they don’t live near him, those that do are of a similar social class and very much in the minority, the resident admits to having a drink with them at Christmas and then virtually ignoring them for the rest of the year, this act can be interpreted as racist, because it means that the immigrant family are excluded from real friendship with the exception of special occasions. This study cannot be generalised to the whole of the UK because it focuses on one particular area. The research is also dated it was carried out over 18yrs ago. It is a valuable piece of research because it looked at different strata’s in society and the attitudes within them to race and ethnicity. It also shows how it is easier to believe that you are not racist when you live in a socially affluent area and do not have to confront the problems associated with a large immigrant influx on a daily basis. The research can be criticised for appearing to be biased, from 80 unstructured interviews we are only given direct quotes from two and both of them prove the researchers point that racism occurs within all levels of white society. We need only look to HRH Prince Phillip to see aristocratic racism in action, he himself has made many a faux pas, which can be interpreted as inherently racist.

The second study that this essay will consider is Unemployment and Racially Motivated Violence (Mark Bainbridge et al, Research Roundup, Sociology Review, November 1994). This study attempts to explain why there is an increase in racial violence when there is a rise in unemployment. This study is from a structuralist perspective and shows how scapegoating occurs within society – scapegoating is when two ethnic groups come into conflict over scarce resources (Giddens, 4th Edition, 2001, p252). The study explains the competition for scarce resources during periods of high unemployment and how people develop a zero-sum position regarding ethnic minorities i.e. they gain we lose, they lose we gain. The study uses Government Statistics and EU statistics to examine the rise in racial violence within the UK and the move towards right wing political organisations.
The study is valuable because it proves the hypothesis that there is a direct rise in racial violence in line with a rise in unemployment however the study fails to address why racial violence does not fall when unemployment falls. The study admits that there are other factors, which influence the rise of incidents of racial violence.

The next study that this essay will examine is Dark Strangers, (Sheila Patterson 1950’s, Haralambos). This essay uses a functionalist perspective and the Immigrant Host Framework theory. The study was conducted using several research methods, interviews, observation and participant observation all of which produce qualitative data. This study examines how two separate groups interact within society, the immigrants and the hosts. Patterson also paints Britain as a homogenous society. Immigration is usually undertaken by large ethnic groups because of many varying push and pull factors. This theory assumes that assimilation is the desired result of immigration by the host nation and that both the immigrants and the hosts would adapt to accommodate assimilation for the greater good of society, however Patterson found that the hosts actually did very little adapting and expected the immigrants to do most of the work, she also found that the process was not static but continually evolving. Patterson like other functionalists viewed accommodation as the first stage in a three-part process of accommodation, integration and assimilation. Assimilation occurs when the immigrants have through interbreeding and shedding their own cultural norms and values completely disappeared into the host society, a process which ignores and devalues the richness and benefits of cultural diversity. Patterson’s study, which was conducted in the 1950’s found that the immigrants of West Indian origin had not progressed further than the stage of accommodation and that the cockney humour directed at the immigrants was not racist but merely friendly jocular ‘banter’ and that the apartheid attitudes of whites only in shops and public places in the areas where the immigrants lived were disappearing. Patterson was confident that eventually the immigrants would be integrated within British society. However it is over 50 years since the study was undertaken and far from there being an integration and assimilation of West Indians into British culture, with the exception of a few select spheres such as employment, there still remain divisions and some areas where there are large numbers of Immigrants (now 2nd and 3rd Generations) have become virtual ghettos, which are perceived by some as being no go areas for whites. This study was confined to Brixton and as such cannot be generalised, it is also dated and there is no link between the research methods employed and the functionalist theory used.

The final study that this essay will consider is The Underclass In Birmingham (John Rex and Sally Tomlinson, 1979, Haralambos). This study is from a Weberian perspective and uses the underclass theory. The study examines the reasons for immigration of New Commonwealth workers and explores the shortage of labour in Great Britain in the 1950’ and 1960’s when large numbers of people from Commonwealth countries were encouraged to emigrate to fill the gaps in the labour market. The positions these immigrants were expected to fill were those undesirable jobs that the homogenous population did not want to do, e.g. working on the London Underground, the service industries and manufacturing jobs, which required little skill, these types of jobs are part of what sociologists refer to as the secondary labour market, jobs requiring little skills or training, with poor prospects, low wages, little or no benefits and not much in the way of job security. This study puts forward the point that because initially the immigrants of the 1950’s and 1960’s were employed within the secondary labour market they began as disadvantaged in British society and thus they have remained there, they are disproportionately represented within the secondary labour market and thus a distinct underprivileged class has emerged. This study was conducted using structured interviews and had a sample base of 1,100 people and was confined to the Handsworth area of Birmingham, as such this study cannot be generalised to the whole of the UK. The study achieved its aim as it showed that there are a disproportionate amount of immigrants working within the secondary labour market, but their working conditions are probably no worse or better than those of indigenous people working in the same and other areas of the UK. The research methods employed were probably the most effective methods that could have been used for this type of study, it can be argued that Rex and Tomlinson set out to prove the existence of a secondary labour market and conducted the study simply to prove that aim. The study identifies the existence of a segregated labour market. There is a link between the theory and the research methods employed in this study.

In conclusion the case studies examined have shown that there is a secondary labour market within the UK and that it consists of a disproportionate number of ethnic minorities. They have also shown that far from the UK becoming a large cultural melting pot where immigrants have become fully integrated, the UK has accommodated the immigrants and appears to be loathe to progress beyond that point. The case studies also show how easily a change in the economic situation of the UK can affect the occurrence of racial violence and hatred and can lead to a rise in support for the political right. S.McGonigal(2001)

Dark Strangers, Sheila Patterson, (1950), Haralambos,

Sociology, Anthony Giddens, 4th edition (2001), Polity Press, 65 Bridge Street, Cambridge, CB2 1 UR, ISBN 0-7456-2311-5

Sociology, Themes and Perspectives, M. Haralambos & M. Holborn, Third Edition (1990), UNWIN HYMAN LIMITED, 15-17 Broadwick Street, London, W1V 1FP, ISBN 0 04 444 8192 6

The Underclass in Birmingham, John Rex & Sally Tomlinson (1979), Haralambos (as above).

Unemployment and Racially Motivated Violence, Mark Bainbridge, Brian Burkitt & Marie Macey, Research Roundup, Sociology Review, November 1994, p10.

Who are the real racists? E. Ellis Cashmore, New Society, 13th June 1986, p7.

Institutional anomie theory of deviance is a member of the group of anomic theories of crime and deviance known as strain theories, which include Merton (1938), Cohen (1955), Cloward and Ohlin (1960) and Agnew (1992). This essay will briefly examine these strain theories and their relationship to the work of Messner & Rosenfeld (1994), this will provide the basis for a critical evaluation of Messner & Rosenfeld’s (1994) theory of deviance, known as American Dream theory, as explained in their book, ‘Crime and the American Dream’. Messner & Rosenfeld were attempting to provide an explanation for the rate of crime and deviance in the USA, which is significantly higher than that of other western capitalist nations and they theorised that the combination of over emphasis of materialism and individualism were causal factors in this problem, they explain that, ‘it is the primacy of the economic in US society that encourages a situation of anomie, where it is each person for her – or himself in a competitive market place, and this results in higher levels of crime’ (in Lawson & Heaton, 1999, p.58).

Durkheim’s (1897) theory of Anomie explains that an imbalance occurs in society usually due to sudden change, a crisis, a disturbance, as a result society becomes unable to influence behaviour and expectations. It is therefore a case of social forces causing deviance, as Durkheim (1897) explains, “The limits are unknown between the possible and the impossible, what is just and what is unjust, legitimate hopes and claims and those which are immoderate. Consequently, there is no restraint upon aspirations.... Appetites, not controlled by public opinion, become distorted...and more impatient of control. A condition of anomie results from passions being less disciplined, precisely when they need more disciplining,” (Durkheim, 1897, Suicide). Robert Merton realized that in such an anomic society the resulting imbalance would create strain between the possible and the impossible and that something would inevitably fill this gap, created by strain.

Merton’s (1938) Strain Theory builds on Durkheim’s theory of Anomie, but focuses on inbuilt strains in the social system. For Merton strain is a result of cultural expectations, of economic achievement being unattainable within the normative/legitimate structures of society, and “crime and deviance emerging as an individual adaptation to pressures flowing from the social structure,” (Carrabine et al, 2004, p.57). The possibilities available are fewer than the numbers of those seeking to attain the end reward, there is an imbalance between the end goals and the means to achieve it, therefore it is a means-end theory. For Merton this strain is always there in a capitalist society, there is a gap between economic expectation and provision of opportunity to achieve those expectations and it is in this gap that the strains occur. Therefore Merton’s Strain Theory explains that deviant or criminal behaviour occurs when an individual realises that he/she cannot attain the economic success that they have been socialised to expect through legitimate opportunities and therefore seek to achieve their goal through illegitimate means, he refers to this as innovative deviance. Merton’s (1938) Strain Theory is a valiant early attempt to explain why criminal behaviour is concentrated among the lower classes in western capitalist nations, the strain occurs in the gap between opportunities limited according to the social class of the individual and the assumed uniformity in aspirations for economic success within that social class. This theory forms the basis for the later work of Messner and Rosenfeld.

Cloward and Ohlin’s (1960), Theory of Differential Opportunity Systems, is also based on the work of Merton (1938) they hypothesised that,” the disparity between what lower class youth are led to want and what is actually available to them is the source of a major problem of adjustment”, (Cloward & Ohlin, 1960, p. 86). Messner and Rosenfeld recognise this as a problem of the economic primacy in all aspects of life.
Agnew (1992) also takes up this thread and develops a theory based on anger, strain is emotional and is manifested in the form of negative emotional responses to negative reward situations and in turn this is exhibited as deviant or criminal behaviour. Messner and Rosenfeld recognise this negative emotional response as exhibited in crimes of violence and in relation to explanations for the prevalence of violent crimes among the lower classes in the USA, this theory of frustrated response would appear to be very useful, especially when economic frustrations are given greater emphasis in the work of Messner & Rosenfeld (1994). Greater economic frustrations lead to greater frustrations in general, which in turn lead to more desperate measures in the pursuit of the desired goal, thus crimes of murder that involve some form of reward, or murders where the victim was an obstruction to the desired goal are explained.
Messner & Rosenfeld’s American Dream theory (1994) is very similar to the original strain theory of Merton (1938), but attempts to build on Merton’s work. Central to Messner & Rosenfeld’s theory is the understanding that material wealth; economic success is the common goal of everyone in a society. Economic success is valued above all, above academic success, vocational success, human success; it is the most valued goal and is therefore the goal that everyone wants to achieve. The social status of the individual comes from economic success, the lower the economic success the lower the social status, Money and its accumulation is the prime objective of society, anything else is merely a bi-product of that achievement, secondary to it or geared to achieving it. The members of society are socialised to believe that economic success is not only desirable, but perhaps more significantly for the purposes of explaining criminal and deviant behaviour, economic success is attainable.
The family is responsible for socialising this belief system into the future generations. The media and education systems all drive home this message of material wealth as a statement of the ultimate success, there is never too much wealth, more is always better and through hard work everyone can attain it.

There is a shared cultural value that to be a ‘somebody’, the individual must achieve economic success, this differs from Cohen’s (1955) sub-cultural value where you can be a ‘somebody’ by gaining a ‘notorious street reputation’ (Carrabine et al, p.59). Messner & Rosenfeld (1994) set this message as a shared cultural ethos and this is important to their theory, the theory would fail if this aspect were flawed. If the false consciousness that is the American Dream is infact a true consciousness, then there is no American Dream Theory. If there are other means to attain the respect and status that is currently achieved by the accumulation of wealth, then the primacy of this goal is lost and with it the very momentum that drives crime, furthermore if American society is one in which everyone can achieve the desired goals through legitimate means the causality of crime cannot be ascribed to this theory.
Messner and Rosenfeld appear to subscribe to an almost Habermasian view of U.S. Society, the life world has been colonised by the system, and that it is this colonisation of the life world by the system that has contributed to the imbalance in society thus creating the conditions for anomie. In other words the social world has been taken over by the economic world, education for the sake of education doesn’t exist, education is undertaken for the purpose of economic reward and to service economic need. There are no goals that override the importance of ultimate goal of economic success, absolutely everything else is secondary, the logic and rationality that prevail are those of the economy, childcare as opposed to parenting, learning skills for the needs of industry, as opposed to learning skills for living and pleasure. The cultural world too, has become the subject of economics; the value of art, music, and literature is no longer aesthetic or entertainment value, the economic value is always prioritised, a phenomenon that Adorno and Horkheimer (1944) refer to as the Culture Industry. So it is argued that in a society in which economic success is the primary goal and everyone believes that this goal is attainable through legitimate routes, perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised when people realise that the legitimate means of attaining economic success don’t work for them and decide to take other, deviant or criminal routes to the desired goal. When crime becomes a more efficient method of obtaining wealth than the legitimate methods and everything else is secondary to this goal of obtaining wealth, the gap created by the strain of desirability and attainability has been filled by criminality, the logic of the market place has rationalised criminal behaviour as a corrective measure for this anomic imbalance in society.

Such theories have validity in that they can explain certain types of crime very well; drug dealing for instance is a good example of a market logic crime. It, like the legitimate market is based on the laws of supply and demand, the criminal aspects of drug dealing are rationalised because the end result of economic wealth is primary to the means, this is the dominant cultural ethos. It doesn’t matter how you get rich just get rich and keep getting richer, it doesn’t matter if you are an inventor, a writer, an artist, a forger, a lawyer, a thief, a doctor, a drug dealer, a merchant, a fence, an investor, a white collar criminal, etc, just keep increasing your economic wealth and although your methods may be more in keeping with Merton’s ‘innovation’, rather than societies legitimate methods, the economic success itself will bring status and power rewards.

Messner and Rosenfeld’s theory appears unlikely to provide adequate explanation for hedonistic crimes in the USA. To explore this we will examine the crime of joy riding.

Joy riding can be viewed as an example of the result of an imbalance between what is presented as achievable and what is actually achievable by legitimate means. Young boys and men growing up on large housing projects in the USA have access to the same media as those young boys and men in middle class America, they see the same advertisements for cars, they read the same magazines and they want to own these machines and drive them just like the ‘real Americans’, on T.V. ‘Criminological research into joy riding and car theft has always highlighted the different attractions for severely disadvantaged young men of the car itself, of speed, and especially the chase, in an attempt to kick against the unravelling destiny of a lifetime of poverty and little opportunity,’ (Lawson & Heaton, (1999), p.61.). It is American to have a car, the American love affair with the car is world-renowned, and American’s refer to driving their cars as a right. Car driving is a cultural norm and some types of cars are more desirable than others, some have more street credibility, or infer greater status on the driver. The boys and young men in the housing projects see driving cars as their right too, it is a norm to them, they are American, they share this love affair with the car, however their economic circumstances may not provide legitimate access to a vehicle in order that they may practice their perceived ‘right’ to drive. So what does this disadvantaged individual do, he takes a car that doesn’t belong to him and for a short period of time lives, ‘the dream’. It is estimated that ‘77% of vehicles stolen in the USA are stolen for joyriding’, (source:Indiacar.com), that is a large number of vehicles being taken for hedonistic purposes; we can pre-suppose that generally those with legitimate access to a vehicle don’t joyride. However, there may be a minority who own a vehicle and yet take more desirable models of vehicle in order to satisfy some hedonistic status fantasy, as Taylor (1997) explains as males ‘wanting to undertake ‘depth analysis’ of the different types of car acquired more or less legitimately by affluent or upwardly mobile men’ (, Taylor I, 1997, in Lawson & Heaton p.61).

From this scenario we can deduce that the gap or strain occurs between the cultural perception of a right to drive and the economic ability to gain legitimate access to the desired vehicle, this is coupled with the hedonistic pleasure of driving the vehicle of choice even for a short while and the thrill of the chase. Therefore, even in crimes of hedonism the American dream theory of Messner and Rosenfeld may be able to provide a theoretical understanding of such crimes, developing an explanation for the cause of and motivation to commit certain crimes which, appear hedonistic on the surface, but in reality contain some relation to economic success, the status associated with it, or the overriding socialised desire to attain the ends, no matter what the means.

Messner and Rosenfeld’s theory appears at first reading, to be of little value when seeking explanation for sexual crimes and deviance like sadism, masochism, paedophilia or rape and crimes such as murder, these types of behaviour tend not to involve the economic. They are considered crimes of power, hedonism or passion. Crimes and deviances that are perpetrated by people of any economic group. Messner and Rosenfeld’s theory is obviously valuable to criminology where the crime or deviance has some facet that is economic or that can be related to the economic ability of the perpetrator to achieve what the cultural ethos says is attainable. However, Lasch (1979) argues that, “ In a society that has reduced reason to mere calculation, reason can impose no limits on the pursuit of pleasure- on the immediate gratification of every desire no matter how perverse, insane, criminal, or merely immoral. For the standards that would condemn crime or cruelty derive from religion, compassion or the kind of reason that rejects purely instrumental applications and none of these outmoded forms of thought or feeling has any place in a society based on commodity production”, (Lasch 1979:69 in Presdee 2002,p.7). Lasch (1979) is arguing that not only does the economic saturation of every aspect of society affect our judgement in relation to crimes against property and the person, but also negatively impacts on morality leading to deviant behaviour and degeneracy in general. American Dream cultural ethos is so deeply ingrained in American society that it has come to be translated as economic success equals pleasure therefore not only economic success at any costs, but pleasure at any or all costs. For this reason it can be argued that Messner & Rosenfeld’ theory is not only a good tool for explaining crimes with obvious economic causal factors, but also those which appear to have no link to economics whatsoever. However, it will be interesting to see if the rise of the Christian right in the USA, its increasing church attendances and its moral crusade will counter this negative aspect of the ‘reduction of reason to calculation’ and impact on this type of crime and deviance.

American Dream theory cannot be generalised to all crimes in all cultures because it is culture specific, it relies on the existence of a specific shared cultural ethos to make it’s claims, Messner and Rosenfeld argued “cultures less focused on monetary values suffer less crime” (Williams, 2004,p.309) thus insinuating that it is the focus on monetary values that are a major causal factor in crime. Although many nations are perceived by their citizens as meritocracies, none have been as successful as the USA in establishing this economic ideology within every social institution. According to Lawson & Heaton (1999), the strength of the welfare state in other industrialised societies may be a contributory factor in the differences in the rates of crime, they explain, ‘US society is dominated by the economy and all other social institutions are subordinated to it. Thus the ideology of the market is in such a dominant position in the U.S. that other social institutions are geared towards it, other industrialised societies have social institutions that promote other ideas such as civic responsibility, altruism (putting others first), self sacrifice’ (Lawson & Heaton, 1999, p.58). Messner & Rosenfeld’s theory may not only adequately explain the higher crime rates in the USA, but may also go someway to explaining the disproportionate amount of Black Males who commit crime, not that the emphasis on economic achievement and the attainability of wealth at any cost is proven to be any stronger within the Black communities of the USA, but simply because of the over-representation of Blacks among the lower socio-economic groups in US Society and because of the inadequacy of the social welfare programmes that exist to help this group, according to Tonry (1994) ‘American social policy since the 1970’s has not provided adequate educational programmes, housing and income support to disadvantaged Blacks and their disproportionate participation in crime is in part the result’, (Michael Tonry, 1994, p.113).

It is Merton’s theory that is more easily generalised to crime and deviance in western capitalist nations, simply because Merton’s theory isn’t as culture specific. Messner and Rosenfeld claim that “ the state structure and social institutions (family, work, polity, education) are designed to give strength to the economy”, (Williams, 2004, p.309), this can be seen to be true in the USA and also more recently in the UK with the suggestion of the re-introduction of more vocational focussed subjects into the national curriculum, the growing norm of children in childcare while the parent(s) work and the opening of the welfare state to private service providers. Changing the focus from service provision to economic achievement by departments e.g. the financial success of a hospital is being prioritised over the service the hospital provides to its patients, those that are less successful economically are being closed. If there is a correlation between this penetration of market logic and reason into the social institutions and higher crime rates remains to be seen, but the changing face of UK social institutions in the face of increased dominance of economic priorities should provide an interesting study for criminologists in the next couple of decades.

In conclusion, Messner & Rosenfeld have provided a valuable theory of crime and deviance that is culture specific to the United States of America. However, although it cannot be generally applied to other nations at the start of the 21st century, this may not be a permanent state of affairs. Several factors are in play in other western capitalist nations that could change this situation; the continued expansion of the market into the social institutions, the growth of market logic, the global influence of the American media, the growing gulf between the socio-economic groups, the changes to the education system, the ghettoisation of the lower socio-economic groups, the growing underclass and the decline of the welfare state. A combination of all or any combinations of these factors could lead to a growth in crime rates in other nations as the influence of the ‘American Dream’ goes global.
S.McGonigal(2004)

References
Carrabine et al, (2004), Pages 57 & 59

Cloward & Ohlin, (1960), p. 86

Durkheim, (1897), Suicide.

Indiacar.com (10/11/04).

Lasch (1979): 69 in Presdee (2002), p.7

Lawson & Heaton, (1999), pages 58 & 61

Taylor I, (1997), in Lawson & Heaton (1999) p.61

Tonry Michael, (1994), p.113

Williams, (2004), p.309

Bibliography

Crime and Deviance, Tony Lawson and Tim Heaton, (1999), Macmillan, Basingstoke.

Crime and the American Dream, Stephen F. Messner, Richard Rosenfeld (1994), Wadsworth Publishing Company, Belmont, CA.

Criminology, A Sociological Introduction, Eamonn Carrabine, Paul Iganski, Maggy Lee, Ken Plummer and Nigel South (2004), Routledge, London.

Critical Criminology Taylor Walton & young (1975), Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd, London

Culture criminology and the carnival of crime, Presdee (2002), Routledge, London.
Running on empty, Taylor I (1997), Guardian Society, 15 may 1997, in Social Science Teacher, Volume 27, no.1, 1997 in Tony Lawson and Tim Heaton, Crime and Deviance, 1999, Macmillan, Basingstoke.

Racial disproportion in US prisons, Michael Tonry (1994), British Journal of Criminology, 1994, volume 34, special issue, p113.

Textbook on Criminology, Katherine S. Williams (2004), 5th Edition, Oxford University Press, Oxford.

Internet References/Bibliography (accessed between 5th and 14th of November 2004)

Agnew, R. (1992). Foundation for a general strain theory. Criminology, 30(1), 47-87. From t O’Connor site
http://faculty.ncwc.edu/toconnor/301/301lect09.htm

Cloward, R., & Ohlin, L. (1960). Delinquency and opportunity, New York: Free Press
http://faculty.ncwc.edu/toconnor/301/default.htm

Durkheim Suicide from
www.malcolmread.co.uk/JockYoung/durkheims_legacy.pdf

Auto theft Facts USA from:
http://www.indiacar.com/index2.asp?pagename=http://www.indiacar.com/infobank/carsecurity4.htm

The purpose of this essay is to critically discuss the contention that Foucault did for the history of ideas, what Kuhn did for the philosophy of science.

In order to discuss this, it is necessary to establish that a common ground exists between Thomas Kuhn and Michel Foucault.
Kuhn was primarily a natural scientist, whose interests developed into a historical study of science and its philosophical basis. Foucault was primarily a historian whose interests lay in exploring historical developments and the role of power relationships in both the social and scientific world; it is therefore the study of history that provides the starting point from which to make our comparisons. Another pre-requisite for discussion of this topic, is to provide a definition for the term a history of ideas. Foucault, in his 1969 work ‘The Archaeology of Knowledge’ defines this as a collection of separate histories, those of ‘science, philosophy, thought and literature’, (Source: Foucault, (1969), pg. 2), and thus this is what the term ideas will mean throughout this essay.

The philosophy of science for Kuhn exists throughout history as a series of epochs, which he refers to as paradigms. Each paradigm is unique to the socio-historical developments that created the situation in which it was possible to conceive of the problem and the solution, (source: Hughes & Sharrock, (1990), pg. 186). This is a very different concept than that of considering eternal questions and simply rehashing them to form improved solutions. For Foucault disconnected socio-historical epochs exist in the form of epistemes and discourses. It is the contention of both of these men that history is not evolutionary i.e. a series of progressive events that build on those that have gone before. History is a series of different epochs; each paradigm or episteme, is simply a transformation from one accepted way of knowing to another, which occurs through intellectually revolutionary changes in our acceptance of knowledge as being how things really are. Knowledge and scientific fact are being constantly challenged and tested. The boundaries that exist are pushed further and further until that which we think we know is fact, becomes something of the past, myth, legend, naïve, primitive knowledge. History is therefore not progressive or evolutionary, but revolutionary for both Kuhn and Foucault. This is a very different approach to that of Karl Marx for whom history is progressive, each epoch culminating in the ruin of the competing classes as history moves from epoch to epoch towards a communist utopia and emancipation. For Marx the project of modernity is one in which human history is a series of progressions. Knowledge isn’t replaced but is increased. Mistakes are made and learned from by both sides in a constant class warfare. Technological advances contribute to improvement in society. Marx argued that throughout history change has occurred as a result of the synthesis of opposing thoughts, thesis and antithesis, a process through which knowledge evolves and brings about improvements, however consider the question; is the enlightened thinking that brought about the epoch of Capitalism really an improvement on the thinking that dominated the epoch of Feudalism? Or is it, as Foucault would argue is it simply a different way of knowing.

Having briefly demonstrated in the introductory paragraph that a common ground exists between the approaches of Kuhn and Foucault, we shall now examine these processes of intellectual revolutionary changes in greater detail, in order to establish if a Foucaultian history of ideas is as powerful a concept as Kuhn’s philosophy of science. Or if it is a weaker concept, which although it is a useful tool for explaining how new ideas are transformed into power and institutions, and thus agents of social control, fails to have the same impact.

In his 1969 work ‘The Archaeology of Knowledge’, Foucault explains the traditional methods of studying history and describes how the tools of historians have enabled them ‘to distinguish various sedimentary strata: linear successions’, (Foucault, 1969, pg.1). Each discovery culminating in establishing links between different strata, as if they are laid down in a sequence of continuity, which forms the big picture of history. He is arguing that the traditional way of examining history is intent on establishing causal links between each layer, so that change is viewed as an improvement over what has gone before, as if there is an underlying structure to history. Foucault denies the existence of any structure; his view of the history of ideas is that of the post structuralist. He attacks the traditional view of history as being contained within nice neat layers of centuries and decades and years, which enable us to make short statements relating to change and thus generalise about that point in time. We perceive the 1950’s being very different to the 1960’s, but was 1958 really so different from 1962, its not as if at the stroke of midnight on New years eve 1959 traditional conservative knowledge vanished and a new form of knowledge appeared resulting in liberal ideas on January the 1st 1960. Such a notion is of course ridiculous.

We know that on occasion sudden dramatic changes in attitude occur, September 11th 2001 is a good example of this, the shattering events that were played out in New York and broadcast by the worlds media resulted in a sudden change in world politics. The western world was treated to a new set of ideas about our societies; this new view of the world was one where danger was omnipresent. Suddenly from one shattering event, society was treated to an information overload through the media, could there be an adult in the western world who does not know the name Osama Bin Laden and associate this name with the increasingly dominant discourse of terrorism after September 11th? Foucault would perhaps argue that a new episteme in political knowledge was born, as the discourse of experts in the field of terrorism was filtered down into mainstream discourse through the media.
Generally though, change isn’t the result of a dramatic event out of which structures of ideas are born. It is a process that is gradual and isn’t contained in neat layers that are dated. It is a constant process where ideas are challenged again and again and replaced with new ideas, as Marx’s synthesis of knowledge suggests. Old concepts appear naïve as new ones are accepted. Foucault proposes that rather than viewing history as progressive events that are leading to a time when history itself is ended, a time when all ideas have been challenged and mankind has achieved the end result of finding knowledge that cannot be challenged because it is the ultimate truth. We should view history as a ‘phenomena of rupture, of discontinuity’ (Foucault, 1969, pg.2). In which, each episteme comes to a definite end and is replaced by another. Not in a sequence of related events as rational thought would suggest, but in patchwork of unrelated events that occur as different groups seek power, culminating in the success of one dominant discourse over another. Epistemes are thus an uncomfortable and radical concept to deal with, as each is discontinued, that which follows is not an evolutionary continuity of the former, replacing outdated ideas with new better ones, it is quite simply change embroiled in a web of intricate power relationships. Envisage if you can, multitudes of spiders each spinning their own webs in a forest, the webs become entangled with one another and produce one massive intricate web. The spiders that spin the strongest webs will eventually come to dominate. Their contributions to the web will outlast the weaker webs; those with the finer webs find their webs disappearing beneath the larger stronger webs. Now consider that this is a continual process never ends there are always spiders spinning webs, some strong, some weak, each spider spinning for his own interests. If we replace the spiders with discourses, the individual webs with epistemes and the large intricate web with history, we get an idea of the complicated mass that Foucault implies historians are faced with when trying to take history apart. Imagine attempting to dismantle the giant web of history piece by piece to establish which epistemes came first, in what sequence they occurred. Their relationships to the other epistemes and discourses out of which each was born and then trying to establish causal relationships between the tangled mass of webs. According to Foucault there is no relationship between these, each discourse came to dominate each episteme with no consideration for the one it had replaced. What remains of past epistemes takes the form of what Foucault describes as monuments, literature, buildings, objects, formed and shaped by not only the basic needs of human kind for their utility, but by the dominant discourses that prevailed at the time of their creation.

Foucault suggests that historians should act like archaeologists, digging into the history of knowledge, dismantling preconceived notions of continuity, removing the notions of tradition and sameness and examine it piece by piece, as single disparate events that are collectively termed history. Accepting that as each idea is challenged and replaced with a new idea it is not an evolutionary step. He argues, that each change in notions of what knowledge is at any given point, is just a different knowledge, there is no connection. Changes in ideas can be explained by different groups in society competing to gain hegemony in that society, through the establishment of powerful ideas in their interest, which come to be accepted as fact. Knowledge therefore consists of unrelated patterns of social construction, in which existing structures of knowledge are challenged and torn down in a process of intellectual revolution, to be replaced with new structures defined by dominant discourses. For Foucault knowledge itself is a power, which exerts its influence over the mind and thus the individual, the most powerful discourses are those, which are internalised. Knowledge is contained in language and therefore to control language is to have power, in each episteme dominant discourses emerge that control the way we think about people, society and the institutions within society. Expert discourses become dominant and influence the individual’s perception of the world in which they live. In Foucault’s work the birth of the clinic the power of discourse becomes evident.

Foucault uses his archaeological methods to examine the rise of the medical profession; he explains the birth of a powerful new discourse within medicine. He describes this work as being, ‘about space, about language, and about death, it is about the act of seeing, the gaze’ (Foucault, 1963). At one time medicine was private in the sense that the Dr/Patient relationship took place in the home. The medical practitioner was a middle class man who administered treatments to the wealthier members of society. This was a medicine of species that focused on categorising ailments and individualising them. The dominant discourse accepted the body as a balance of humours, red blood, yellow bile, black bile and phlegm. This balance was individual to each patient.
Medical practitioners didn’t have professional training in the way we tend to think of it today. Physicians were often schooled in the arts, while surgeons were artisans. Dissection of a corpse was a form of entertainment that would draw crowds of the curious. Comparisons of organs from those who died of natural causes and those who died from execution led to questions concerning pathology, what was normal and what was pathological? The body became part of scientific study. Criminal corpses were in demand for dissection because their organs were likely to be normal. Thus the body and its various components could be categorised, this brought a new knowledge about the internal organs. Dissection of morbid anatomy became empirical and a new discourse began to emerge, there was a move away from the discourse of humours to a discourse of diseased tissue and growths. The ability to compare the organs of healthy individuals with those who had died of natural causes also changed the focus of medicine from the individual, a medicine of species to a medicine of social spaces, the medicine of the population. Disease was generalised, the sameness of the body was emphasised. The discourse takes account of this by becoming descriptive instead of normative, health becomes ill health or good health. As comparisons of diseased tissues continued they became categorised. The search was then on for causal relationships between the diseased organs found in different people and this then led to a search to find the origins of disease. As knowledge changed physicians developed a new discourse about the body and limited the use of the discourse, a move to draw professional boundaries around the discourse and thus create expertise. Expertise was achieved by centralising the discourse to the locus of the clinic, a site for studying clinical material i.e. corpses.
The chosen locus was the hospital, previously a place of charitable works where alms were provided for the poor, a pastoral centre based on patronage, the medicalisation of the hospital changed not only its use, but also the meaning of the word hospital. The hospital became the preserve of those who are ill, where the ill were studied as opposed to treated. This centralisation of the ill and the study of illness provided an increase in expert knowledge. Only physicians/clinicians could study the ill in the clinic and only they could use the discourses associated with medicine. The medical profession thus have a new expert knowledge about the aetiology of disease and they push this knowledge out through an alliance with the state. This expertise then grants legitimacy to state concern with prevention of disease and allows the state access to the minute of people’s lives, it is now within the realm of medical expertise and the medico-administrative model emerges. The civil body collects and collates statistical information on birth rates, death rates, housing conditions, and the clinical gaze shifts from sick bodies to healthy bodies and plants the roots of policing the population, under the legitimate guise of preventing the spread of disease. The population are then faced with a series of rules what you should and shouldn’t do, this in turn spreads from not only being interested in health, but also behaviour. (Source: Foucault, 1963)

Expert knowledge has been transformed into power; the sick man has as Jewson puts it ‘wilted away under the clinical gaze’, (Jewson, Sociology 10, (1976)). People are no longer people; they are to the medical practitioners, no more than the sum of their constituent parts. Medicine has become focussed on the observable, one of the outcomes of this is the development of increasingly observational based technologies x-rays, ultra-sound, MRI and CAT scans, visual information has taken on a new significance. The population internalises this knowledge and everything that people do is weighed down with risk factors and thus more aspects of life have become objectified. Thus expert terminology has resulted in a realignment of power relations and a change in ideas, the medical discourse has become dominant in this episteme.

What Foucault’s archaeological exploration of the history of medicine has uncovered would appear to be a paradigm shift in the science of medicine, the old laws of the humours that had governed medicine previously have disappeared and been replaced with new laws that govern all knowledge of the body. To infer that this is not an improvement for society could be construed as being flawed; the changes in medicine and the social controls that have evolved to limit poor health in society are surely an improvement. The knowledge itself was gained through a process of reasoned evolutionary steps, not an abrupt change. Foucault negates to address the point of eternal questions directly in this archaeological exploration and yet what he has illustrated with relation to change in knowledge in ‘The birth of the clinic’ is the attempt to answer the eternal question, ‘why do people die? Therefore what we see is the underlying structure of the history of ideas in medicine, man pushing forward the boundaries of knowledge by asking the same questions in different ways. Foucault’s work suggests that new ideas occur as a consequence of deliberate revolutionary acts that are controlled by different groups seeking to attain power through control of language. Although the result appears to be the emergence of a change of power relationships and a new dominant discourse, it can be argued that the new ideas are the cause of this effect. The inference that the knowledge itself is a consequence of a deliberate revolutionary act is unsupported; in Foucault’s work what we see is a evolution in society that occurs as a result of a synthesis of ideas that seek to answer eternal questions, punctuated by the occasional revolution.

Kuhn’s paradigms bear some comparison, in scientific circles we find experts, who use terminology that cannot be understood without training in the field, therefore professional boundaries have been drawn around the scientific community, protecting the knowledge and creating elitism and this gives the scientific community power. Like Foucault, Kuhn does not see an underlying structure to knowledge, as each paradigm shift occurs, what emerges is not an increase in knowledge, but a new knowledge, as is evident in the case of the shift from the Aristotelian/Ptolemaic paradigm to the Copernican paradigm.

In medieval times everyone knew that the earth was the centre of the universe, it was fact and as such shaped the scientific knowledge of the time, so when in 1543 Copernicus theorised that the earth was not the stationary centre of the universe, but a moving planet that orbited the sun, the scientific community was outraged. Such a shift in thinking would erase that which had been accepted as scientific fact and thus discredit scientific knowledge. It wasn’t until Galileo developed a telescope to observe the heavens that scientists such as Kepler were able to make calculations based on ‘Tycho Brahe’s recordings of planetary positions’ (Chalmers, 2003, chapter 7, pg. 100), and thus conclude that Copernicus had indeed uncovered new knowledge that had major consequences for accepted scientific fact. This was not more knowledge, but different knowledge, thus supporting the post structuralist arguments of Foucault.

Kuhn argues that ‘a mature science is governed by a single paradigm, which sets the standards for legitimate work within the science it governs’ (Chalmers, 2003, pg.108). So in physics Newton’s paradigm governs the motion of many different things from the planets to that of a billiard ball, (source: Chalmers, 2003, pg. 108). When a paradigm shift occurs this creates a void in scientific knowledge because if the previous paradigm is wrong, it follows that all the knowledge within the field that is governed by the laws of the previous paradigm is also wrong. Therefore a paradigm shift may actually result in a temporary reduction in scientific knowledge, as opposed to more knowledge.

Paradigm shifts are revolutions in scientific thinking, what is proven today as a scientific law has an immediate impact on science. Similarly Foucault’s archaeology of history provides us with revolutions in the context of social knowledge, but because there are no defined edges to the episteme, because it overlaps, juxtaposes and exists in alongside, underneath and on top of other epistemes, the revolutionary impact of transformation from one episteme to another is less dramatic an event than the impact of the paradigm shift within the scientific world. It would appear to occur at a more gradual pace than it does within science, evolution as opposed to revolution. The sudden impact of change in the social world is reduced, there is a subtlety to the episteme shift that is less defined than that which occurs with the paradigm shift. Therefore, although Foucault has provided the social world with a new methodology for the study of history, a tool for understanding how and why we think as we do, it would be unfair to say that this has the same implications for the history of ideas that Kuhn’s paradigms have had for the philosophy of science. Kuhn’s work has provided the scientific community with an explanation for changes in scientific knowledge that has become part of accepted thinking. Foucault’s work has failed to achieve this acceptance among historians, who are still intent in uncovering cause and effect and view history as an evolutionary process that is punctuated by the occasional revolution. Therefore the contention that Foucault has done for the history of ideas what Kuhn achieved for the philosophy of science, can be viewed as being valid, but to a lesser extent. Kuhn’s paradigm shifts are a revolution in knowledge; Foucault’s epistemes are, in spite of his insistence to the contrary, more evolutionary. Foucault’s work appears to be a weaker discourse among the community of historians than Kuhn’s discourse of paradigms is among the scientific community. The dominant discourse in relation to the history of ideas remains that of project of modernity and structuralism, the continued evolution of a synthesis of ideas. S.McGonigal (2005)

REFERENCES
Chalmers A.F, (2003), pg. 100, 108
Foucault M, (1963)
Foucault M. (1969), pg. 1, 2
Hughes & Sharrock, (1990), pg.186
Jewson N, Sociology, 10, (1976) pg. 225-244.

INTERNET REFERENCES

Foucault M, (1963), The Birth of the clinic at
http://www.stanford.edu/dept/HPST/BirthOfTheClinic/clinicenter.htm (accessed on 8/01/05)

The purpose of this essay is to critically discuss the contention that Foucault did for the history of ideas, what Kuhn did for the philosophy of science.

In order to discuss this, it is necessary to establish that a common ground exists between Thomas Kuhn and Michel Foucault.
Kuhn was primarily a natural scientist, whose interests developed into a historical study of science and its philosophical basis. Foucault was primarily a historian whose interests lay in exploring historical developments and the role of power relationships in both the social and scientific world; it is therefore the study of history that provides the starting point from which to make our comparisons. Another pre-requisite for discussion of this topic, is to provide a definition for the term a history of ideas. Foucault, in his 1969 work ‘The Archaeology of Knowledge’ defines this as a collection of separate histories, those of ‘science, philosophy, thought and literature’, (Source: Foucault, (1969), pg. 2), and thus this is what the term ideas will mean throughout this essay.

The philosophy of science for Kuhn exists throughout history as a series of epochs, which he refers to as paradigms. Each paradigm is unique to the socio-historical developments that created the situation in which it was possible to conceive of the problem and the solution, (source: Hughes & Sharrock, (1990), pg. 186). This is a very different concept than that of considering eternal questions and simply rehashing them to form improved solutions. For Foucault disconnected socio-historical epochs exist in the form of epistemes and discourses. It is the contention of both of these men that history is not evolutionary i.e. a series of progressive events that build on those that have gone before. History is a series of different epochs; each paradigm or episteme, is simply a transformation from one accepted way of knowing to another, which occurs through intellectually revolutionary changes in our acceptance of knowledge as being how things really are. Knowledge and scientific fact are being constantly challenged and tested. The boundaries that exist are pushed further and further until that which we think we know is fact, becomes something of the past, myth, legend, naïve, primitive knowledge. History is therefore not progressive or evolutionary, but revolutionary for both Kuhn and Foucault. This is a very different approach to that of Karl Marx for whom history is progressive, each epoch culminating in the ruin of the competing classes as history moves from epoch to epoch towards a communist utopia and emancipation. For Marx the project of modernity is one in which human history is a series of progressions. Knowledge isn’t replaced but is increased. Mistakes are made and learned from by both sides in a constant class warfare. Technological advances contribute to improvement in society. Marx argued that throughout history change has occurred as a result of the synthesis of opposing thoughts, thesis and antithesis, a process through which knowledge evolves and brings about improvements, however consider the question; is the enlightened thinking that brought about the epoch of Capitalism really an improvement on the thinking that dominated the epoch of Feudalism? Or is it, as Foucault would argue is it simply a different way of knowing.

Having briefly demonstrated in the introductory paragraph that a common ground exists between the approaches of Kuhn and Foucault, we shall now examine these processes of intellectual revolutionary changes in greater detail, in order to establish if a Foucaultian history of ideas is as powerful a concept as Kuhn’s philosophy of science. Or if it is a weaker concept, which although it is a useful tool for explaining how new ideas are transformed into power and institutions, and thus agents of social control, fails to have the same impact.

In his 1969 work ‘The Archaeology of Knowledge’, Foucault explains the traditional methods of studying history and describes how the tools of historians have enabled them ‘to distinguish various sedimentary strata: linear successions’, (Foucault, 1969, pg.1). Each discovery culminating in establishing links between different strata, as if they are laid down in a sequence of continuity, which forms the big picture of history. He is arguing that the traditional way of examining history is intent on establishing causal links between each layer, so that change is viewed as an improvement over what has gone before, as if there is an underlying structure to history. Foucault denies the existence of any structure; his view of the history of ideas is that of the post structuralist. He attacks the traditional view of history as being contained within nice neat layers of centuries and decades and years, which enable us to make short statements relating to change and thus generalise about that point in time. We perceive the 1950’s being very different to the 1960’s, but was 1958 really so different from 1962, its not as if at the stroke of midnight on New years eve 1959 traditional conservative knowledge vanished and a new form of knowledge appeared resulting in liberal ideas on January the 1st 1960. Such a notion is of course ridiculous.

We know that on occasion sudden dramatic changes in attitude occur, September 11th 2001 is a good example of this, the shattering events that were played out in New York and broadcast by the worlds media resulted in a sudden change in world politics. The western world was treated to a new set of ideas about our societies; this new view of the world was one where danger was omnipresent. Suddenly from one shattering event, society was treated to an information overload through the media, could there be an adult in the western world who does not know the name Osama Bin Laden and associate this name with the increasingly dominant discourse of terrorism after September 11th? Foucault would perhaps argue that a new episteme in political knowledge was born, as the discourse of experts in the field of terrorism was filtered down into mainstream discourse through the media.
Generally though, change isn’t the result of a dramatic event out of which structures of ideas are born. It is a process that is gradual and isn’t contained in neat layers that are dated. It is a constant process where ideas are challenged again and again and replaced with new ideas, as Marx’s synthesis of knowledge suggests. Old concepts appear naïve as new ones are accepted. Foucault proposes that rather than viewing history as progressive events that are leading to a time when history itself is ended, a time when all ideas have been challenged and mankind has achieved the end result of finding knowledge that cannot be challenged because it is the ultimate truth. We should view history as a ‘phenomena of rupture, of discontinuity’ (Foucault, 1969, pg.2). In which, each episteme comes to a definite end and is replaced by another. Not in a sequence of related events as rational thought would suggest, but in patchwork of unrelated events that occur as different groups seek power, culminating in the success of one dominant discourse over another. Epistemes are thus an uncomfortable and radical concept to deal with, as each is discontinued, that which follows is not an evolutionary continuity of the former, replacing outdated ideas with new better ones, it is quite simply change embroiled in a web of intricate power relationships. Envisage if you can, multitudes of spiders each spinning their own webs in a forest, the webs become entangled with one another and produce one massive intricate web. The spiders that spin the strongest webs will eventually come to dominate. Their contributions to the web will outlast the weaker webs; those with the finer webs find their webs disappearing beneath the larger stronger webs. Now consider that this is a continual process never ends there are always spiders spinning webs, some strong, some weak, each spider spinning for his own interests. If we replace the spiders with discourses, the individual webs with epistemes and the large intricate web with history, we get an idea of the complicated mass that Foucault implies historians are faced with when trying to take history apart. Imagine attempting to dismantle the giant web of history piece by piece to establish which epistemes came first, in what sequence they occurred. Their relationships to the other epistemes and discourses out of which each was born and then trying to establish causal relationships between the tangled mass of webs. According to Foucault there is no relationship between these, each discourse came to dominate each episteme with no consideration for the one it had replaced. What remains of past epistemes takes the form of what Foucault describes as monuments, literature, buildings, objects, formed and shaped by not only the basic needs of human kind for their utility, but by the dominant discourses that prevailed at the time of their creation.

Foucault suggests that historians should act like archaeologists, digging into the history of knowledge, dismantling preconceived notions of continuity, removing the notions of tradition and sameness and examine it piece by piece, as single disparate events that are collectively termed history. Accepting that as each idea is challenged and replaced with a new idea it is not an evolutionary step. He argues, that each change in notions of what knowledge is at any given point, is just a different knowledge, there is no connection. Changes in ideas can be explained by different groups in society competing to gain hegemony in that society, through the establishment of powerful ideas in their interest, which come to be accepted as fact. Knowledge therefore consists of unrelated patterns of social construction, in which existing structures of knowledge are challenged and torn down in a process of intellectual revolution, to be replaced with new structures defined by dominant discourses. For Foucault knowledge itself is a power, which exerts its influence over the mind and thus the individual, the most powerful discourses are those, which are internalised. Knowledge is contained in language and therefore to control language is to have power, in each episteme dominant discourses emerge that control the way we think about people, society and the institutions within society. Expert discourses become dominant and influence the individual’s perception of the world in which they live. In Foucault’s work the birth of the clinic the power of discourse becomes evident.

Foucault uses his archaeological methods to examine the rise of the medical profession; he explains the birth of a powerful new discourse within medicine. He describes this work as being, ‘about space, about language, and about death, it is about the act of seeing, the gaze’ (Foucault, 1963). At one time medicine was private in the sense that the Dr/Patient relationship took place in the home. The medical practitioner was a middle class man who administered treatments to the wealthier members of society. This was a medicine of species that focused on categorising ailments and individualising them. The dominant discourse accepted the body as a balance of humours, red blood, yellow bile, black bile and phlegm. This balance was individual to each patient.
Medical practitioners didn’t have professional training in the way we tend to think of it today. Physicians were often schooled in the arts, while surgeons were artisans. Dissection of a corpse was a form of entertainment that would draw crowds of the curious. Comparisons of organs from those who died of natural causes and those who died from execution led to questions concerning pathology, what was normal and what was pathological? The body became part of scientific study. Criminal corpses were in demand for dissection because their organs were likely to be normal. Thus the body and its various components could be categorised, this brought a new knowledge about the internal organs. Dissection of morbid anatomy became empirical and a new discourse began to emerge, there was a move away from the discourse of humours to a discourse of diseased tissue and growths. The ability to compare the organs of healthy individuals with those who had died of natural causes also changed the focus of medicine from the individual, a medicine of species to a medicine of social spaces, the medicine of the population. Disease was generalised, the sameness of the body was emphasised. The discourse takes account of this by becoming descriptive instead of normative, health becomes ill health or good health. As comparisons of diseased tissues continued they became categorised. The search was then on for causal relationships between the diseased organs found in different people and this then led to a search to find the origins of disease. As knowledge changed physicians developed a new discourse about the body and limited the use of the discourse, a move to draw professional boundaries around the discourse and thus create expertise. Expertise was achieved by centralising the discourse to the locus of the clinic, a site for studying clinical material i.e. corpses.
The chosen locus was the hospital, previously a place of charitable works where alms were provided for the poor, a pastoral centre based on patronage, the medicalisation of the hospital changed not only its use, but also the meaning of the word hospital. The hospital became the preserve of those who are ill, where the ill were studied as opposed to treated. This centralisation of the ill and the study of illness provided an increase in expert knowledge. Only physicians/clinicians could study the ill in the clinic and only they could use the discourses associated with medicine. The medical profession thus have a new expert knowledge about the aetiology of disease and they push this knowledge out through an alliance with the state. This expertise then grants legitimacy to state concern with prevention of disease and allows the state access to the minute of people’s lives, it is now within the realm of medical expertise and the medico-administrative model emerges. The civil body collects and collates statistical information on birth rates, death rates, housing conditions, and the clinical gaze shifts from sick bodies to healthy bodies and plants the roots of policing the population, under the legitimate guise of preventing the spread of disease. The population are then faced with a series of rules what you should and shouldn’t do, this in turn spreads from not only being interested in health, but also behaviour. (Source: Foucault, 1963)

Expert knowledge has been transformed into power; the sick man has as Jewson puts it ‘wilted away under the clinical gaze’, (Jewson, Sociology 10, (1976)). People are no longer people; they are to the medical practitioners, no more than the sum of their constituent parts. Medicine has become focussed on the observable, one of the outcomes of this is the development of increasingly observational based technologies x-rays, ultra-sound, MRI and CAT scans, visual information has taken on a new significance. The population internalises this knowledge and everything that people do is weighed down with risk factors and thus more aspects of life have become objectified. Thus expert terminology has resulted in a realignment of power relations and a change in ideas, the medical discourse has become dominant in this episteme.

What Foucault’s archaeological exploration of the history of medicine has uncovered would appear to be a paradigm shift in the science of medicine, the old laws of the humours that had governed medicine previously have disappeared and been replaced with new laws that govern all knowledge of the body. To infer that this is not an improvement for society could be construed as being flawed; the changes in medicine and the social controls that have evolved to limit poor health in society are surely an improvement. The knowledge itself was gained through a process of reasoned evolutionary steps, not an abrupt change. Foucault negates to address the point of eternal questions directly in this archaeological exploration and yet what he has illustrated with relation to change in knowledge in ‘The birth of the clinic’ is the attempt to answer the eternal question, ‘why do people die? Therefore what we see is the underlying structure of the history of ideas in medicine, man pushing forward the boundaries of knowledge by asking the same questions in different ways. Foucault’s work suggests that new ideas occur as a consequence of deliberate revolutionary acts that are controlled by different groups seeking to attain power through control of language. Although the result appears to be the emergence of a change of power relationships and a new dominant discourse, it can be argued that the new ideas are the cause of this effect. The inference that the knowledge itself is a consequence of a deliberate revolutionary act is unsupported; in Foucault’s work what we see is a evolution in society that occurs as a result of a synthesis of ideas that seek to answer eternal questions, punctuated by the occasional revolution.

Kuhn’s paradigms bear some comparison, in scientific circles we find experts, who use terminology that cannot be understood without training in the field, therefore professional boundaries have been drawn around the scientific community, protecting the knowledge and creating elitism and this gives the scientific community power. Like Foucault, Kuhn does not see an underlying structure to knowledge, as each paradigm shift occurs, what emerges is not an increase in knowledge, but a new knowledge, as is evident in the case of the shift from the Aristotelian/Ptolemaic paradigm to the Copernican paradigm.

In medieval times everyone knew that the earth was the centre of the universe, it was fact and as such shaped the scientific knowledge of the time, so when in 1543 Copernicus theorised that the earth was not the stationary centre of the universe, but a moving planet that orbited the sun, the scientific community was outraged. Such a shift in thinking would erase that which had been accepted as scientific fact and thus discredit scientific knowledge. It wasn’t until Galileo developed a telescope to observe the heavens that scientists such as Kepler were able to make calculations based on ‘Tycho Brahe’s recordings of planetary positions’ (Chalmers, 2003, chapter 7, pg. 100), and thus conclude that Copernicus had indeed uncovered new knowledge that had major consequences for accepted scientific fact. This was not more knowledge, but different knowledge, thus supporting the post structuralist arguments of Foucault.

Kuhn argues that ‘a mature science is governed by a single paradigm, which sets the standards for legitimate work within the science it governs’ (Chalmers, 2003, pg.108). So in physics Newton’s paradigm governs the motion of many different things from the planets to that of a billiard ball, (source: Chalmers, 2003, pg. 108). When a paradigm shift occurs this creates a void in scientific knowledge because if the previous paradigm is wrong, it follows that all the knowledge within the field that is governed by the laws of the previous paradigm is also wrong. Therefore a paradigm shift may actually result in a temporary reduction in scientific knowledge, as opposed to more knowledge.

Paradigm shifts are revolutions in scientific thinking, what is proven today as a scientific law has an immediate impact on science. Similarly Foucault’s archaeology of history provides us with revolutions in the context of social knowledge, but because there are no defined edges to the episteme, because it overlaps, juxtaposes and exists in alongside, underneath and on top of other epistemes, the revolutionary impact of transformation from one episteme to another is less dramatic an event than the impact of the paradigm shift within the scientific world. It would appear to occur at a more gradual pace than it does within science, evolution as opposed to revolution. The sudden impact of change in the social world is reduced, there is a subtlety to the episteme shift that is less defined than that which occurs with the paradigm shift. Therefore, although Foucault has provided the social world with a new methodology for the study of history, a tool for understanding how and why we think as we do, it would be unfair to say that this has the same implications for the history of ideas that Kuhn’s paradigms have had for the philosophy of science. Kuhn’s work has provided the scientific community with an explanation for changes in scientific knowledge that has become part of accepted thinking. Foucault’s work has failed to achieve this acceptance among historians, who are still intent in uncovering cause and effect and view history as an evolutionary process that is punctuated by the occasional revolution. Therefore the contention that Foucault has done for the history of ideas what Kuhn achieved for the philosophy of science, can be viewed as being valid, but to a lesser extent. Kuhn’s paradigm shifts are a revolution in knowledge; Foucault’s epistemes are, in spite of his insistence to the contrary, more evolutionary. Foucault’s work appears to be a weaker discourse among the community of historians than Kuhn’s discourse of paradigms is among the scientific community. The dominant discourse in relation to the history of ideas remains that of project of modernity and structuralism, the continued evolution of a synthesis of ideas.

REFERENCES
Chalmers A.F, (2003), pg. 100, 108
Foucault M, (1963)
Foucault M. (1969), pg. 1, 2
Hughes & Sharrock, (1990), pg.186
Jewson N, Sociology, 10, (1976) pg. 225-244.

INTERNET REFERENCES

Foucault M, (1963), The Birth of the clinic at
http://www.stanford.edu/dept/HPST/BirthOfTheClinic/clinicenter.htm (accessed on 8/01/05)

The aim of this essay is to explain the differences between sociological problems and social problems, describing five factors that influence sociological research and five factors that influence social policy making. The essay will then examine three policy areas, those of health, education and policy concerning lone Parents.

Sociological and Social problems are difficult to define as there is more than one accepted definition and because it is often difficult for individuals to make a distinction between the two. Davies defined them thus ‘ Social problems involve forms of behaviour, social conditions or social situations which are defined as undesirable and as calling for some kind of action to solve them. Sociological problems, on the other hand are theoretical problems; that is, problems of description and explanation of social reality. It follows that social problems will, almost inevitably, also constitute sociological problems, but the reverse does not hold true.”(Source: Mullen D, (2003)).
C, Wright Mills differentiates between the two as follows; a sociological problem is one that concerns public issues a social problem is one which concerns private troubles. This means that if one person loses their job, it is for them, a private trouble this constitutes a social problem, however if 3 million people lose their jobs then this is a public issue and thus a sociological problem. (Source: http://www.faculty.rsu.edu/~felwell/Theorists/Mills/index.htm#Problems ).

The study of sociology encompasses a wide perspective of society free from the binds of ethnocentrism and a sociological problem is the wider perspective of problems that occur within entire societies, not small groups or individuals within that society. Furthermore a sociologist uses objectivity when studying problems within the whole of society. Sociologists examine all aspects of a problem including roles, norms, institutions involved with the problem, class, culture, subculture and society and such study incorporates value freedom. Sociologists will study problems from a range of perspectives such as, conflict or functionalist perspectives, according to a conflict theorist the cause of social problems is the power relationships between individuals and the economic base of society, according to functionalist theorists, social problems occur when society becomes so disorganised that it’s basic functions cannot be performed as well as they should be. Social problems are identified through sociological research, which provides a theoretical basis for the research, and the Government uses the research to devise strategies to tackle the social problems. The result of this process is social policy, which is then implemented through the institution responsible for Social Welfare. The BSA describes sociological research as being conducted in two ways; ‘Aspects of society are conceptualised. Ideas are devised as 'concepts' to describe and explain the workings of society. In this way the forms of social organisation and the resulting social institutions, which people create and reproduce in the course of everyday life become defined in sociological terms. Concepts are tested through 'empirical' research, that is research involving active investigation of particular aspects of society and the way that people interact with each other. This provides a check as to whether sociological concepts actually correspond to the way that social life is conducted by real life people’, (http://www.britsoc.co.uk/index.php?link_id=6&area=item1 )

Sociological research is subject to many constraints, ideological, political, as well as the accessibility to the group being researched. Time and money are also constraints, as time is money and vice versa. Funding sources are also another form of constraint as it can be inferred that ‘ he who pays the piper calls the tune’ it is presumed that some funding sources will undoubtedly introduce some bias into the research thus compromising value freedom and objectivity, furthermore the funding sources appear to have a preference for certain research methods and according to Platt (1996), this often places limits on the type of research a sociologist can conduct thus restricting the methods the sociologist can use,’ McCartney (1971) concludes that major funding agencies have a preference for statistical and 'scientific' work which is skewing the methodological style of sociology’, (http://www.socresonline.org.uk/1/1/5.html ). The personal characteristics of the researcher can also introduce bias into the research, for example a radical feminist conducting research into employment is likely to be tempted to paint a harsher picture of reality in relation to women and employment than a functionalist conducting the same research, it is also possible that the researcher may unwittingly introduce further bias based on their own social status and perceptions of class. In relation to time there is another constraint, some case studies may take years to complete and thus by the time the research has been completed its findings may already be dated and thus inapplicable. Other constraints can range from the legal to the ethical, e.g. a sociologist studying drug abuse among prostitutes may find that it is impossible to gather information because both drugs and prostitution are illegal therefore the true figures pertaining to such activity rely on the willingness of people who break the law to admit that they do so, i.e. admit to criminal activities. A way of obtaining a more accurate picture of the true extent of such problems would involve covert activities on behalf of the researcher and thus may compromise the code of ethics relating to research.

Sociological research is conducted by many organisations and universities and is funded by many organisations, such as Demos, The Joseph Rowntree Foundation, The Fabian Society, The Institute for Fiscal Studies, The Centre for Policy Studies, The Adam Smith Institute, Catalyst and Nexus, as well as charitable organisations such as Age concern There are many others each seeking to influence social and economic policy making by the Government, some come from very different political perspectives, e.g. Catalyst is a left wing organisation committed to Marxist values, while Nexus declares itself to represent the ‘third way’, Demos is one organisation that has found affection among Blair’s ‘New Labour’ movement. The Adam Smith Institute found favour with the Thatcherite Government and influenced it’s economic policies, it describes itself as centre-right in political terms.
What do these types of organisation actually do? According to the Policy Research Bureau, ‘ all the policy research bureau’s work is allied to our interests in children, young people and families. It takes a variety of forms including large scale surveys, quasi-experimental studies, smaller qualitative projects, literature reviews and evaluations – topics we focus on include parenting, fatherhood, young offenders, prevention and intervention for antisocial behaviour and drug misuse, child maltreatment, child protection and child/adolescent mental health issues. We specialise in applied research and in making our work useful to others in the policy and practice arenas’ (http://www.prb.org.uk/ ). This illustrates that although these funding bodies seek to influence social policy, they do not actually make social policy they conduct the groundwork, the research, which is then published and through this they hope that their recommendations will be implemented by the Government.

For a definition of Social policy we must turn to Titmuss (1976), who describes social policy as being, ‘Concerned with the study of a range of social needs and the functioning, in conditions of scarcity, of human organisation, traditionally called the social services or social welfare systems, to meet those needs. This complex area of social life lies outside on the fringes of the so-called free market, the mechanisms of prices and tests profitability’, (Lavalette M & Pratt A, (2001) 2nd Edition, page 2). Gils’ explanation of social policy is that its major concern is ‘the analysis of access to life enhancing and life-sustaining resources’ (Lavalette M & Pratt A, (2001) 2nd Edition, Page 2). For an explanation of how this process works we again turn to Titmuss (1976), he discussed the processes involved in the formation of social policy as follows, ‘ (i) The analysis and description of policy formation and its consequences, intended and unintended, (ii) The study of structure, function, organisation, planning and administrative processes of institutions and agencies, historical and comparative, (iii) The study of social needs and problems of access to, utilisation and patterns of outcome services, transactions and transfers, (iv) The analysis of the nature, attributes and distribution of social costs and dis-welfares, (v) The analysis of distributive and allocative patterns in command-over-resources-through-time and the particular impact of the social services, (vi) The study of roles and functions of elected representatives, professional workers, administrators and interest groups in the operation and performance of social welfare institutions, (vii) The study of the social rights of the citizen as contributor, participant and user of social services, and finally (viii) The study of the role of Government (local and central) as an allocator of values and of rights to social property as expressed through social and administrative law and other rule-making channels’, ( Lavalette M & Pratt A, (2nd Edition), (2001), P 3). Although this would appear to be a comprehensive account of the process it has been criticised because its omits the role of the market, viewing the role of Capitalist society as a fore gone conclusion, because historically it had been demonstrated that such a basis for society was unsuitable ‘ as an allocative agency for those resources essential to the experience of a full and complete life’, (Lavalette M & Pratt A, (2nd Edition), (2001), P4). Indeed historically a major criticism of the social welfare system that existed in Germany during the period of the Weimar Republic, was that it undermined both economic and political viability of the country. A further criticism of this account of the process is that it fails to address the fact that social policy can be used as a system of social control, thus the presumption made by Titmus (1976) can be assumed to be that all social policy is intended to be ‘beneficial, humanitarian and progressive’ (Lavalette M & Pratt A, (2nd Edition), (2001), P4). Temple (1941) warned in his book Citizen and Churchmen that ‘ the power assumed by a benevolent state to advance its citizens welfare could lead to totalitarianism’, (Lowe R, (2nd Edition), (1999), p10), The Poor law of 1834 in conjunction with the Poor Law Amendment Act could loosely be described as being an early attempt at social policy, however the result of this law was more a form of social control because it was ‘designed primarily to create a free, national labour market through the implementation of a harsh deterrent system of poor relief based on the principles of less eligibility and the work house test’, (Lavalette M & Pratt A, (2nd Edition), (2001), p5). The final criticism of Titmus (1976) is that these points also fail to address the fact that ‘ social policies are intimately bound to the societies in which they develop and reflect the priorities of those systems’ (Lavalette M & Pratt A, (2nd Edition), (2001), P4), In a capitalist society for instance the performance of the economy has a direct impact on how much funding the Government can allocate to social welfare policies, if the economy is in poor health then it is likely that there will be greater strain on the budget for social welfare expenditure and perhaps less funding available. There is an increased likelihood of the need for increases in social welfare provision and thus a demand for increased funding at a time when the economic situation does not allow for such action.
The formation of social policy is confined by the political ideology of the Government, the performance of the economy, the public recognition of problem areas, which inevitably occurs through mass media promotion of certain issues. Thus the political ideology of the owners of the mass media and their relationship with the Government in power have to be considered when assessing how they choose to promote or ignore certain social issues. Other considerations must be given to the validity and accuracy of the research and how and when the research is presented e.g. research made public close to an election will possibly have a greater chance of being acted upon and thus being included in social policy because it may well be a vote catcher for a political party. However, research, which shows Government policy in relation to social issues in a bad light may well be suppressed by the Government because they do not want the people to be aware that the research exists or to be aware of the scope of the social problem because it conflicts with their socio-political aims e.g. The Black Report was commissioned by a labour Government, but was not completed until the Thatcher era, it was suppressed by the Government who thought it prudent to issue the report on a Bank Holiday in August, when they hoped there would be little interest. This would allow them to virtually ignore its existence and prevent any public pressure for changes recommended in the report. Trade Unions are another source of influence concerning social policy, especially in relation to employment matters, and Trade Unions such as the N.U.T will campaign for changes in social policy pertaining to educational matters in addition to campaigning for better working conditions for teachers and educational staff. Charities too seek to influence social policy relating to their individual spheres of concern e.g. Age Concern will campaign for changes in legislation that affects old people, Shelter will seek to influence social policy regarding housing and the rights of the homeless. Interest Groups also seek to influence the formation of Government social policy, as do the political parties in opposition to the Government, each group or party will represent the interests of those areas of social policy they feel affects those they represent. The people in charge of influential organisations may also seek to alter policy for their own ends rather than to achieve better welfare services for the population at large, this may happen when the interests of the organisation conflict with sectional or individual interests.

This essay will now examine three key areas of social welfare policy and how sociological research influenced the policies. The three areas to be examined are Health, Education and Lone Parents. As can be ascertained from the recent election campaigns in Scotland (2003), Health and Education are areas of social policy that all political parties now recognise as being vote winners or vote losers and thus areas about which they must make clear, their intentions in their manifestos. The major changes in the way that introduction of, and recognised need for social policy has impacted on the politics and the voting behaviour of the people of the United Kingdom were instigated after the First World War during a period of economic decline and then built on after the Second World War when the Government decided that the war wounded and their families should be given support. Furthermore the decline in the male population, post war, meant that mothers too needed assistance and encouragement if the population was to recover. This meant major reforms in the provision of health care and that the introduction of financial assistance for families was necessary. The report published by Sir William Beveridge, a liberal and sole signatory to the report, in 1942 entitled ‘Social Insurance and Allied Services ‘, was an instant best seller. It was the result of work by a committee consisting of members of various departments in the civil service, and instigated by Arthur Greenwood. The remit to the committee was ‘ to undertake, with special reference to the interrelation of the schemes, a survey of the existing national schemes of social insurance and allied services, including workmen’s compensation and to make recommendations’, (Gladstone D, (1999), p38). The resulting report went far in excess of its original remit and was considered to be a blue print for change. Hennessy (1993) declared ‘ there has never been an official report like it’, (Gladstone D, (1999), P39). The report identified social insurance as ‘ one part only of a comprehensive policy of social progress. Social insurance fully developed may provide income security, it is an attack upon want. But want is only one of the five giants on the road to reconstruction. The others are Disease, Ignorance, Squalor and Idleness’ (source: Gladstone D, (1999), P 39- (Cmd.6404, para. 8)). Thus the report was addressing what it viewed as all of the major social problems of the time, economic, health, educational, housing and employment, areas of that are still in the social welfare spotlight today. According to Harris (1977) the report was viewed by many, ‘ as the light at the end of the tunnel of war and as a promise of ‘ social justice’ for the post war world’, (Gladstone D, (1999), P39), thus public pressure was in favour of implementing the recommendations in the report, pressure the post war coalition Government could not ignore, according to Brooke (1992) the report reflected the feelings of the WW2 Labour Party and thus ‘became an icon for the Labour Movement’, (Gladstone D, (1999), P39).

The first reform to take place was in the sphere of education, the 1944 Education act also known as the Butler Act raised the school leaving age to 15 and provided free secondary education for all children by abolishing fees, the new act advocated a transition from primary education to Secondary education at the age of 11 plus and was organised into a tripartite system, a three tier system of schools for the provision of secondary education, the deciding factor as to which Secondary school a child would to attend was decided by means of the now infamous 11 plus examination. At the age of 11 – 12 children in their final year of Primary education were given a test, the results of which would form the basis for their future educational development and thus the basis for their future lives as adults. The schools were divided into Grammar Schools, Secondary Modern Schools and Technical Schools, the children were then filtered into the schools on the basis of their results, the top achievers were sent to the Grammar Schools and the other children were in some areas divided into Technical Schools or Secondary Modern Schools, however there were geographical variations on the availability of Technical Schools and therefore in most areas the tripartite system was actually a bipartite system, a system that was not uniform from county to county or region to region. Educational chances, and thus life chances therefore were subject to restriction based on geographical location and educational abilities at age 11 – 12. The system was based on,‘a combination of educational theory derived from the wartime Norwood Report which referred to three types of children, the academic, the technically minded, and the 'rest', and a scarcity of resources and school buildings, meant that instead of common secondary schools there were instead selective Grammar Schools for an academic elite and Secondary Modern Schools for the rest. Technical Schools were rare. Admission to Grammar Schools was on the basis of passing a selective examination at 11 (the 11 Plus) and was free. The proportion passing varied from LEA to LEA depending on the number of available Grammar School places but averaged 20%. The examination was weighted to give an equal number of male and female passes - without weighting 70% of passes would have been by girls’, (Byrne D, & Rogers T, (1996) at http://www.socresonline.org.uk/1/2/link2.html). This appeared to many to be an unfair system of education and there was an alternative system that had been proposed. In 1938 Sir Will Spen produced a report which proposed a comprehensive system of education, the 1944 Act had neither supported nor rejected the idea of Comprehensive Schools and so the system had been adopted by some Local Education Authorities as early as 1945. This system was viewed as fairer by some people because it did not stigmatise children in relation to which school they attended. It was under the influence of Anthony Crosland as Secretary of State for Education that the campaign for a comprehensive system of education took root and with it a deepened hatred of the Grammar School system. ‘In some rural areas with scattered populations and in some urban areas where extensive bombing meant schools had to be rebuilt, Comprehensive Schools attended by all pupils were provided. In 1966 Anthony Crosland, the Minister in the first Labour Administration since 1951, issued a Circular (10/66) from his Department inviting LEAs to prepare plans for reorganising their secondary school provision on a comprehensive basis. This broad hint was later backed up by legislation and by the mid 70s (the policy was continued under the Conservative Government of 1970-74) most English and Welsh Secondary Schools were Comprehensives. Many of the non-Catholic Direct Grant Schools refused to abandon selectivity and left the state system to become private day schools’,
(Byrne D, & Rogers T, (1996) at http://www.socresonline.org.uk/1/2/link2.html).
Like everything else in the world the system of Education and its aims are constantly evolving and thus sociological research is invariably commissioned to report on necessary changes of the system and content and delivery of education, this ensures that when Governments departments and ministers are faced with calls for change from the electorate, they have ample research available to aid with any changes that may be necessary. According to Brown (1995) his research indicates that the education system is now changing due to pressure from market forces and, 'This change in the rules of engagement is giving the middle classes the opportunity to capitalize on their superior market power in the competition for credentials within a market-driven system of education.' (http://www.socresonline.org.uk/1/2/3.html). Byrne & Rogers (1996) point out that only 30 years after the Circular (10/66) by Crosland, the Schools system has again become unfair and more often than not based on geographical boundaries and the ability to afford travel to other areas, to better schools. The system of allowing Parental choice in which schools their children attend has caused problems, financially for some schools as attendance drops due to poor marks on the league tables, funding drops accordingly, it being linked to attendance. Byrne and Rogers (1996) make the point that ‘The choice of secondary school attended by pupils is still enormously important for the educational achievements and future career prospects of children. Indeed changes in the nature of the employment structure and of modes of access to employment, which are themselves the product of the basal changes usually described by the term 'deindustrialization' have made secondary educational careers even more important now than they were when the move towards a comprehensive system was initiated’, (http://www.socresonline.org.uk/1/2/3.html). League tables are now very important in assisting parental decision and has put pressure on Head Teachers to improve their schools rating in the league tables with the hope of encouraging parents to choose their school, so much pressure in fact that it has been reported in the news (May 2003) that one head teacher has been accused of helping his pupils cheat! Such pressure on head teachers needs to be addressed and this is part of the wider picture of education that sociologists are examining. A sociologist such as Byrne cannot change the rules and policies, he can merely point out the inequalities in the system and suggest changes and improvements, but how much chance does he have of that occurring? To improve his chances of having the geographic catchment area boundaries in Teeside and the surrounding areas altered, Byrne’s study would need to come to the attention of both parents and the media, and invariably to politicians both local and in the departments responsible for such alterations. The study by Byrne can be used to illustrate and highlight a problem, but unless it receives public support the recommended changes have little chance of becoming policy and more chance of being confined to the world of academia for reference purposes by other sociologists. This is the same for all sociological studies and reports, the mechanism for implementing changes in Social policy is the Government and thus public pressure with political support must be created for change to occur and in this role media interest is particularly important. This leads us back to funding of research, some organisations that fund sociological research have the mechanisms in place to create public awareness and begin a campaign for change and as a result the sociological research commissioned by them, has a better chance of being taken seriously by the Government. The current Government overseen by PM Tony Blair tends to favour research from an interactionist, weberian perspective, it is known that Anthony Giddens is often approached as an advisor. Governments tend to favour sociological research that comes from their own perspective e.g. left wing Governments prefer research from a Marxist Perspective, because it suits their ideology. The following list is of up to date research that has influenced or is influencing Government policy towards education UK Government White Paper on Higher Education – The future of higher education (January 2003), The Tomlinson A-levels inquiry (December 2002), The Russell Group report on the future funding of Universities – Funding Universities to meet National and International Challenges (July 2000), The Cubie Report- The independent Committee of Inquiry into Student Finance (December 1999), The Use of Technology to Support Learning in Colleges (The Higginson Report) (May 1998), The Dearing Report – National Committee of Inquiry into Higher Education (July 1997) the Governments response to which was, Higher Education for the 21st Century (July 1997) and finally The Kennedy Report - Widening participation in Further Education - Learning Works" (produced by NIACE) (June 1997) the Governments response to this was Further education for the new millennium (all of these reports can be viewed at(http://www.niss.ac.uk/world/misc-reports.html ).

Health is another area of social policy that is influenced by sociological research and thus many studies are conducted in relation to this topic. Health care in the United Kingdom is provided by the National Health Service, the birth of which was an indication of major political change in regards to social issues and hence of social policies. As early as 1911 under the Government of Lloyd George, a system on National Health Insurance was introduced for some of the population of the British Isles, and later under a labour Government the health care system was altered to the NHS, which is funded by a general taxation on the population as a whole, ensuring access to health care for everyone. Such a system was supposed to ensure equal access and treatment for all regardless of income or social status, however the changes instigated under the Conservative Government of Margaret Thatcher, which allowed for Private finance into the world of health care have altered the system, instigating inequalities in many areas of health care e.g. regional variations in waiting times, ability to access specialist treatments, even the regional variation on when a premature birth is considered viable is dependent on geographic region. The Current Government now recognises that there is a need for change within the NHS and it will take account of sociological research when addressing just how to prevent health care inequalities, however sociologists are only 1 group that are working in this sphere, economists, Health Care professionals, Trade Unions, civil servants and academics will also be studying the issues that need addressed, each working from their own perspective. In the USA a report entitled ‘Social inequality harms health’ by James S House (1997) of the University of Michigan highlights the inequalities that exist in the American system of health care, house recommends that ‘"To have a substantial impact on public health, there would need to be a decrease both in absolute and relative deprivation and inequality of the lower 30 to 50 percent of the socio-economic distribution." (http://obssr.od.nih.gov/Publications/SOCIALIN.HTM), whether this recommendation will be acted upon in a society such as the USA will be dependant on the amount of attention its authors and those who funded the research can provide it with, furthermore if such a target were to be aimed at it would involve many reforms for the USA and thus a change of economic, fiscal policy and perhaps even ideology for the political parties in the USA. Therefore such actions are unlikely to come to fruition because the political, ideological and economic climate of the country is unsuitable and because the author of the report does not appear to writing from a perspective that the US Government has any affinity for. In the UK however we have a different political climate and poverty of the lowest socio-economic groups is constantly targeted by the Government, therefore a similar sociological report in this country has a greater chance of being taken seriously and perhaps having its recommendations implemented because the basis for, and attitude towards health care and indeed the social welfare system in general within the UK is entirely different to that of the USA, and because the political sphere of the UK encompasses a much wider range of ideological perspectives. Therefore it can be assumed that the reasons for inequalities in health care provision may exist for very different reasons in both countries, although it appears to be the same socio-economic groups that are affected by the inequalities, the poorest members of society.

Charles Murray, a sociologist, developed a theory called the underclass theory, this theory identified a whole class who’s economic status was below the levels of the working classes, a class who had been ‘invisible’, however unlike a Marxist sociologist who would blame these circumstances on the relationship between the individual and the economic base of society, Murray blamed the circumstances of the individual on the individuals themselves, although he indicated that perhaps the living environment played a part in the circumstances of the underclass. Murray identified three factors that are indicative of the underclasses, illegitimacy, unwillingness to Work and Violent Crime; Murray believes that the three are inextricably linked. Of these three factors Murray points to illegitimacy as the best indicator of the existence of the underclass because sociological research has shown that illegitimacy is linked to an increased drain on the welfare state through the claims of single mothers and is also linked to the availability of council housing. Further Sociological research links longterm unemployment, crime and drugs to illegitimacy and although there is a general acceptance that this is the case, there is also a general acceptance that there are exceptions. However, because of the sociological research giving a theoretical basis for these problems within society, it gave the Governmental policy makers a legitimate framework on which to build their policies that are geared towards lone parents. In 1965 the paper ‘The Poor and the Poorest’ was published it identified social groups living in abject poverty, thus identifying that one of the objectives of the Beveridge Report had not been accomplished, the elimination of poverty. The supplementary benefit, which was means tested, was altered and a new means tested benefit was introduced Family Income Supplement, the purpose of which was to eradicate child poverty by providing parents with an incentive to work, to assist escape from what has become known as the benefits trap. This benefit has been altered and renamed several times, to Income support and then to income support with single parents benefit, then with the abolition of the single parent entitlement a new system was introduced as an incentive to work bridging the benefits trap gap, Family Credit, this was altered to working families tax credit and now exists as part of a wider tax credit system, it is however for all intents and purposes FIS in disguise. Other work was done by the Government as a means to assist single mothers, Murray (1989) stated that ‘Men who do not support families find other ways to prove they are men, which tends to take various destructive forms’, ( Source:, Single Parents – impact of research on legislation). Murray therefore was implicating the connection between fathers who abandoned their children and the rise in criminality, Murray wanted a change in the system, he wanted tougher sentencing for criminals and he wanted the abolition of single parent benefit, these recommendations were taken on board by the Government and the single parent component of Income support was abolished. The 1991 Child Support Act introduced a new government agency, the CSA, which was born among much controversy. The intent of the CSA was to make fathers financially responsible for their children, thus decreasing child poverty and decreasing the criminal activity of the father. The new agency was given a broad range of powers and was soon an agency that was hated by many fathers and mothers, the fathers because they expected that the state should finance the upbringing of their offspring and mothers hated the CSA because for those who had escaped violent partners the CSA had opened a whole new can of worms. The CSA has been blamed for suicides among absent fathers and for pursuing fathers who were already maintaining their children. From the offset the remit of the CSA has come under constant criticism as being unfair to both parents and to second families and thus the structure of the CSA was altered in 2002, to take better account of individual circumstances and to allow mothers to keep more of, or in some instances all of, the maintenance, while in receipt of some benefits, the way the fathers contributions were assessed was also changed to take into account children from a second relationship and second families. The new deal for lone parents and the system of tax credits was also introduced to assist lone parents with the transition from benefits to work, working tax credit does not take into account maintenance payments received from the absent parent. We can see from the way the Government changed its policies towards single parents that the work of Charles Murray was taken seriously and acted upon and this illustrates the way in which a sociologist can influence social policy.

Sociologists have a good chance of having their theories and recommendations take seriously by a government if they can generate publicity, public support and media interest in their findings and perhaps more importantly if the perspective they are writing from does not conflict with the ideology of the party in power. The funding process and funding body for the research also plays an important part in what social problems are identified and how they are interpreted, this in conjunction with the constraints mentioned earlier in the essay and the economic situation of the country has a major influence on which research takes place and how successful the sociologist who has conducted the research is in influencing policies, and which policies are implemented and when.

S.McGonigal (2003)

This essay will examine four sociological theories of Religion, Durkheim a functionalist perspective, Weber’s social action perspective, Marx’s conflict/structural perspective and a feminist perspective. The essay will then examine four case studies and provide an evaluation of two of them.

In order to examine religion it is necessary to define what constitutes a religion. In the United Kingdom people usually perceive a religion as being an established, organised form of worshiping a God, monotheism or Gods, polytheism. The most widely recognised being Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism or Islam, there are however other religions, which are neither monotheistic nor polytheistic.
The New Guinea highland religion of the Dugum Dani appeases supernatural beings or Mogat who are ghosts of the dead; this is not religion of worship but one of appeasement. These Mogat bring illness and violent storms and torrential rain. This type of religion known as animism.
In North America the Teton Sioux evoke the powers of the wakan for protection and assistance, like other smaller cultural religions this is a form of totensim.
Confucianism is an old religion which in itself is not concerned with explanations for the existence of man or earth but in simply accepting the ‘natural harmony’ of the world, (source: Giddens, 4th edition, (2001), p531), Confucianism along with other eastern religions such as Taoism and Buddhism are ethical religions and as such have no gods, they use ethical ideologies relating the individual believer to the natural unity and cohesion of the universe (source: Giddens, 4th edition (2001), p535).
Melford E. Spiro stated that religions are based on ‘beliefs in superhuman beings and in their power to assist or harm man’ (Haralambos, Third Edition, 1990, p645). According to Giddens ‘Religions involve a set of symbols, invoking feelings of reverence or awe, and are linked to rituals or ceremonials engaged in by a community of believers’, (Giddens, 4th Edition, (2001), p531). There are many theoretical versions of what function a religion serves in a society, history and social anthropology show that homosapien has from very early in evolution sought to find answers and order in events beyond his understanding, placing supernatural significance on such events in an effort to understand the mystery’s of the environment in which he found himself. Later man evolved these mysteries into forms of religion which involved worshipping an object or supernatural being to benefit himself, his tribe or society or to placate the mysteries to prevent harm befalling the society, e.g. Stonehenge where it is believed that the large altar stone may have been used to make sacrifices to the sun to ensure good weather and bountiful harvests by Stone age man.
Modern organised religions make an attempt to place order within society and interpret man’s raison d’etre. Most theories of religion are based on the major organised religions of the world such as Christianity, however Durkheim’s theory of totem is based on studies of smaller tribal religions, it is Durkheim’s functionalist perspective that this essay will deal with first.

Durkheim’s thesis on religion is based on small scale, non-literate societies. According to Durkheim all religions deal with offering an explanation for mysteries of the universe, the rising of the sun the changing of the seasons for instance, looking for causes for the effects that man can witness. Durkheim believed that ‘religious forces are the original expression of the concept of force in science since they represent the first historical expression of causality. First it has it’s expression through religion, then philosophy, coming to rest in the scientific conception of the causes of nature,’(Morrison, 2001, p205). Durkheim argues that this concept of cause did not arise from the individual because the mind of the individual is limited but that this concept was founded by society, presumably the primary function of religion being to explain the unexplained. It is the explanation or cause of unexplained events, which then evolves to become the basis of the religious beliefs of a particular society. Once the religion is accepted within the society certain religious rites are performed that take on sacred significance and certain objects also are given sacred significance all other objects are then profane, the religious objects become totem’s and are used in worship and sacred rites. The wider function of these religious rites being to focus social solidarity within a particular society, thus amalgamating a set of values and beliefs with social harmony and integration. The religion ensures that there is a collective consciousness of shared moral beliefs and social values, without which there would be no social order or control.

The next perspective that this essay will examine is that of the conflict theorist Karl Marx.

It is widely accepted that Marx himself did not examine religion in any great detail but based his theory on the writings of Ludwig Feuerbach’s The Essence of Christianity 1841. Feuerbach explained that man had alienated himself by wrongly projecting his own ideas and values onto divine forces during his cultural evolution, attributing mans own norms and values to the work of a God or Gods, ‘thus the story of the ten commandments given to Moses by God is a mythical version of the origin of the moral precepts which govern the lives of Jewish and Christian believers’, (Giddens, 4th Edition, (2001), p536). Marx takes this basis and applies it to his own concept of a society in conflict. He determines that infact Christianity is a method of social control, which gives people laws and moral values while keeping the lower classes subdued by promising that ‘the meek shall inherit the earth’ and that the rich cannot enter heaven that is reserved for those who live out their lives on earth quietly obeying the rules and laws of the bible and not accumulating wealth. This is borne out by the way in which Christianity has kept the lower classes ignorant before social pressure forced change e.g. Catholic services in Latin meant that those who were uneducated could not understand what the priest was saying, it maintained the mysteriousness of the church service and the mass so that the organised church and its hierarchy could control the lower ranks of society. They were only told what the church and those who controlled the church wanted them to know in the same way that the Government controls the school curriculum. Christianity perpetuated Feudalism and the Divine Right of Kings; it was a perfect method of preventing social uprisings by instilling the fear of God into the masses. Therefore according to Marx religion subdues people in a similar way to opium, dulling the expectations of the individual. Marx’s work is based on conflict between the ruling classes and the oppressed workers within society so it is natural that his interpretation of religion is that of an oppressive social control. This theory points out the justification of inequalities that exist in many religions such as Hinduism and Christianity and how religion is used to justify political agendas. It also shows how religion is used to promote acceptance of oppression of the poorer people within society. However Engles pointed out that religion did not always justify political oppression or favour the ruling classes and that it can be accepted in conjunction with socialist principles e.g. the Kibbutz system in Israel which is founded on communist principles but incorporates the Jewish faith. This theory has also been criticised because in the USSR religion did not disappear as Marx had imagined it would, it was simply suppressed by the ruling communist party. Neo-Marxists argue that religion does not necessarily need to be linked to the economic base of a country and can therefore exist in a communist society as it does in Cuba .

The next theory that this essay will examine is that of Max Weber, this theory of religion is based on a massive study of religions on a global scale. Weber’s theory is that of social action.

Weber studied what he considered to be the major religions of the world, Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism and Taoism these studies were undertaken between 1951 and 1963 and his extensive study on Christianity ‘The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism’ 1905 is a detailed study of the impact of Christianity on the history of westernised societies. He argues that religion is responsible for great social changes and that its impact through Puritanism/Calvinism is what gave Western Societies a capitalist economic framework; work hard to please God, material success being a sign of having favour with God. Weber points to the differences between the economies in the East and the West and regards the protestant work ethic as being responsible for the economic success of the west. Weber rejected the Marxist view that religion always shapes the economic base of a society but concurred that religion can have an effect on the economic climate of a country. This theory has been criticised by Sombart (1907), he argued that Calvinism was really against the pursuit and accumulation of money and greed and that predestination was not intended to encourage the pursuit of profit, capitalism was therefore an unfortunate consequence of Calvinism not the intended. Kautsky (1955) argued that capitalism actually preceded Calvinism and it was Calvinism that developed in areas where industrialisation and commerce already existed. Therefore the ideology of Calvinism was used to legitimise Capitalism. In countries where Calvinism was a strong ideology capitalism has developed .

The final theory that this essay will examine is that of feminism. The feminist approach being one of conflict between patriarchal dominance and matriarchal subservience. Pederson and Solberg 1977 argue that very few women are active within theology and this can still be argued today almost a quarter of a century later most religions are still dominated by men. Some feminists argue that religions restrict the freedom of women to express themselves by making them wear restrictive clothing to obscure them from the world e.g. the Burkha (Islam) and that religions such as Christianity portray women as being linked to temptation and wickedness, e.g. Bathsheba tempting David into committing adultery, Mary Magdalene the prostitute, eve conspiring with the snake in the garden of Eden to create trouble for Adam. Women’s biology is even under attack through religion, the idea that menstruating woman are unclean permeates several religions, thus debasing even the natural biology of the female. Other feminists would argue that Christianity gives women an impossible role model in the form of a virgin mother for Christ; Mary has indeed done the impossible. The virgin Mary is an image that gives men false expectations of women, they are to be virginal and yet procreate the species, men want virgin brides and yet few men are prepared to wait until marriage before having sex, thus religion debases females who participate in pre-marital sex.

This essay will now examine 4 different case studies and evaluate two of them.

The first case study is Sexual Identity and Religious Socialization (British Journal of Sociology, Vol 46, No3, Sept 1995).
This study was confined to Penvollard, a small Cornish town. Those studied were from 2 junior schools, a Church of England School and a non-denominational County School. The study considers socialisation and gender differentiation in beliefs, attitudes and practice. The study shows that girls have a more positive attitude towards religion and higher levels of belief. The study also shows that prior to the age of 5, 87% of Girls and 86% of boys had attended church at sometime. At age 12 there was a marked difference between the percentage of girls and boys who attended church, 47% of girls attend most weeks accompanied by friends while only 5% of boys continued to attend church at this age and they were accompanied by family. It appears that the activities within the church are more appealing to girls than boys; this may point to the socialisation process encouraging female involvement in religious activities. The mothers interviewed accepted that a normal degree of Christian Practice was acceptable as long as it did not interfere with ‘More important aspects of education or social activities nor with their own central values of individual autonomy and freedom of belief.’ It appears that School was regarded as being the ideal place for children to come into contact with religion even those children who came from non practicing families, this allowed the parents to regard religion as an element of education rather than a religious practice in its own right. The Mothers interviewed became critical when they felt too much time was being devoted to religion in schools, despite the connections that exist between religion and morality.

This study achieved its aim and was an in-depth study due to use of unstructured interviews which frees the researcher from restrictive pre-determined questions allowing greater exploration and clarification of points which uncovered truer motives and feelings regarding the subject matter. However the nature of the study, that being a small sample within a small town means that it cannot be generalised to the whole population. The study also utilised the functionalist presumption that religion is the province of women in their nurturing role, which is not always the case. This study therefore omitted any paternal contribution. The technique used, that of unstructured interviews is costly and time consuming to implement. There is no link between study method and theory in this case study because it is a functionalist perspective using unstructured interview techniques, which produce qualitative data.

The next case study that we will examine is Attacking the attacker: Gay Christians Talk Back- Andrew K.T.Yip

This study, which uses Social Action theory, was based on 60 male gay Christians, the study used two different research methods, those of self- completion questionnaires and semi structured interviews thus providing a tenuous link between theory and method. Apparently gay Christians show more anxiety regarding being exposed as gay, they also suffer from low self-esteem possibly because of a conflict between sexual orientation and religious norms and values. The church has been resistant to changes in attitude and its official position regarding homosexuality and the lifestyle of the homosexual is labelled unacceptable, thus Gay Christian men tend to distance themselves for the church community to avoid stigmatisation.
Gay Christians have argued that the Bible is used as justification for the churches official stance and that the argument is taken form text and used out of context to support the churches position on homosexuality avoiding the opportunity to practice broad Christian principles. Gay Christians also argue that sexuality is handed down to us from God therefore how can Homosexuality be wrong. Gay Christians call for Ideological empowerment, which will allow them to transcend the label of deviant placed on them by the church.

The next case study this essay will examine is Religious Identification and moral attitudes; The British Case – Bernadette C. Hayes. British Journal of Sociology (1994). This study uses a structuralist perspective and the research method employed is that of surveys therefore the data collected is quantitative thus providing a link between research method and perspective. The study examines the Impact of religions identification on controversial social issues such as aids, homosexuality pornography and artificial insemination. The study results show that there are marked variations in patterns of religious identification in addition to significant differences in relation to moral attitudes. It appears that religious non-affiliates are more supportive of aids victims, but disapproving of homosexuals and are less inclined to hold conservative views in relation to artificial insemination methods or pornography than religions affiliates. However, multi variant analysis shows that religious identification only affects certain types of moral issues the one exception to this is pornography this relationship remained with regard to independent apostates and stable independents also for these issues. It is the lack of religious identification, which constitutes one primary factor in explaining moral attitudes.
Roman Catholics and Protestants more likely to adopt a conservative opinion on lack of legal rights for aids victims. Religious identification is not the most significant predictor of moral attitudes with regards to homosexuality and artificial insemination the primary factor appears to be age, older the individual the more conservative the viewpoint. In relation to pornography while the primary factor again appears to be age religious identification also has some significance in attitudes. While this study was examining religious identification in relation to moral issues it cannot be regarded as the sole predictor, other factors, which must be regarded as being significant are age, gender, level of education, partisanship and level church attendance in the respondent.
This case study appeared to make the assumption that a decline in moral standards goes hand in hand with a decline in religious identification.

The final case study this essay will examine is Helen Watson-The meaning of Veiling,
Watson studied three women, in an attempt to discover whether Muslim women regard wearing the veil as oppressive, as we westerners perceive it to be or liberating. Nadia a second generation Muslim, her age at the time of the case study is unclear although it states that she was 16 when she began wearing the veil, The decision to wear the veil was hers and she felt that far from being an oppressive experience the veil allowed her freedoms that she had previously been denied. Marayam an Algerian woman living in France who is referred to as middle aged, she too stated that wearing the veil did not infringe on her freedom but allowed her to progress unhindered. Fatima a vegetable seller in Cairo in her late 70’s she believed that the veil was a restriction and that the decision as to whether to wear the veil or not should be one of personal choice not law. The study implies that the ‘trend ‘ of wearing the veil is a backlash against western society and its cultural implications; it is viewed among the younger women as a form of liberation rather than oppression. The study was very small scale and cannot therefore be generalised to Muslim women, it takes no account of women forced into wearing the veil by the patriarchal dominance of the Islamic religion. The study also shows how western interpretation of other religions and cultures can be restricted by western values and perceptions. It also shows that western sociologists must be aware of the meaning of the religion being studied to its believers. This study used unstructured interview techniques producing qualitative data and is written from a feminist interactionist perspective therefore there is a link between theory and method.

There are many reasons why people choose to follow a certain religion and many interpretations and theoretical approaches to the study of religion, each has it’s own merits and drawbacks but for the individual within society belief is a very personal thing as is the interpretation of the religious texts, rites, ceremonies, and method of practice. The way society views religion is based on the social, cultural and political climate within that society. It is wrong to put western norms and values on religions that have developed and evolved within other cultures without having a deep understanding of the religion itself.
S.McGonigal (2002)

The aim of this essay is to describe the ideological basis of the Republican and Democratic parties of the United States of America and provide an evaluation of their role in the legislative process. According to McKeever et al (1999) the founding fathers of the USA had little faith in political parties whom they regarded as selfishly seeking political power to satisfy their own ambition; furthermore the founding fathers regarded a political party with a majority support as tyrannical. Political parties were viewed as being divisive during a period in which, the fledgling United States’ greatest need was unity, (source: McKeever, Zvesper & Maidment, (1999), p 235). It was with this opinion in mind that the constitution was written, with its separation of powers and systems of checks and balances in place to hold all political parties in check whatever their aspirations. James Madison attempted to create what became known as a constitution against party political interests, but was deemed to have failed. Indeed by 1797 two political parties had emerged within the United States, the Federalists and the Jeffersonian Republicans.

The Early Federalists were supporters of Alexander Hamilton’s proposals for the promotion of commerce and the powers of Federal Government (1790-91). Those in opposition to these proposals were called the Republicans. Republicans led by James Madison and Thomas Jefferson viewed the ideologies of the Federalists as being a return to the centralised power base, which promoted “the interests of the wealthy at the expense of ‘the common man’,”(McKeever, Zvesper & Maidment, (1999), p236).
This initial party system had a brief role in American politics and party politics dissipated for a period between 1816 –1828 after which a new political party emerged under the leadership of General Jackson; this party was named the Democratic Party.

The Democratic Party sought the support of newly enfranchised voters, immigrants and those of the lower classes. Tailoring its ideologies towards the needs of the people and not business. This is illustrated by events in 1832, when Jackson vetoed the Recharter Bill, a bill that sought to renew the charter of the National Bank. Jackson accepted that there would always be differences between the wealthy and the common man but saw no reason in giving the wealthier members of society advantages which would allow them to secure more wealth and power at the expense of the ordinary citizen. The Democratic Party is anti-elitist in the sense that they support equality of opportunity for all, the creation of wealth without the creation of privilege for the wealthy. This party cannot therefore be classed as socialist even in the watered down European sense of participationary socialism, as opposed to revolutionary socialism, whose objectives are a communist utopia. The Democratic Party are pro capitalist, but not elitist, this being a major difference in the ideologies of the two political parties, whose other ideologies appear to be submerged in blurred grey areas rather than concrete black and white differences of political ideals. Neither Political Party appears to be locked into ideological boundaries, they remain free to pursue a more pragmatic approach should the need arise, similarly Political candidates appear to hold little allegiance to a partisan ideology therefore elections are candidate centred i.e. based more on the individual ideology and personality of the candidate than on any set agenda.
Following the Wall Street Crash of 1929, President Hoover a Republican refused to accept the need for social welfare policies referring to the system of the dole in the UK as the ‘English disease’, (McKeever, Zvesper & Maidment, (1999), p 241). For the Republican Party the traditional system of economic self-reliance and free enterprise was still the way forward, however some apparently socialist principles were adopted by the Democratic Party as a method of aiding the ailing American economy. It was Franklin D. Roosevelt who instigated this change in his party’s attitude he argued, “The country needs, and unless I mistake its temper, demands bold, persistent experimentation. It is sensible to take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something”, (McKeever, Zvesper & Maidment, (1999), p242). It was Roosevelt’s commitment to the ordinary man, the ‘underdog’ that brought about policies which strengthened the industrial base, the banking sector and the landowner, which in turn benefited those individuals in society who needed help. These policies helped change the way people had traditionally voted in the US, transferring the votes of many Negroes from the traditional ‘anti-slavery’ policies of the Republican Party to the ‘New Deal’ offered by the Democratic Party. This New Deal introduced policies of subsidising agriculture, job creation, support for Trade Unions and those they represented, social security packages for the infirm and the elderly and the end of Negroid exclusion from these benefits.
Traditionally the right wing conservative moral and foreign policies of the Republican Party are representative of most Americans and since the terrorist attack by Al Queda on the World Trade Centre there has been a greater shift towards these attitudes, as has been borne out by the recent elections to Congress. However American voters also prefer the social policies of the more centralised Democratic Party. Therefore American voters would appear to prefer a Republican executive and a Democratic Congress thus ensuring a balance of voters’ interests. However, since the events of September the eleventh it is clear to the observer that the American voter perceives the Republican Party as the Party of national security and places greater stress on the importance of this security. President Bush’s speeches in recent times repeat the words ‘homeland security’, creating the illusion that Republican Party is the only Party with the preservation of the safety of American citizens as it’s agenda, a message which the electorate appear to have swallowed wholeheartedly and in doing so have given President Bush carte blanche to pursue his foreign policies and war on terrorism. The Republican Party in common with the Conservative Party in the UK have traditionally portrayed themselves as being the Party of Law and Order, taking a tougher stance on related issues than their Democratic counterparts. However, the ideological lines of division on most issues are blurred, making the legislative process regarding most uncontroversial issues a straight forward process, Party members will more often than not be free to vote on each issue not having to toe a particular party line. Since the recent elections the executive wing of Government should find very little opposition to its policies simply because it has an overall majority in congress and the Whitehouse. Former Presidents have often found themselves with a minority in congress, a situation that the founding fathers probably thought ideal when they were writing the constitution, this conflict of party political interests would support the anti-tyrannical objectives that they were aiming to produce.

Although not an ideal political system, a two party system in the USA has emerged despite the best efforts of the founding fathers to produce a system free from party politics. The constitution could therefore be viewed as a failure in this aspect, it has however helped ensure that the two parties, which emerged within a system built on control and distribution of power among many different institutions, are not dependant on any particular ideology, but are free to adapt as American society and its citizens requires them to.

S.McGonigal(2002)

The aim of this essay is to explain the electoral process in the USA and to examine voting behaviour within the USA. When examining the electoral system in the USA it is necessary to remember that the framers of the constitution set out to prevent the rise of tyranny through the systems of checks and balances and the separation of the powers. When the founding fathers were devising a system for electing politicians they were equally aware that in order to avoid tyranny the electoral process would have to contain its own preventative measures. The founding fathers decided that the best method of doing this was to devise a system in which the separate institutions of power were elected by separate constituencies, involving separate electoral procedures (source: McKeever, Zvesper & Maidment, (1999), First Edition, p183).
This means that different people choose the representatives of different institutions at different times and using different methods. An election is the primary means a Modern democratic society has of determining who governs that society; there are different methods of electing a Government, e.g. proportional representation, and first past the post. The purpose of an election is to allow eligible voters within that society to select a candidate or party that he/she feels best represents their interests. Furthermore elections enable the political parties to evaluate public opinion concerning major issues and facilitate popular influence. Elections also promote accountability, a party or leader who does not do well by the electorate is unlikely to be returned to office and Americans are taught to equate participation in elections with citizenship.

The first system we will examine is the election of members to the House of Representatives. These elections are held every two years and are direct elections, i.e. those eligible to vote directly for the candidate they wish to hold office. The electorate are divided into small constituencies for the purposes of these elections, according to population, the idea being that each constituency or district holds roughly the same amount of voters, approximately 570,000 people per district (source for Figures: McKeever, Zvesper & Maidment, (1999), First Edition, p184).
However this method means that states with a high population appear to be over represented, while states with a small population appear to be under represented. California has a population of circa 29,760,000 and therefore has 52 representatives while Wyoming has a population of 454,000 and has only 1 representative, (Source for figures: McKeever, Zvesper & Maidment, (1999), First Edition, p841). The fact that the elections are held every two years ensures that the representatives keep in close touch with their districts, because if they lose touch with the district and the voters they would be unlikely to succeed should they choose to stand for re-election.
The idea of two year terms can be criticised because the representatives are likely to spend a lot of time electioneering compared to the time spent fulfilling the duties of their office, in addition to which it would be unsurprising if the electorate themselves did not suffer from voting fatigue at being asked to elect representatives on a two yearly basis. There have been calls within the USA for the terms to be extended to four years. The house of representatives appears to be subject to the whim and will of the general public than the other branches of Government within the USA therefore the founding fathers probably achieved their aims regarding the prevention of tyranny in this instance.

The next electoral process we will examine is that of the election of Senators to the Senate. The primary objective of the Senate is to represent the states rather than the electorate, therefore regardless of geographical size or population count each State is represented by two Senators. Each state votes as a whole entity and not in smaller constituencies. The Senate was not formed to represent the popular choice but to keep the popular choice in check, therefore it is necessary for Senators to distance themselves from the whim and will of the public, the founding fathers assisted this distancing by allowing senators a six year term in office. Originally there were no direct elections to the Senate, each state senator was appointed by the legislature, this was ratified by the 17th amendment in 1913 and as a result Senators are now directly elected. Elections to the senate are staggered, one third of Senators face elections every two yrs, this appears to be a fail safe introduced to ensure that even if the public is extremely discontented with the Senate, the effects this will have on the voting behaviour of the electorate will only affect one third of the Senate. However yet again frequent trips to polling stations could be a contributory factory to voter weariness within the USA today.

The final electoral process this essay will examine is that of the Presidential elections.
The process of electing the President differs from the process of electing members to the Senate and the House of Representatives; the President is elected to represent the Nation as a whole and not the interests of individual states or districts. It is for this reason that a National constituency elects the President i.e. a President is indirectly elected by the electoral colleges. The Presidential term in office is four years and each President is restricted to no more than two terms in office by the 22nd amendment to the US Constitution (1951). This is inline with the wishes of the founding fathers and their policy of the avoidance of tyranny and prevents a populist President from having a long term hold over all the institutions of power.
The Electoral College system prevents the states with small populations from continuously having a President imposed upon them by the states with high populations. The electoral College consists of electors chosen by different methods in different states, each elector is supposed to choose a candidate based on their own opinion of the various Presidential Candidates, however this system has emerged into one whereby the electoral college vote usually mirrors the popular vote in each state. The number of electors within each Electoral College is decided by adding the number of Senators from each state to the Number of representatives from each state therefore in California, which has two Senators and Fifty Two representatives the Electoral College consists of fifty-four electors. There is an exception to this rule the District of Columbia has 3 members of it’s electoral college. To secure the Presidency a candidate must win over half of the Electoral College votes, a minimum of Two Hundred and Seventy. A Presidential candidate does not need to win over half of the popular vote in order to secure a victory as can be seen from the elections in November 2000 and the election of President Clinton in 1992 when in spite of only securing 43% of the popular vote he secured 69% of the electoral college votes and was therefore elected into office, (Source for figures: McKeever, Zvesper & Maidment, (1999), First Edition, p188, Box 9.3). Presidential candidates therefore tend to concentrate on winning the state votes from those states with the largest concentration of population, thus securing the largest amount of Electoral College votes. The Electoral College uses a first past the post system, which favours a two party system of Politics therefore this puts any third party candidates at a disadvantage as can be illustrated by the 1992 elections, Ross Perot of the Reform Party secured 19% of the popular vote but failed to secure any one state and therefore no electoral college votes. In theory a third party candidate with some state votes could hold the balance of power providing that the other two candidates had an almost equal number of votes, the founding fathers ensured that if this were the case the House of representatives would then decide upon who becomes President, each state would hold just one vote in such circumstances regardless of the number of representatives from that state.

Presidential candidates are chosen at a nominating convention, which is held in the summer before the elections. The delegates to the nominating convention are chosen during the Primary and caucus elections. In a primary election each voter places their vote for the candidate they choose to be their Presidential candidate. At a caucus a meeting is held and the merits of each candidate are deliberated and discussed and the caucus decides as a single body whom to choose as their Presidential candidate. These methods can be either open – everybody registered may vote for any candidate from any party, or closed – only registered party members are eligible to vote for their party candidate. Yet again in the case of primaries and caucuses the larger the population of the state the more representatives there are attending. Each Presidential campaign lasts for a two-month period.

At the heart of every democracy lies the voting franchise; this has been fought for by different classes, races and women in democracies across the world. For many the right to vote is a treasured right, however within the USA some people have been disenfranchised, excluded from participating in democracy because of their race, sex, standard of literacy, criminal convictions etc. In today’s USA everyone over the age of 18 is eligible to vote with the exception of the insane and the criminal. Voting is not compulsory, the decision to vote or not rests with the individual and in recent elections the actual turn out has been less than 50% of those eligible to vote. Therefore less than 50% of Americans choose to use their only voice in the Government of their country, Hadley (1978) dubbed those who do not participate as ‘Boobus Americanus’, He was referring to a stereotype, poor, ill educated, disproportionately southern, female and black, (McKeever, Zvesper & Maidment, (1999), First Edition, p206). Teixeira (1987) argues that this stereotype accounts for only a small percentage of non- voters in today’s USA and therefore there must be other reasons for the decline of voter participation. In an attempt to encourage people to vote and to make the process of registering to vote simpler ‘The National Voter Registration Act 1993 was introduced, this meant that anytime a person applied for a change of address on their driving licence they could register to vote in addition to this disabled people and those receiving public assistance could register to vote at the agencies that deal with them, registration by mail was also permitted. Verification of the accuracy of the voter registrations takes place every four years. This act took care of the practicalities of registering to vote but did not halt the decline in participation. Research indicates that voter apathy is due more to the feeling that a vote doesn’t count in the American political system or that it doesn’t matter which party is in power because there is very little difference between the parties. It appears that American voters choose not to vote because they have lost faith in the political process due to many factors such as the Vietnam War and Watergate.
Of those that do vote their voting behaviour is not as bound by socio-economic factors as it is in the UK for example, traditional class votes. This is because Americans are not historically class conscious, however income and social status do play a part in how an American chooses to vote, the higher the income the more likely the person is to vote Republican, a similar picture emerges with regard to the standard of education an individual has achieved those who hold higher qualifications are likely to vote Republican. There are exceptions with regard to education with a significant number of those holding post-graduate qualifications voting Democrat (source: Mckeever, Zvesper & Maidment, (1999), First Edition, p213). Personal ideology is also a factor in deciding which way to vote just as it is in any other westernised democracy, those who feel themselves to be Liberal will vote for the Democrats, while those who perceive themselves to be Conservative will vote Republican. The Democratic Party also finds its supporters among social workers, blue-collar workers, union members, ethnic minorities and women (post 1960). The Republican Party supporters tend to be married people and men, people who favour low taxes and free enterprise and family values concerning morality. According to McKeever et al, a wealthy, Protestant, married, southern, white, male with a college degree is likely to vote Republican and an unmarried, black, female, union member of modest financial means who does not have a high school diploma is likely to vote Democrat (McKeever, Zvesper & Maidment, (1999), First Edition, p214).

As we can see the American electoral procedure is complicated and requires voters to go to the polling stations frequently compared to other Westernised Democracies, however people within the USA are less likely to vote than enfranchised people in other democratic nations. The reasons for this are many and varied and the USA is not alone is seeing a decline in active participation in elections by the electorate, this turn of events could be significant for many democracies as signalling a failure in trust in the system and the political parties and ideologies available. We can also see that although some stereotypes do emerge in relation to voting behaviour in the USA they are not as clear cut as they appear to be in the UK for example, possibly because the ideologies of the political parties blend together and are not polarised as they are in other nations. S.McGonigal (2002)

The aim of this essay is to examine both Marxism and Liberalism as political theories of the state and to make a comparison between the two theoretical perspectives showing similarities and differences. The way this will be approached is to give a general overview of theories of the state in a historical context and then examine Marxism in detail, followed by Liberalism and then conclude the essay with the comparison.

What is a ‘state’? The word ‘state’ is used in politics to mean an area with defined geographical boundaries that shares a political system, a Government and a civil society, which includes organised permanent institutions and behavioural practices. In a democracy the Government is not the state, it is merely a tool of the state, as are the military forces, the police force, the legal structures such as the courts, the educational structures, Parliament and the civil service, (Source: Robertson D, (1993), pages 444-445).
Early forms of state can be traced back to ancient Greece, to Plato and to his pupil Aristotle. Plato and Aristotle used the word Polis as meaning a state. It is from the word Polis that the word Politics itself is derived. To both Plato and Aristotle a main constituent of being a human being was to live in a polis, according to Aristotle ‘Man is by nature a political animal’, (Redhead B, (1995), page 30), what Aristotle meant by this was that Man is political i.e. the inhabitant of a polis. A polis was a small self-contained state centralised around a city, but including agricultural lands. Being a citizen of the polis was of far greater importance than being Greek, Political men had a strong loyalty to their polis, the ideology of the polis was that participation in the life of the polis gave the citizens moral development, organised religion, provided culture and as such it was the duty of every citizen to participate in the life of the polis, citizens of the polis placed great importance on their collective bond and their shared identity, (Source: Robertson D, (1993), pages 380-381). When examining the type of state Plato envisaged it becomes apparent that some of his ideas have influenced the way modern states are set up, Plato decided that the widest possible distribution of power was a way of preventing tyranny, the separation of powers in the USA could be argued to be a modern example of this, Plato however thought that the best system for state rule was that of a monarchy and this is a system that was rejected by the founding fathers as they viewed monarchies as being tyrannical. Plato also decided that isolation was the best way for a state to exist and survive as he argued there are only two kinds of relationships between states, either they are at war or they are not, thus for Plato for any state to exist it needed to be self sufficient and isolationist, (source: Redhead B, (1995), page27).
Aristotle’s ideas on how a polis should be ruled was based on the notion that all hitherto constitutions were imperfect because whether a tyrannis, an oligarchia or a demokratia system of rule was in place, each system would serve the interests of those in control and not the interests of every citizen of the polis. Aristotle’s conclusion was that a mix of oligarchia and demokratia would best serve the interests of the citizens of the polis; he called this mix ‘polity’. Polity rule was based on economics; it would serve the interests of the majority those who were neither extremely rich nor extremely poor, those who we refer to today as the middle classes, (source: Redhead B, (1995), pages 40-44). Again similarities to modern day politics can be seen here, as many political parties move towards the centre away from their right wing and left wing roots, so as to be representative of the middle classes. Later political theorists and philosophers drew from the work of Aristotle, such as Machiavelli and John Locke, however Hegel, the tutor of Karl Marx and Marx himself who declared Aristotle to be a ‘giant thinker’, (Redhead B, (1995), page 43) were probably the most influenced by his works. This becomes apparent when we examine Aristotle’s views on property ownership. According to Aristotle ‘ The households property is a collection of tools for living and so there is a limit on how much it should possess: more that what is needed to live a plain, simple, moral and civilised life is un-natural excess, and to be avoided’, (Redhead B, (1995), pages 36-37), thus to Aristotle to accumulate property for its own sake and the pursuit of profit are immoral, which is an idea that permeates the works of Marx.

‘Marxism is a general label to attach to any social theory that can claim a vague philosophical derivation from the works of Karl Marx’, (Robertson D, (1993), P305). Marxism in common with Aristotelian theories of state has its roots in economics. Economics control both political and cultural phenomena. Inequality in economic circumstances is for Marx the root of all of the problems and according to Marx; capitalism is (in this epoch) the perpetuator of this economic inequality, the system that makes the rich richer and the poor poorer. Marx thus theorised that a series of events would eventually lead to the end of economic inequality and that a new utopia, in which all men are equal (economic status), would be born. It is this series of events that makes up the Marxist theory of State. Central to this theory is the abolition of private property, however not the property acquired by a man through the fruits of his own labour, as Marx states quite clearly ‘the property of the petty bourgeoisie and that of the small peasant? There is no need to abolish that; the development of industry has to a great extent already destroyed it, and is still destroying it daily’, (Marx & Engels (1888 edition), p18).
Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels collaborated on a major piece of political theory published in 1848 and translated into English in 1888 by Samuel Moore; this major work bears the title ‘ The communist Manifesto’ and is recognised as being an outstanding work in the field of political ideology, although heavily criticised as being unworkable by those who harbour both political and personal affections for capitalism. The manifesto begins with the words ‘The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles. Freeman and slave, patrician and plebeian, lord and serf, guild master and journeyman, in a word, oppressor and oppressed stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on an uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that each time ended, either in revolutionary reconstitution of society at large, or in the common ruin of the contending classes’ (Marx & Engels, (1888 edition), p3). This illustrates Marx’s dialectic view of history. Marx divided history into epochs and saw that throughout history there had been a struggle between the classes, he proposed that there were 5 epochs each based on a different mode of production and that the conflict that existed was between the owners of the means of production and those who owned only their labour. According to Marx pre 1500AD was the epoch of Feudalism, from 1500AD to 1750AD was the epoch of Mercantilism and from 1750AD to the present day is the epoch of Capitalism, Marx theorised that 2 further epochs are to come that of Socialist Revolution and finally a Global Communist Utopia, which would see the withering away of the state as it would become unnecessary, given that economic inequalities and thus conflict would no longer exist, however in order to achieve this objective there can be no limits on the power of the socialist state that is in control as a result of the revolution, a powerful state mechanism is necessary to overthrow capitalism and achieve a global communist utopia.
In The Communist Manifesto, Marx and Engels explain that Capitalism has divided the population into two camps the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, the bourgeoisie are the owners of the means of production, they own the factories and the land and they allow the proletariat to work in these factories and on the land in return for a wage, which the proletariat need in order to buy shelter and food for survival, thus in order to survive proletarians must work for the bourgeoisie. The bourgeoisie are however not humanitarian benefactors; their aim is the pursuit of profit, for profits sake, the accumulation of wealth at the expense of their workforce. According to Marx this system is designed to keep the poor in poverty, to ensure a supply of labour for the factories of the bourgeoisie. Today we can apply this to not only factories but to all the variations of workplace that exist, anyone who does not own the business they work for is the proletariat in a modern day capitalist society. Class divisions and antagonisms exist today in even greater proliferation than they did at the time Marx was writing. Marx pointed out that capitalist society is designed to keep the bourgeoisie in power and that social policies are mere tokens to the workforce to prevent revolt, illusionary devices that prevent the proletariat from realising their true situation that of the oppressed and thus develop a single class consciousness, which would motivate them to rise up and overthrow the capitalist system. Marx makes the point that ‘ The advance of industry, whose involuntary promoter is the bourgeoisie, replaces the isolation of the labourers, due to competition, by their revolutionary combination, due to association. The development of Modern industry, therefore, cuts from under its feet the very foundation on which the bourgeoisie produces and appropriates products. What the bourgeoisie therefore, produces, above all, is its own grave-diggers. Its fall and the victory of the proletariat are equally inevitable’, (Marx & Engels, (1888 edition), pages 15 & 16). Marx is theorising that Capitalism is by its very nature the creator of its own destruction because, manufacturing requires factories and people who work in factories have contact with others in their own situation, greed and competition require more and even bigger factories to produce more goods for the market thus allowing more people contact with each other both at work and in the towns and cities that grow up around the factories, this will eventually mean that the dissatisfaction of the oppressed worker becomes the dissatisfaction of all oppressed workers who will then through communication, develop a class consciousness and revolt against the oppressors. The manifesto then becomes involved in the politics of how communists will build the road to a communist utopia. Marx theorises that communists, operating within the existing political structures, will represent all members of the proletariat with no separate interests, the singular objective being to develop the class-consciousness and eventually overthrow bourgeoisie supremacy and the conquest of political power by the proletariat. Marx theorises that this will be a global action and not an action in isolation, thus communism the way Marx envisaged has yet to occur. Marx argues that ‘working men have no country’ and as such it is natural for all working men to work together for a global utopia, ‘where exploitation of one individual by another will be (also) put to an end’, (Marx & Engels (1888 edition) p23), and just as the exploitation of one man by another is ended so will the exploitation of one nation by another and in direct relation to the end of the class hostility within separate nations, so hostility from nation to nation will end allowing for global communism. The first step in this communist revolution is the proletariat organising themselves as the ruling class and in advanced countries Marx theorises that the changes will develop along the following lines, land will be expropriated and the rent from all lands will be put to use for public purposes, taxation will become progressively heavier, inheritance rights will be abolished, all property of immigrants and rebels will be confiscated, credit will be centralised in the hands of the state, transportation will be centralised in the hands of the state, the means of production will be put in to the hands of the state and extended, wasteland will be cultivated, everyone in the new society will be equally liable for labour, on the land and in the factories, agriculture and industry will become combined and thus lessen the differences between town and country and free education in all schools and the end to child labour. In the present day some of these developments have taken place in westernised societies on the whole, there is no longer any child labour and there is no charge for education at a state school in most countries. However for a Marxist these concessions such as free state education are obscuring the true reality of the class oppression, and as such perpetuate the capitalist system.
Marx encourages all socialists, communists and those opposed to capitalism to rise up and fight the bourgeoisie as he so aptly says ‘ The proletarians have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to win.’(Marx & Engels (1888 edition), p39). The idea of a world where the pursuit of profit no longer exists and where everyone works for the good of everyone else is according to the ruling classes in today’s capitalist system, unworkable, but perhaps they mean unthinkable, after all they have the most to lose!

The next theory of state that this essay will examine is that of liberalism, liberalism can probably trace its roots back to Hobbes and Locke, Paine and Smith, Calvin, Rousseau, Voltaire, Mill and Hume and other enlightened thinkers, philosophers and men of religion.
From Hobbes, the author of the Leviathan, we are given the notion that all men have a right to protect themselves and they must be free to protect themselves in any manner and that any man who hurts another in an incident not concerned with self-preservation is acting immorally, and finally all men are their own judges, as to what actually constitutes self-preservation. This led Hobbes to believe that all men would naturally distrust one another and therefore Hobbes concluded that if this is really how things are then the natural state of everyman is war. Therefore men who could rationalise would willingly give up their rights to decide for themselves over any uncertainty, give up their power of judgement concerning their preservation to a ‘sovereign man or institution’, (Redhead B, (1995), p 105), this would be the only area of judgement they did not retain. The state/Monarch therefore becomes the instrument of decision in such matters the state had no ideological basis and could therefore remain neutral in such matters. Next in this examination of the liberalist theory of state, is John Locke author of the politically acclaimed work the Two Treatises of Government. Locke’s work influenced many political structures that exist today in the Western World. Locke based his work on the Laws of Nature as he saw them, a set of rules given by God to the world he had created. He believed that the salvation of every man and woman is their own affair and that Governments should not legislate over such matters, he believed that people who do not believe in God are a ‘source of hazard to their human fellows, a civil bad in themselves, because they cannot have firm rational grounds for acting morally’, (Redhead, B, (1995), p112), in other words he believed that all morality stemmed from Christian belief in the next life and this is what makes men rational. Locke believed that all men are created equally and that it is how the individual chooses to live their life that creates inequality. On this basis Locke formed his thoughts on Government power and the restriction of that power, what the aims of the powers are for and who should check on this power and decide if it should be extended. Locke drew attention to the fact that the avoidance of tyranny is important when deciding on how governments should operate, Locke proposes that Governments should serve the civil interests of the people and give them protection from harm against their lives, their freedoms, their property and their rights. Government should prevent one person or a group of people interfering in the interests of others. Locke decided that there are 2 forms of Government, legitimate Government, those who rule by consent and illegitimate Government, those who have taken power by force, he declares that illegitimate Governments do not have political authority over the people, ergo authority to govern comes from the consent of the governed. Locke viewed legitimate political power as a trust, derived from a contract between the members of society and elected representatives, elected according to their own best judgement, thus they elect a government they can trust, (source: Redhead B, (1995), p115). Locke is insists that a Government must contain a legislature where laws can be made and undone, as situations and times change, this legislature should consist of elected representatives of the people. Locke also commented that on matters of taxation there must be a clear separation between the rights of the individual over their property and of the Governments rights to raise funds through taxation to provide defence for the nation against enemies. The Governments right to tax is wholly dependant on the consent of an elected legislature. Locke’s work influenced the structure of American politics greatly. According to Redhead (1995) Locke’s work in devising a political structure concerned with property rights is the basis for modern doctrines, which either advocate the private ownership of property or oppose it i.e. the liberal theory of free market exchange and the socialist theory of the sale of labour, (source: Redhead B, (1995), p117).
The purpose of Locke’s work is apparently to legitimise the opposition of the people to a sovereign who had lost their trust, and thus enable them to form a Government and thus a system of rule in which they did trust. And so to a great leap forward in time, how do the theories and thoughts of the enlightened philosophers and free thinkers of history translate into the modern day liberal state?
The most important characteristic of the liberal theory of the state is the doctrine of jurisdiction. In layman’s terms it is the idea that there is such a thing as a limited area of power and authority for the state, beyond, which, it is improper for the state to trespass. The liberal theory of the state emphasises that the state is not superior to other institutions, it is not however an inferior institution, but can be so when other institutions have a special competence in a specialised field i.e. in respect of defining moral values it is the Church who is superior, in respect of health matters it is the NHS, (in the UK), that has superiority. The state is simply one institution among many institutions all of which have a special competence, and the state should not enter into the sphere of competence of other institutions. The liberal theory of the state also emphasises that the state ought to respect the fault principle i.e. The state ought not to punish or inflict any detriment upon any man except on the basis of his fault, strict liability being applicable in exceptional circumstances. The state ought not to reward those who are blameworthy for their blameworthiness. The state ought not otherwise promote blameworthy conduct or attach disincentives to virtuous conduct in any way. If these principles were observed within the welfare sector, that sector would be structured very differently. Welfare would be restricted to the genuinely needy. The liberal theory of the state recognises and demands the supremacy of law and adherence to established, proper procedures, giving society legal precedence, what has already been decided in law is applicable to other legal situations, as it has become established. The liberal theory of the state also emphasises that the power of the state ought to be divided between many separate institutions, decentralisation, which is an important consideration, to prevent tyranny and corruption. As Lord Acton said, "Power corrupts: absolute power corrupts absolutely. The positive liberal theory of the state arises out of the problem of the preservation of liberty. Liberalism does not propose an absolute state but places individual liberty as of much greater importance, however this leaves the liberalist theory open to threats from anarchy within the state. Liberalism affirms moral values and opposes relativism and does not succumb to the false dogma of moral neutrality. The modern state greatly exceeds the original liberal ideal of limited government as it impinges on the rights of the individual. The motivating factor is that of economic efficiency and not appreciation of the importance of individual liberty and limited government (source: http://www.ourcivilisation.com/cooray/btof/chap162.htm).

Both these theories of state recognise that initially the state is contained within a defined set of geographical borders containing their own national set of governing bodies and institutions, however for the Marxist the object is to abolish these borders and create a global communist utopia, whereas for the liberals the object is to make the nation state secure from interference from other nations, with the exception of free trade. A liberal state demands the separation of powers and a system of checks and balances that provides a system of government with limited powers. The Marxists however do not advocate such a system, for the Marxist the state must be able to interfere in every aspect of life, it must be a singular body in which control of all of the institutions of power are placed to enable the proletariat to overthrow the bourgeoisie. Liberals emphasise the rights of the individual, Marxists emphasise the rights of the collective proletariat. Liberals advocate the pursuit of profit for its own sake, Marxists find such pursuits intolerable. The right to private property is also an area of contention between Liberalism and Marxism, Marxists believe that an individual has the right to own only that which is necessary for the survival of the individual, enough but not excess, enough to live and provide for oneself but not enough to employ another, to make profit from the labour of another man is immoral, Marxists advocate economic equality and abolishment of class. Liberals however believe that each man has the right to own as much as he can, even at the expense of others, and that he has the right to allow others to inherit the property he has accrued during his lifetime, thus securing better life chances and economic prosperity for his own and perpetuating his own class. Liberalism believes that the state is a necessary evil to prevent man from being evil and brutish, Marxism believes that they must operate within the existing state in order to secure its demise and thus ensure equality, they do not view man as being brutish and evil in the equality of a communist utopia, because free from oppression, man will have no need of such qualities.
S.McGonigal (2002)

Bibliography

Marx Karl, Capital, (1867), Oxford University Press (1999), Oxford

Marx Karl & Friedrich Engels, The communist Manifesto, (1888 edition), Oxford University Press (1998), Oxford.

Morrison Ken, Marx, Durkheim, Weber, Formations of Modern Social Thought, (2001), Sage publications Ltd, London

Redhead Brian, Plato to Nato, Studies in Political Thought, (1995), Penguin Books Ltd, London.

Robertson David, Penguin Dictionary of Politics, (1993), Penguin Books Ltd, London

http://www.ourcivilisation.com/cooray/btof/chap162.htm

Introduction

The aim of this report is to examine drug crime within Britain. The report makes extensive use of Home Office Research Studies available on the Home Office web site, http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk; therefore any statistics included in this report are more likely to represent England & Wales. According to the British Crime Survey 2001/2002 the prevalence of drug use in England and Wales for illicit Drug use is 12% of all 16-59 yr olds, (http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs2/r182.pdf), this means that 12% of that population sample have indulged in a criminal activity. The finances involved in the illicit drugs trade are far greater than the budget available to police such matters therefore it is difficult for the police to control, let alone eradicate this problem. Drug usage is responsible for all kinds of other criminal activity, recently in the USA the Government has criticised drug users for indirectly financing terrorist activities, other crimes that are common place among drug users are crimes of violence, such as muggings and burglary, which help to finance the users habit.
The drugs this report refers to as illicit drugs are; amphetamines, cannabis, cocaine, crack, ecstasy, heroin, LSD, magic mushrooms, Methadone, tranquillisers, amyl nitrate, anabolic steroids and glues.
According to the 2001/2002 British Crime Survey the most prevalent drug used is Cannabis with an estimated 3 million users between the ages of 16 – 59 in the year 2001/2002, that is 11% of the age group in England and Wales (Aust R, Sharp C & Goulden C, (2001-2002), Findings 182, BCS). This section of the British Crime Survey found a decrease in the usage of amphetamines, LSD, Magic Mushrooms and Steroids among the same age group since 1998, and no change in the usage of class A drugs for the same period, the same survey found what is referred to as a ‘significant increase in the use of cocaine, crack and ecstasy for the same period, that is since 1998. These findings also maintain that the ease of access to drugs within society is closely tied to the patterns of use, with cannabis being the easiest illicit drug to obtain, followed by ecstasy, amphetamines and cocaine. The strategy of the British Government is to ‘ reduce the use of class A drugs and the frequent use of any illicit drug among all young people under the age of 25 especially by the most vulnerable young people’, (Aust R, Sharp C & Goulden C, (2001-2002) BCS findings 182, p2), the reason for which is to reduce ‘the harm that drugs cause to society, including communities, individuals and their families’, (Aust R, Sharp C & Goulden C (2001-2002) BCS Findings 182, p2). Various agencies are involved in tackling drug crime through prevention, treatment, education and deterrence these include the various Police Forces, the Prison Service, the National Probation Service, the National Treatment Agency, the Youth Justice Board, the Social Exclusion Unit and HM Customs and Excise. In Scotland the Drugs Enforcement Agency, which has a budget of £10 Million over 2 years is dedicated to making an impact on the amount of illicit drugs on the streets, and thus reducing specific drug use and drug related crimes, given the scale of the problem and the money to be made by the criminal fraternity, this budget appears almost insignificant. The drugs clock contained in appendix (i) of this report shows the amount of money spent by both federal and state Governments tackling the drug problem it also shows the relatively small number of arrests and convictions which involve incarceration, in relation to the budget. For Police forces the budgetary requirements to tackle the trade and use of illicit drugs is too large for it to be viable so the actual amount spent is akin to a dripping tap being used to fill a swimming pool, therefore the resources available to the police have very little impact on the availability of illicit drugs on the streets. David Blunkett, the home secretary, has increased the budget for tackling drugs problems to £1,026 billion for this financial year to £1,244 billion in the next financial year rising to approximately £1.5 billion by 2005. Much of this money will be targeted at drug treatment programmes as the British Government searches for new strategies to combat illicit drugs usage and thus reduce drug related crimes. (Http://www.drugs.gov.uk/News/PressReleases/1038909859)___##1##___ Criminological Theories

Criminology is concerned with drug abuse not only because the acts of using, possessing, selling, trafficking and producing certain substances are illegal acts in themselves, but because of the wider implications of drug usage, the crimes associated with drugs, those that exist to support a drug users habit such as burglary, muggings, shoplifting etc, Chaiken & Chaiken (1991) believe that most drug related crime is against property and can be classified as non violent property offences, Pearson (1991) backs this idea stating that there is no clear proof of an increase in non-acquisitive crimes, Plant (1990) links drugs to prostitution ( Source: Williams (2001) 4th edition, P259). There are many other crimes connected to drugs such as money laundering, gun crimes, acts of violence, even murder, as well as crimes connected with the effects the drug has on the user such as altered perception, behavioural changes and mental or physical breakdown. Hammersley et al (1989) drew the conclusion from extensive research in Scotland that the criminal activity a person indulges in pre drug usage is a predictor of criminal activity that an individual will indulge in once an individual uses drugs (Source: Williams (2001), 4th edition, P259).
Drugs have not always been illegal commodities, in the past Great Britain has fought wars for the right to trade opium in China. The first anti drug legislation in the United Kingdom was the Dangerous Drugs Act of 1920 and in the USA (1914), according to Toch (1966) the anti drugs laws actually increased the rate of addiction some 1500% in the USA between 1914 & 1918 (source: Williams, (2001), 4th Edition, P259).

As early as 384-322 BC Aristotle linked learning to association i.e. that certain behaviours are learned from others, drug taking like many behaviours has been explained as learning by example from drug users. However once an individual has learned how to use a drug, the individual learns that the act of using the drug brings with it a reward, the high experienced by drug users and so it can be argued that operant conditioning plays a major role in the area of drug abuse. Operant conditioning is a psychological theory developed by Skinner (1938) in relation to drug abuse the user initially tries a drug, the drug produces a high, a pleasant experience, the reward, the drug user learns that this feeing can only be obtained by using the drug and thus re uses, the eventual effect of this is that the drug user invariably begins to use drugs in larger and larger quantities in order to achieve that initial high experience, chasing reward for his actions, a psychological addiction has then been established, with the use of some types of drugs this can lead to a physical addiction.
This psychological theory in conjunction with the theory of differential association Edwin H. Sutherland (1939) can be used to explain drug usage. The theory of Differential Association states that criminal activity is learned by association with others in a deviant subculture. As early as 1843 Tarde theorised that people imitated others within a group and the closer the group the greater the imitation, the world of the drug user is because of it’s illegality often a close knit community, where the buying, selling and taking of drugs often takes place within a group setting. A new member of the group will learn by imitation how to prepare the drugs and how to consume them, they will usually learn from other drug users which drugs are ‘safe’ what alternatives there are, how to use other drugs and much other information and misinformation relating to drugs and criminal activity associated with drugs. Thus by associating with other drug users the novice learns how to become an ‘expert’ drug user.
Glaser (1956) conceived the theory of differential anticipation which states that ‘behaviour depends upon expectations’ (Williams, (2001), 4th edition, P282), this theory is based on an individuals perception of what to expect by indulging in certain behaviours i.e. punishment or reward. For the majority of people the law itself is a deterrent to criminal activity, however in relation to drugs use this does not appear to be the case. It is common knowledge that certain drugs are illegal and yet this illegality does not appear to work as a preventative measure for everyone. Fear is often cited as a preventative measure and thus successive Governments have played to the ‘ dangerous’ aspects of drug use as a deterrent, however once an individual has used a drug for the first time, such as an ecstasy tablet and they have found that the effects of using the drug are pleasurable and that there was no immediate threat to their lives or general well being the ‘punishment’ aspect of the behaviour has been proven to be false, ergo the punishment aspect of the law itself may be as false as the Governments’ anti drugs message which conveys the ‘danger’ message. The punishment has been eradicated in the mind of the drug user and all that is left is the pursuit of the pleasure/reward, therefore the novice drug user continues to abuse drugs. Differential reinforcement theory can also be used to explain drug abuse, according to Gove & Wilmoth (1990) there is an ‘internal biological system that rewards operant behaviours, and that this system does not simply reflect external reinforcement processes’ (Williams, (2001), 4th Edition, p285). This theory is valuable when attempting to understand drug abuse; the neurological rewards or internal reinforcers produced by the drug outweigh the external negative reinforcers such as threat of prison or a criminal record.

Social learning theories are also of value when examining drug abuse these theories combine differential reinforcement with operant learning and cognitive learning a leading exponent of this theory is Bandura (1973, 1977 & 1986). The theory states that in addition to operant learning the individual gains reinforcement from watching others indulge in the same or similar behaviour, in addition to which the individual also gains self-reinforcement by achieving their objective, in the case of the drug user having watched others and learned by imitation and association and achieved the pleasurable reward, the user takes pleasure in watching others commit the same act.

Matza & Sykes (1957) & Matza (1964 & 1969) developed the theory of delinquency, the main theme of which is drift, basically this theory explains that people drift in and out of crime at different times in their lives by choice and that during adolescence there is a greater drift towards crime and that by the time people reach their 20’s they have drifted back into non criminal activity. The empirical statistics contained in this report show quite clearly that drug use among adolescents is far greater than that of any other age group. Therefore this theory is of value when examining adolescent drug abuse, it does not explain why large numbers of people continue to use drugs into adulthood. Again we can look to how the Government chooses to educate youngsters about drugs by emphasising the dangers associated with drug abuse, once the adolescent has tried the drugs and found that he/she did not die, jump off of tall buildings, become insane etc their whole outlook with regards to drugs has changed, they have experienced something pleasurable with little or no side effects, the adolescent then questions the validity of the laws concerning drugs, they associate both the education concerning drugs and the Law with the Government and therefore if the Government has ‘lied’ with regards to the effects of drugs then their perception of the law is altered, they took the drug not only did they not die , they have not been caught by the law, no one was hurt, there is no damage, there are no victims only pleasure, this initial transgression often leads to further transgressions, if one law does not have an immediate negative impact then perhaps no law will have a negative impact.
Control theories examine both social controls such as the law and those who enforce the law, group norms etc and personal controls, how the individual resists participating in unacceptable or delinquent behaviours. Reckless (1967 &1973) describes this as a set of drives in conflict with one another, push and pull factors. The individual may be law abiding in one social setting and yet in another their personal boundaries are extended beyond the law, by peer pressure for example. Gottfredson & Hirschi (1990) concentrate on individual control, denying biological or genetic predispositions to crime and concentrating on socialisation factors. The theory rests of the individual assessing risk and reward in relation to their activity, therefore the individual assess the risks of drug taking against the reward of drug taking and makes a choice. In order for a person to begin taking drugs their perception of the reward must be greater than the perceived risk, this perception is influenced by many factors, information received from others who abuse drugs as to how it makes you feel, information formed as a result of education, family influences, peer group etc. It is up to the individual as to which arguments have the most validity as having never used drugs before the individual cannot make an informed choice, therefore it is social pressure & social control which will affect the level of personal control in the individual. This theory is of value when examining why people choose to take drugs for the first time and why they continue to use drugs once they have experienced the reward for themselves, however for some the initial experience with drugs is not rewarding and this theory does not explain why for people who have a bad experience with a drug the first time they may go on to take it again.

Anomie explains that breaking the law is part of normal behaviour for all of us at sometime in our lives and can be used to explain drug abuse because curiosity is a normal human behaviour and sometimes that curiosity can lead an individual to break the law, perhaps only once, just to try. Anomie is useful in explaining short-term drug abuse because it allows for that element of natural human behaviour.

Of the criminological theories examined with regards to drug abuse those concerned with differential reinforcement and differential association are probably of the greatest value when explored in conjunction with psychological theories of learning and addiction.
Strategies

In order to devise a strategy to combat the drugs problem the Government and its agencies must examine several areas in the world of the drug user and the drug supplier, the deviant sub culture that exists within society. The various agencies and researchers who examine this topic must take many different social, economic, legal, psychological and political equations into account before they can begin to devise new ways to tackle this criminal problem. Patterns of Drug use among different ages groups change from time to time, perhaps because the older the individual the less likely he/she is to experiment with illicit drugs, unless addicted, in addition to which as was mentioned in the introduction, the availability of illicit drugs dictates the patterns of use.
The current approach to the prevention of drug misuse in the UK appears to be a disjointed uncoordinated affair, there are several agencies attempting to tackle the problem from very different angles, Mr Blunkett is attempting to shift the emphasis from prevention to treatment, which is perhaps a more logical approach given that many police forces spend a lot of police hours and a great deal of their budget attempting to prevent the illicit drugs reaching the end user. It appears that no matter how much money the Governments allocates the Police forces they seem to be fighting a losing battle, they are attempting to combat what for the crime syndicates is a very lucrative business, they are all to ready to supply their product when the users demand it. The profits to be made from the supply of drugs are overwhelming for those at the pinnacle of the drugs business. The drug dealers on the street often make small profit margins from the sale of their wares, the supplier from whom they buy is the next link in the chain, similar to pyramid selling the more dealers you have selling for you the bigger the profit to be made, the man at the top is often a ‘business man’ who has no actual dealings with the drug itself but is merely an importer/exporter of a product, and with the sums of money involved in this illegal trafficking, the ‘business man’ or his associates will commit further crimes, often of violence to protect his interests. Unlike the Police force and Government agencies, the criminal underworld has no legitimate rules or regulations to obey therefore they are able to use every trick in the book to ensure that their product reaches the customer, where as the police forces who are trying to combat the problem are bound by laws.

Suppliers of illicit drugs have very little to do with the actual product and therefore are unconcerned with the quality of their product and because the product itself is illegal there are no government controls on the content, purity and strength, therefore the drug user takes a huge risk with his /her life whenever they purchase a drug, there are no quality controls to ensure that what they are using has been made as safe as possible.

Due to the very nature of illicit drugs themselves, in that they tend to be addictive either psychologically or physically, drug users will often turn to criminal activities to fund their habit. If as Mr Blunkett is suggesting the emphasis is shifted from prevention to treatment then perhaps the drug related crimes at this end of the sphere will begin to fall, which will free police resources so that they can tackle other crimes.

There is an argument for the legalisation of illicit drugs, it is controversial, however there is validity in many of the arguments. As things are at the moment in the UK it is very difficult to obtain true figures relating to drug abuse, most studies carried out rely on self reporting and therefore true figures cannot be verified, the social stigma of indulging in a criminal activity also prevents true figures from being accurately collected and collated. This means that research is often based on estimates (see table 2, appendices (iii), (iv) & (V)) those who campaign for the wholesale legalisation of drugs argue that:
a) Accurate records could be kept regarding the scale of drug usage in the UK.
b) The quality of the merchandise would be subject to government legislation, as it is for the pharmaceutical companies in the UK.
c) Drug paraphernalia would be more accessible to the user and therefore cut the risk of HIV infection for drug users.
d) Drugs could be subject to tax in a similar way to cigarettes and alcohol and thus raise revenue for treatment programmes within the NHS.
e) Police would have greater effect in other areas of crime because their resources would not have to cover the ‘crimes’ of drug supply and abuse.
f) The drug industry would not be profitable for criminals to indulge in and
Therefore the old perception of the drug pusher offering someone something a bit ‘harder’ and usually addictive, when their usual drug is not available, would be gone, so the true path of how and why people use drugs could be studied with much more accuracy.
f) The social stigma associated with drug abuse could become a thing of the past and therefore more drug users may seek treatment for their problems, without fear of reprisal from society or the law.

Arguments against the legalisation of drugs are:
a) If youngsters see that drugs are legal they may think that it is safe and ok to use them.
b) There will still be criminal activity associated with drug supply just as there is a black market trade in cigarettes and alcohol to avoid VAT, it would be the same for drugs.
c) There would be people who would never have tried drugs because of the deterrent effect of the law, trying them because it is legal.
d) It would put a greater strain on the NHS & Social work departments.
e) People would start using at an earlier age.
f) HIV may spread faster
g) There would be more deaths related to drugs than there are currently because it is legal people presume drugs are safe.

The whole question relating to the legalisation of drugs is a political minefield and only through research into the effects of drug use on a personal and social level can any sort of compromise be reached. However most people concerned with the issue of drugs do agree that some kind of radical change is necessary because current strategies appear to have little affect. According to the BCS there are approximately 4 million users of drugs in England and Wales between the ages of 16 –59 yr olds, this clearly illustrates that people can obtain illegal drugs and do use them and therefore current policies need to be adapted in order for the situation to change. Table 2 (see appendix (iii)(iv) & (v)) illustrates the estimated drug usage for England and Wales and is extracted from the BCS findings 182, according to these estimates the best estimate for the use of amphetamines among 16-59 year old is 492,000 of these it is estimated that 282,000 are in the age group 16-24 year olds, for cannabis the best estimated usage is 3,293,000 of 16-59 year olds of which 1,525,000 are in the 16-24 age range. Although it is stated in the BCS 2001/2002 that the abuse of glues has declined within the 16-24 age group the figure of 34,000 (best estimate for that age group) still accounts for the majority of those abusing Glues the total best estimate for the abuse of glue is 45,000. This age group 16-24 year olds accounts for the majority of class A drug users, best estimate for this age range is 499,000 from a total best estimate of 1,007,000, the BCS detected a statistically significant rise in levels of class A drug usage for the 16-24 age range during the period 2001/2002. The Government has therefore decided to target the 18-24 age group, hoping to reduce class A drug usage in this category. Compared to the 1998 BCS there appears to be a statistically significant drop in the usage of amphetamines, LSD, Magic Mushrooms and steroids but during the same time frame other drugs have increased in popularity, possibly this is due to a wider availability, these drugs are cocaine, ecstasy, crack and class A drugs. The prevalence estimates however show that in the last year 2001-2002 there has been a decrease in the use of amphetamines, crack, heroin, LSD, magic mushrooms and steroids but a statistically significant increase in the use of ecstasy. This move from stimulants and hallucinants could possibly be due to the cheaper supplies and wider availability of cocaine and ecstasy. Over all the most commonly used illicit drug in all age groups is Cannabis. The mean age for first time use of cannabis is 15.5 compared with the mean age of 18 for cocaine usage, in the 16-24 age group. Again, the ease by which individuals can access an illicit drug is probably the over riding factor in which drug is used first, with cannabis being sited as being the most easily accessible substance.

The role of the prison and probation services is to execute court sentences, reduce re-offending and protect the public; they are therefore in the frontline with regards to drug crime. Many prisoners who come before the courts and enter the penal system have a drug habit and therefore as part of the remit to reduce re-offending they are required to treat the drug habits of the inmates and prevent drugs entering the prisons.
In 1998 the Prison Service Drugs Strategy was introduced as part of the National Drugs Strategy. All prisons now provide Counselling, Assessment, Referral Advice Throughcare services known as CARATs, since the programme was initiated the prison service has undertaken 37,000 assessments and over 3000 prisoners have entered drug rehabilitation programmes, a further 30,000 having undertaken detoxification programmes. More than 17,000 prisoners have signed up for the voluntary drugs testing scheme and all prisons now have mandatory drugs tests.
Post release hostels have been introduced for those prisoners with long histories of drug abuse, their aim is to help these prisoners who have been through the detoxification and rehabilitation programmes, to prevent them falling back into the lifestyle they led prior to incarceration. In an attempt to reduce the circulation of drugs within the prison environment new measures relating to visiting rights have been introduced with persistent drug smugglers being placed on closed visits only.
( source: http//www.Drugs.gov.uk)
The probation service attempts to reduce re-offending rates among prisoners on probation in their own communities by tackling the drug problem there. This role is aimed at those prisoners who have committed crimes over an extensive period to fund their drug habits. This is done by imposing a drug treatment and testing order on the individual as part of their probation. This work is carried out by drug action teams, whose aim is to get these individuals access to treatment programmes, devised by the NPS these treatment programmes use cognitive behavioural therapy techniques and are known as Addressing Substance Related Offending (ASRO) and the Programme for Reducing Individual Substance Misuse (PRISM). The Probation service will also monitor and run the post release hostel scheme in conjunction with the Prison Service.
(source: http://www.drugs.gov.uk).

According to the Scottish office website over £50 million per annum is spent helping communities tackle the drug problem in Scotland. The new strategy for Scotland is backed by and extra £5 million in funding, the objectives of the new strategy, named Tackling Drugs in Scotland: Action in Partnership, is among others to reduce the number of drug related deaths in the country and to give additional help to encourage youngsters to avoid using drugs this include new education concerning drugs. The new strategy also aims to introduce new measures devised to break the drug/crime cycle, such as the £3 million pilot Drug Treatment and Testing orders;
What is called a 'gloves off' crackdown on pushers and dealers by the nation's enforcement agencies, specifically targeting drug trafficking and distribution networks is also set to be introduced. Mr Galbraith described the drugs problem faced by Scottish communities thus, "Drug misuse is eating away at the fabric of life in too many communities across Scotland. Getting 'wasted' on drugs means just that - wasted lives, wasted homes, wasted jobs, and wasted opportunities. It is time Scotland took a stand to dispose of that waste”, (http://www.Scotland.gov.uk).

The new enhanced drugs strategy for Scotland has been signed up to by all the key partner organisations including:
- Drug Action Teams
- Scottish Advisory Committee on Drug Misuse
- Scottish Drugs Forum
- Scotland Against Drugs
- the NHS in Scotland
- COSLA on behalf of Scottish local authorities
- Scottish Police Forces
- HM Customs and Excise
- the Health Education Board for Scotland (HEBS)
- the voluntary sector
- Scottish Business in the Community
(source:http://www.Scotland.gov.uk)

It is hoped that by involving over 100 organisations the drugs problem in Scotland can be dealt with from the community level upwards. However the prime target for the strategists has to be the suppliers of drugs, there will always be a demand as long as there is a supply of illicit substances and those that are the most widely available are bound to be as we have seen the most widely abused. People take drugs initially perhaps to experiment, they find they like the feeling they get and so they continue to use, until they suffer a physical or psychological addiction at which point they stop being unless the supply of these substances is made so difficult to obtain then people are bound to continue to abuse them.
Conclusion
The findings of the British Crime Survey all appear to lead to the conclusion that the most effective way to tackle the drug problem is by way of a two pronged attack, the treatment of addicts and the prevention of supply. The latest Government strategies for dealing with the drug crime rates within the UK as a whole all appear to be following this policy. However it will never be possible to obtain true figures as to the extent of the problem within society as long as there is criminal and social stigma attached to the role of ‘drug user’, therefore perhaps some changes in the legislation that applies to drug use should be made. An ambiguous solution maybe to legalise the use of illicit substances thus removing criminal and social stigmas, but to allow the laws regarding the importation, production and supply of illicit drugs to remain as they are and introduce stiffer penalties for those who choose to break those laws.

S.McGonigal (2003)
References

Williams, Katherine S. (2001), 4th edition, pages 259, 282, 285.

http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs2/r182.pdf
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs/hors183.pdf
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/pdfs/hors205.pdf
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/pdfs/hors224.pdf
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/pdfs/hors249.pdf
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/pdfs/hors253.pdf
http://www.drugs.gov.uk
http://www.scotland.gov.uk

The aim of this paper is to identify the key provisions and principles of New Labour legislation in the field of criminal justice since 1997 and critically evaluate the effectiveness of the legislation in being ‘tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime’. Evaluating the effectiveness of New Labours policies is problematic because in 1998 and 2002 there were changes made to the classification of crimes and the ways in which crime is recorded. If a crime is reported it must now be recorded even if there is no evidence of a crime having taken place and crime is recorded as one crime per victim, therefore if there are several victims of a crime it is recorded as several crimes not a single incident.

New Labour’s mantra of ‘tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime’, was first presented by Tony Blair when he was still Shadow Home Secretary, it appears that New Labour had recognised the appeal of a tough stance on law and order to the voters in Middle England. Thus they adopted a similar rhetoric to that of the New Right in order to gain votes at the 1997 General Election.

According to Morris (2001), when New Labour came to power in 1997 it inherited a United Kingdom where criminals were resented with,
‘An attitude wholly consistent with that powerful strain of working-class authoritarianism that has nourished enthusiasm for capital and corporal punishment and hostility towards ‘scroungers’ and foreigners and more recently, asylum seekers’, (Morris, 2001, p356).
Morris asserts that this tough attitude on crime, which had been expounded by the Conservative Home Secretaries Leon Brittan and Michael Howard and endorsed by the media, was a reflection of public attitude. He suggests therefore that New Labour’s Crime and Penal policies are reflexive.

The majority of crimes were crimes against property. Crime reduction (2005) estimates that 100,000 prolific offenders are responsible for half of all crimes committed. Public attitudes to property were vastly different to those attitudes that were pervasive under previous Labour Governments due to an expansion of property owning classes. Thatcher’s legacy of council house sales meant that the working classes now had an interest in protecting their property. This more affluent working class therefore found itself among the victims of crime against property, something which although not entirely new was now more common due in some part to a growing number of drug addicts funding their habits by stealing from their own class.

A number of socio-economic factors influenced the publics perception and experience of crime, the decline of industrial and manufacturing jobs and boom and bust economic policies had increased unemployment under the Conservative Government topping ‘3 million in the early 1980’s’, (BBC News, April, 2005). The effect of this was a culture of dependency on welfare benefits, a generation of people, for whom poverty was a norm, were growing up and emulating their parents’ social circumstances. The United Kingdom was experiencing an increase in what Merton (1938) refers to as strain . Among academics and politicians there was a growing realisation of the development of a socially alienated underclass in which some kinds of crime flourished such as; shoplifting, petty theft and prostitution, fuelled by drug addiction. Public perception of actually becoming a victim of crime was heightened by the media and created a moral panic, thus a tough stance on crime was popular with the electorate. The result was a public ready for a Government to tackle the causes of crime.

New Labour promised to tackle both the causes of crime and the criminals themselves and thus they set about introducing policies of social inclusion to tackle the social exclusion of the underclass from mainstream society. The idea was to reintegrate these people into work and thus reduce the impact of unemployment on the crime figures. Such policies were to result in a promotion of the idea of access to and participation in education as being part of the solution to a growing public pre-occupation with crime. Thus New Labour chanted ‘Education, Education, Education’ as a mantra for tackling economic and social problems. In a New Labour election broadcast in 1997 Tony Blair clearly linked together the dysfunctional family, poor achievement in school and crime. He stated
‘To me education is the big passion, it's the thing that you know should drive everything that we're doing, which is one of the reasons why it's so crazy that today we spend more on unemployment than we do on education. If a family's got people in the home where no-one's working, how can the kids grow up with any sense of the work ethic, any sense of turning up to work on time earning a wage, then they start living in a different culture in a different society, and when that actually happens then all the other problems come with them, all the crime, all the drugs, benefits bills, and when I talk about getting young people off benefit and into work it's not [inaudible] uncaring, on the contrary the only proper true compassionate way to care is to say we're going to do something about that,’’( Blair, 1997).

In conjunction with a focus on access to education and a policy of ‘lifelong learning’, New Labour sought to tackle issues of poverty and thus introduced a series of changes including New Deal, the Child Support Agency and the Child Tax Credit, which was later extended into a Working Tax Credit and Pension Tax Credit system. Such policies were meant to break what had become labelled as the benefit trap and encourage people off of welfare and into work. Labour MP Frank Field however introduced a Bill to Parliament that suggested withholding benefits as a fine for anti-social behaviour, an act that would have surely undermined the Governments policy on tackling poverty to reduce crime.

Other causes of criminal behaviour began to creep into New Labour strategies that were to bridge the gap between tackling social exclusion and punitive actions. Firstly there was a rejection of what was portrayed as soft liberal attitudes to offenders toward a more punitive approach. New Labour appeared to be looking for somewhere other than economic circumstances to lay the blame for the rising incidences of youth crime. A subject, which increasingly dominated New Labour discourse in relation to crime, so the political finger naturally began to point to dysfunctional families and in particular the parents. Thus parenting orders were introduced in conjunction with Anti-social behaviour legislation and Youth Offending Teams . The UK Home Office states that
‘Anti-social behaviour has a wide legal definition – to paraphrase the Crime and Disorder Act 1998, it is behaviour which causes or is likely to cause harassment, alarm or distress to one or more people who are not in the same household as the perpetrator… among the forms it can take are graffiti, which can on its own make even the tidiest urban spaces look squalid Abusive and intimidating language, too often directed at minorities. Excessive noise, particularly late at night and fouling the street with litter. Drunken behaviour in the streets, and the mess it creates and dealing drugs, with all the problems to which it gives rise’, (Home Office, 2002).
Parenting orders meant that parents could be punished for failing to prevent their children from committing anti-social acts, such as truancy by means of a fine or imprisonment. In addition to which, compulsory and voluntary parenting classes were introduced for those parents whose children persistently offended. This was a three- pronged interventionist approach developed to tackle youth offending, an attack on child poverty through the changes to the tax and benefit system, an effort to educate parents and punitive actions for those who persistently failed to curb criminal or anti-social behaviour in their children. However, parents were not expected to tackle this problem alone, New Labours policy suggested a partnership of agencies including Schools to tackle truancy and bullying. Local Authorities and Social Landlords to tackle problems with their tenants and Social Services to ensure community welfare was accounted for in their decision making processes .

Acceptable Behaviour Contracts (ABC), are voluntarily entered into on the advice of an agency such as the Social Services, Police or School. These may be effective in themselves or may lead to an application for an Anti-Social Behaviour Order (ASBO) if the voluntary ABC is broken. ASBO’s were introduced as part of The Crime and Disorder Act (1998) and are enforced through Civil Law, however failure to comply with an ASBO may result in prosecution and conviction under Criminal Law. In theory then under this system an offender could be sentenced to be imprisoned without having ever committed a crime. In December 2004 ‘Blair urged Judges to ‘come down very hard’ on youths who breach Anti-Social Behaviour Orders’ (Sturcke, 2004). This system is therefore interventionist only at surface level, deeper analysis reveals that it is also punitive.

According to New Labour (2002) they have ‘increased the number of police recruits by 3,000 and introduced stiffer sentences for drug dealers, they are also acting on confiscating the proceeds of crime and have introduced mandatory drugs testing for prisoners and emphasised rehabilitation’, (Labour Party, 2002). All of these policies continue to emphasise New Labours tough stance on crime. But New Labour’s strategies appear to be a hodge-podge of policies, cherry picked from the policies of other nations. They have begun to focus on a victim centred approach to dealing with offenders. The introduction of reparation style programmes popular in Australia means that offenders will be given opportunities to make reparations to the victims of their crimes, either directly or to the community at large. They have also examined the ways in which other nations deal with drug related crimes and are therefore attempting to incorporate both rehabilitation and harm reduction strategies into their drugs crime policies for dealing with drugs users while being tougher on drug dealers with the Proceeds of Crime Bill (2001) and what they refer to as tougher sentences for those convicted of dealing drugs. There is criticism from the opposition parties that New Labour is not tough enough because they have stopped short of introducing mandatory minimum sentences for those convicted of dealing drugs.

New Labour appears to have set itself a very difficult task in promising to be tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime. Their integrated strategies propose to tackle a range of causal problems by developing tough solutions. They identified several key causal factors, Poverty, Social exclusion, unemployment and dysfunctional families. New Labour set about providing solutions to these problems in the form of changes to the welfare benefits system that propose to break the benefit trap and encourage people into work with financial incentives. They improved access to education and introduced several key pieces of legislation that promised to be tough on crime itself such as; Acceptable Behaviour Contracts, Anti-Social Behaviour orders, Parenting Orders, Community Rehabilitation Orders and Reparation Orders .

In addition to these key pieces of legislation New Labour strategy was to address the problem of drug related crime by introducing mandatory drugs testing in prisons and to advocate harm reduction strategies in communities and prisons. New Labour themselves admit that even with these measures in place, take up of the use of the Anti-social Behaviour Orders has been greater in some localities than it has in others. They also recognise that there is more to be done, for instance tackling the problems caused by binge drinking especially in inner cities where drink induced violence is creating major problems at night and weekends.

New Labour does appear to be tough on the causes of crime and is beginning to get tougher on crime itself, but it is also passing the buck, placing the responsibility for dealing with crime back into the hands of communities, which exist in the minds of the planners, local authorities and in the minds of Government. This is problematic, because it is not certain that such an entity as a community exists in reality, society appears to have become more focussed on the individual. The decline of large manufacturing industries means that now in towns and cities few people work along side their neighbours and share neither their working nor social lives with them. For most people a neighbour is someone with whom they share little more than a postcode. It is not even the case that people actually know their neighbours anymore. Therefore to claim that there is a community to whom you can pass responsibility for dealing with crime is fraught with difficulty. If people don’t have common values and common goals there will be a large difference in public attitudes and perceptions of what constitutes a threat in relation to crime and thus providing solutions on a community level, is not practical, no matter how desirable it may appear. There have been reductions in certain types of crime within communities due to New Labour’s devolution of responsibility to Local Authorities, the provision by councils of better security measures in towns and cities such as CCTV have led to a cut in some crimes in some areas. Critics argue that this has simply moved these crimes to areas where there is no surveillance. Also councils have increased security in their housing stock, which has made it more difficult for burglars to gain entry to these properties. Councils also now have powers to evict tenants who are anti-social and in some instances have managed to cut crime in areas where these tenants were prolific offenders, however again critics argue that in doing so the problems created by such people have not gone but have simply been moved to other areas. To tackle an issue of drugs users using public toilets as a space for intravenous drug use, councils have introduced UV lighting, which makes it difficult for users to find veins and thus this has made public toilets a virtual no go area for intravenous drug users, again critics argue this has simply moved the problem on to other social spaces. Individuals are also encouraged to take more responsibility for their own security and there has been a growth in the home security business. Car manufacturers have also contributed to stem the growth of car crimes by installing better security measures in their vehicles, such as chipped ignition systems and alarms and immobilisers as standard.

The Intensive Supervision and Surveillance Programme and the Home Detention Curfew Scheme i.e. the tagging of prolific, but non-violent offenders, are solutions offered to tackle the problem of a growing prison population, which has grown steadily since New Labour took office. Both schemes restrict movement of offenders and place a curfew on them. The ISSP also may include a voice recognition system in conjunction with the following core elements of education, training, interventions to tackle offending behaviour and reparation to victims. Opponents of these schemes argue that an ankle bracelet cannot prevent an offender from committing crimes while tagged or from re-offending. Supporters argue that recidivism rates are lower than or comparable to those of offenders who have been incarcerated for their entire sentence. They point to the maintenance of family relationships as being a benefit because as the Social Exclusion Unit maintains that ‘research illustrates that prisoners are six times more likely to re-offend if they have lost contact with their families’, (SEU, 2002).

It does appear that Labour strategies are working when we take into account the changes to the methods of recording crime, although what Young (2001) refers to as the ‘dark figure of crime’ remains. The latest British Crime Survey (2003-2004), which questions 40,000 people in England and Wales, but excludes serious crimes such as Murder, Sex Offences and Offences against children, reports that crime has fallen since its all time high in 1995 and would thus appear to indicate that New Labour strategies are effective. The Scottish Crime Survey (2003), reports an increase of 30% in crimes since 1999 of which two-thirds are property related. On the surface this would appear to indicate that New Labours policies are not having the same effect in Scotland. However account must be taken of the differences in measuring crime between the BCS and the SCS and also the differences in the legal and criminal justice systems. We must therefore conclude that there is evidence to suggest that New Labour are being tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime, but that their strategies are haphazard, in some instances problems are merely being moved from one geographic location to another. Public perception of becoming a victim of crime is rising, but that is due to the changes in the way that crime statistics are recorded and measured and the way the media use these statistics. Unless uniformity in the measurement of crime is achieved there is no clear way for the public to gauge if New Labours promises are being kept or for statisticians to make comparisons of pre-labour crime strategies and the current ones. Thus we can say that New Labour appear to be tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime with the provision that a clearer picture will emerge of success or failure of these strategies after the next British and Scottish Crime Surveys have been conducted allowing for real comparisons to be made.

S. McGonigal (2005)
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The Purpose of this lecture is to discover the extent to which morality is applicable to
war. Can war ever be considered moral?
Philosophers have been asking this question for as long as there have been Wars and there have probably been Wars for as long as there have been men.
War can be defined as a state of open, armed, often prolonged conflict carried on between nations, states, or parties. Karl Von Clausewitz defines War as simply ‘a duel on an extensive scale’ that is ‘therefore an act of violence to compel our opponent to fulfil our will’ , ( Clausewitz,(1832), Book1, chap 1).
Obviously War involves the taking of life, an act, which in peacetime is considered in most, but not all, circumstances immoral, the exceptions being other ethical arguments such as; abortion, the death sentence, euthanasia, and killing in self-defence.
In western democracies we tend to view the taking of life as murder and therefore we expect there to be strict legislation against such immoral acts, indeed such actions are criminal and in some western democracies are punishable by execution. However the fact is that Wars do take place and the states that participate in warfare attempt to claim a moral justification for their participation rather than an excuse.
This lecture will examine theoretical justifications for war, these are largely based on ‘an attempt to reconcile three aspects of Christian philosophy, thou shalt not kill (Exodus 20:13) , the duty of a state to defend its citizens and justice, and finally, that protecting innocent life and important moral values requires a willingness to use force and violence’. St Thomas Aquinas makes the case for war and the morality of War in relation to Christian morality i.e. sin. In his work The Summa Theologica,(Source: Benziger Bros. Edition, 1947), Aquinas outlines the objections that state that War is always a sin in the eyes of God and then makes the case for a just war based on three principles;
i) the authority of the sovereign, the supreme authority to declare war
ii) those who are attacked must be at fault
iii) rightful intentions of those waging war. In all other cases therefore War is a sin and therefore, neither moral nor just. However simply having a just cause for a war does not necessarily mean that the war itself is just. The conduct of combatants in war is governed by the Jus in Bello conventions that provide a moral basis for acts that occur in war. Actions taken against non-combatants are never deemed to be moral.
The accepted theoretical justifications for waging war are the Jus ad Bellum conventions, these comprise of both deontological and consequentialist philosophical moral reasoning, regardless of treaties and rules that have been entered into by the warring parties, it is concerned only with the philosophical morality of the cause of War. The rules of what are considered a Just War are those of Justum Bello; historical treaties that provide rules for war, it is worth noting that these rules are binding only to signatories of the treaties, a modern example of which is the Geneva Convention. There must be Just cause for War according to Justum Bello, but a Just cause is not necessarily a philosophical moral cause. This lecture is concerned with the Jus ad Bellum conventions of philosophical morality of war, the moral cases.
The political and historical causes for Wars have been many and varied and even in some cases hotly disputed by Historians, the First World War is an example of this. Arguments rage over the political and historical causes ranging from territorial disputes in the Balkans, Alsace Lorraine and Africa, the right to passage into the Black sea, expansionist policies by the Junker classes, determined to retain their position as the ruling classes in Germany against a backdrop of newly industrialised capitalist societies in Europe with their new bourgeois and proletarian classes, rivalry and jealousies between the related rulers of European nations, to the Assassination of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand in 1914 and it is in this context that a moral case for war will be examined. The convention that War must be declared by a lawful authority had been adhered to. In the case of The First World War, the proper authorities being the Monarchs and statesmen in whom the legal right to wage war is vested, it is the moral reason or case for War that is in question in this instance. According to the Fischer Thesis (1966), Chancellor Bethman-Hollweg was not concerned with avoiding war but with maintaining the appearance that Germany was not morally responsible for the War (source: Mills, 2002, p 5).
It is assumed that there is a moral cause when the assassination of a Monarch or leader occurs. Was the assassination of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo 1914 by members of the Black Hand just cause for waging war on Serbia? Although he was indeed a member of the Royal Family, Franz Ferdinand was not the Monarch, he was the heir to the throne and thus the status of monarch or leader cannot be conferred on him. Retribution against Serbia for the assassination itself cannot be morally justified as ‘Serbian implication in the assassination had not and even today has not been proven’,( Source: First World War.org , 2001 ). The assassination was a trigger for the First World War, but if a Kantian duty for Austro-Hungary to wage war because of the assassination existed, on whom did they have a moral duty to wage war? This line of moral cause also begs the question, if it is the moral duty of a nation to wage war after a leader or monarch is killed why didn’t Austria wage war on Switzerland and Italy after the murder of the Empress Elizabeth in 1898. A consequentialist case for the morality of the war cannot be made in relation to the assassination as a moral cause, because the principle of utilitarianism is to promote the greatest happiness or good, the assassination of one person, regardless of his position in society or his political prominence, when compared to the loss of many, does not uphold this principle.
Moral justification is granted when a nation acts in self defence against an act of aggression such as an invasion of territory, the Alsace Lorraine dispute between Germany and France prior to the First World War appears to give a reason for War when you consider Clausewitz ‘s (1832) definition of what war is i.e. ’an act of violence to compel our opponent to fulfil our will’, the German will being to hold the disputed territory, but it is not a cause that can be said to be moral because in this instance the German claim was the claim of the aggressor not the defender. Germany having seized the territory from France. The territorial dispute in Mittel Africa, involved German plans to join up its territories in Cameroon, German East Africa and South West Africa. Germany wished to take territories from Belgium and Portugal in Africa, however this would mean problems in the Anglo-German relationship and therefore such expansionist plans were placed on the back burner until after Germany had completed its aims in Mittel Europa, the moral case of the German plans both in Africa and Europe has no grounds, from Utilitarian perspective there was no great happiness or good to be had from either policy, the benefit would have been for the small Junker class alone who could bolster their economic and social positions from the acquisition of new lands and resources. and there is no case from the deontological argument either, Germany did not have a duty to expand. The Serbian claim to Austro-Hungarian territory may however provide a just cause for Austro-Hungary to wage war on Serbia. It is documented that ‘Serbia had expansionist aims of its own in relation to Bosnian and Croatian territory, part of the Habsburg Empire’ (source: http://www.lib.msu.edu/sowards/balkan/lect15.htm), this could then be both a just cause and a moral case for war between Serbia and Austria, defence of territory. The state has a deontological duty to protect its citizens from acts of aggression such as an invasion. However , all other ways of resolving the problem must have been tried first, if the moral case for war is to be made with any certainty in such a situation and it is in this respect that the moral case on the grounds of protection of territory is flawed. Threats of Serbian expansionism into Habsburg territory existed, but were all other methods of resolving the issue exhausted prior to war being waged? The answer to that question is that some lip service was paid to diplomatic efforts to extinguish the Serbian threat. It took the form of a German instigated, 48hr ultimatum to Serbia to comply with Austria’s terms. ‘The ultimatum was worded in extreme terms, to ensure a negative response by Serbian Leader Pasic, a situation that was protested by Count Stephan Tiza’, (source: http://www.lib.msu.edu/sowards/balkan/lect15.htm). The diplomatic efforts cannot be described as being exhaustive, they were inflammatory and deliberately short, so as to provoke war, not avoid it and therefore the moral cause for war on the basis that all other avenues had been exhausted has not been made. A far cry from the days when opposing leaders rode out to face each other on the battlefield in a last ditch diplomatic attempt to resolve disputes.
Perhaps then there was an attack on National honour that could provide a moral justification for the First World War, the Austro-Hungarian Ultimatum to Serbia 23rd July 1914 implies that publications by the Nardona Odbrana society were in general circulation in Serbia and that they promoted hatred and contempt for the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy and that teaching staff in public institutions were engaged in similar propagandist activities. The same document also demands ‘explanations regarding the unjustifiable utterances of high Serbian officials’, (Austro-Hungarian Ultimatum to Serbia: 23rd July 1914). Therefore there is a perception that National Honour, in the form of anti-monarchist propaganda and public speeches, was under attack by the Serbs. But did this provide the moral case for war? The propaganda was against the Monarchy, not the nation and in today’s world this claim as a moral case and just cause holds little moral value, unless the monarchy itself can be defined as being the nation. From a utilitarian point of view there is a mild case here for a just war, if we bear in mind the socio-historical context of European Monarchies in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, anti-monarchist propaganda may have caused the Austro-Hungarian population some distress, at this point in history Monarchs were often held in very high regard by their subjects, their subjects would have considered an attack on their monarch as an attack on the nation. From a deontological point there may be a duty to defend the honour of the Monarch in some form, but these actions cannot be rigidly construed as an attack upon the nations honour and as moral cases for war these ones are weak.
The intention behind the War must be good, in order for a war to be deemed moral and just. In relation to the First World War, the intent to wage war appears to stem from Germany. Many primary and secondary sources relating to the causes of the war, paint Germany as the provocateur, egging her ally Austria to engage in war with Serbia, as a means to involve Serbia’s ally Russia in the conflict, before Russia’s forces and infrastructure were completed to the extent that she would be too strong for Germany to defeat. Therefore it is Germanys intent that must be discussed at this point. Germany intended to honour her alliance with Austria should war be waged, that is clear from the literature and in that instance Germany had Just cause for war. The moral grounds lie in the Jus ad Bellum convention that it is moral to honour treaties and alliances made between nations. However German intent appeared to be, to create a war precisely so that it could apply that convention, and therefore the Just cause for war does not lie in this Jus ad Bellum convention.
The Fischer Thesis (1966) explains German intent in terms of expansionism due to her domestic social, economic and political position, the ruling Junker classes desperate to maintain their position in society in the face of the growth of capitalist class systems elsewhere in Europe. (Source: Henig, (2002), p45 – 59). Such a position has no Jus ad Bellum convention and therefore based on this aspect of Franz Fischer’s Thesis there was no moral case for war. Germany has defended her intent in terms of self-defence against a perceived threat from growing Russian military power and the development of railway networks in conjunction with alliances such as the triple entente that threatened to encircle Germany both geographically and politically. This scenario can be acknowledged as a moral cause for war, the build up of troops along a border and the development of the machinery of war on a mass scale gives a perception of threat and therefore action by Germany in this instance can be said to be moral on the grounds of self-defence, although whether any pre-emptive action on these grounds would carry the same moral weight is open to debate. It has been argued that German perception of threat was unrealistic, however perception is subjective and therefore examination of primary sources and historical documentation should reflect the German perception of a real threat from a subjective point of view. The Memoirs of Prince Bernhard von Bulow I, show concern for the subjective reasoning ability of the Kaiser, he wrote ‘I feel bound to reiterate once more that I am firmly convinced that William II was not mentally deficient, but he was certainly superficial, hypersensitive to impressions lacking in self criticism and self control’. He also quotes the Kaisers physician Dr Renvers as saying ‘ If the Emperor were and ordinary patient I should diagnose Pseudelogia Phantasia, a tendency to live in phantasy’, ( Bulow, 1897 - 1903), so perhaps the threat from Russia was little more than a fantasy in the mind of the Kaiser, and thus neither a moral case or just cause for war. The June – July, 1914 German Dispatches and the Kaisers notes certainly give the impression that the state of mind of Europe’s most powerful man, Kaiser Wilhelm was questionable (Source: German Dispatches, 1914). The Telegrams that were exchanged between Tsar Nicholas and Kaiser Wilhelm between July 29th and August 1st 1914 concerning the alliances between Russia and Serbia, and Germany and Austria, demonstrate not a fear of invasion of Germany by Russia, but a series of thinly veiled threats concerning what Germany expected Russia to do in relation to the Austrian – Serbian conflict and Russian duty to its treaty with Serbia. (source: Levine, 1920). In 1889 Bismarck wrote to the Kaiser that ‘It is the aim of German policy today to bring about hostile rather that too intimate relations between Russia and England’ ( Bismarck, 1889), inferring malicious intent in international relations 24 years prior to the outbreak of War. So therefore although Germany maintains that her role in World War I was one of defence, the primary sources appear to say the opposite, that Germany was infact the aggressor and had been intent on aggression for some time, therefore the moral case on this basis is flawed.
The convention that there must be a reasonable chance of success in any war that is waged appears to be the German motivation for getting a war started at the soonest possible date. Germany was aware that delays in entering into a War against Russia would mean that Russia could increase its military strength and thus the feasibility of a German victory in a conflict would be reduced. Both primary and secondary sources indicate that this was reason for urgency in German attempts to instigate a War between Austria and Serbia at this period. However this Jus ad Bellum convention can only be applied if other moral cases for war have been satisfied and therefore it does not stand alone as moral justification for war.
The convention on the proportionality of means used to achieve the aims can be said with the benefit of hindsight to have failed abysmally, however it is unlikely that anyone could have foreseen the length of time the war would last, given that it was expected to be over by Christmas 1914. The fact that Austrian-Serbian conflict managed to spiral into a global conflict is due to an adherence of nations to their treaties with allied nations already engaged in the war and therefore their participation in the First World War can be deemed to be justified on that Jus ad Bellum convention, and it can be said that this escalation of the war was not only foreseen, but planned by Germany herself, in an attempt to mount an attack on Russia at the earliest date. Thus German aggression and expansionist policy in regards to Mittel Europa and Mittel Africa( itself dependent on the success of the Mittel Europa plan) must take the blame for The First World War and on those grounds, there was neither a moral case nor a just cause for War.
So to what extent is morality applicable to war? It is extremely applicable to War in all circumstances, although as is apparent from the case of The First World War, Lack of a moral case or a Just Cause does not mean that a War will not be waged. Excuses are made in political terms, which appear on the surface to give reasons for war and are perhaps, to those with a vested interest in waging war, all the reason needed to justify their actions. However, the moral cause does not attract blame for waging war, it alleviates guilt from those parties concerned and perhaps salves their consciences, when there are ulterior motives beneath the surface. This is probably why in modern warfare, international leaders attempt to claim a moral case for war in addition to a Just cause, a war fought on moral grounds, such as liberation of an oppressed people, the prevention of genocide etc is much more palatable to the general public , than an invasion for economic or political reasons alone.
S.McGonigal (2004)

.
Bibliography
Aquinas St Thomas, The Summa Theologica, Part II, question 40 Benziger Bros. Edition,( 1947) online at http://ethics.acusd.edu/Books/Texts/Aquinas/JustWar.html
Austro-Hungarian Ultimatum to Serbia: 23rd July 1914
Anderson M S, The ascendancy of Europe 1815-1914, Second Edition, (1985), Pearson Education Limited, Harlow.
Bismarck Otto Von, Letter to Kaiser Wilhelm 1889
von Bulow, Prince Bernhard, Translated by F.A. Voigt (1931), Memoirs of Prince von Bulow 1-From Secretary of State to Imperial Chancellor, 1897-1903. Little, Brown, and Co, Boston.
Henig Ruth, The Origins of The First World War, Third Edition, (2002), Routledge, London
Redhead Brian, PLATO TO NATO, Studies in Political Thought, (1995), Penguin Books Ltd, London
Levine Isaac Don The Kaisers Letters to the Tsar, copied from the Government archives in Petrograd and brought from Russia, (1920), Hodder and Stoughton Ltd, London online at: http://www.lib.byu.edu/~rdh/wwi/1914/willynicky.html

Seligmann Matthew S. and Mclean Roderick R. Germany From Reich to Republic 1871-1918, Politics, Hierarchy and Elites , (2000), Macmillan Press Ltd, Basingstoke.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/ethics/war/justwarintro.shtml
http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/ethics/war/justwarintro2.shtml
Clausewitz (1832), On War, online at: http://www.clausewitz.com/CWZHOME/On_War/BK1ch01.html
Exodus 20:13, King James Version of the Bible
First world War.org , (2001), http://216.219.216.235/origins/julycrisis.htm
Mills Wallace G.(2002) Germany’s responsibility for WW1, p5 online at:
http://husky1.stmarys.ca/~wmills/course520/fischer.html
http://www.lib.msu.edu/sowards/balkan/lect15.htm
June-July, 1914 German Dispatches and the Kaisers Notes online at : http://www.lib.byu.edu/~rdh/wwi/1914/wilnotes.html
http://www.lib.byu.edu/~rdh/wwi/1914/paperscrap.html
http://www.worldwar1.com/tlplot.htm

The aim of this essay is to breifly describe the constitutional framework of the federal system of Government in place in the United States of America, including a description of the powers of Federal Government and State legislators. This essay will also attempt to explain the relationship and changes in the relationship between the Federal and State Governments.
Hamilton and Madison explained the federal system as being that ‘the State and Federal Governments are in fact but different agents and trustees of the people’ (source: The federalist No.46, quoted in Mckeever et al, 1999, p97).
‘ Federalism can be defined as a form of government in which a constitution distributes powers between a central govt and sub-divisional govt, which are usually called states or provinces, giving both the national and the regional Governments substantial powers’ (Kirsteen McLevy, 2003).
A Federal system of Government was devised in the newly independent USA as a method of preventing tyranny, the main feature of the constitution, from which both forms of Government derive their powers. Therefore Power and control was divided between separate institutions of both Federal and State Governments, this division encompasses tax raising powers and the power to create and introduce new laws only constitutional change can evoke changes in the distribution of powers among these institutions.

Prior to 1787 the American style of Federalism can be summed up in the words of James Madison, ‘a non descript – hitherto unclassified species’, (Mckeever et al, 1999, p80), according to Diamond (1974) the following terms were synonymous with one another, federalism and confederalism, federation, confederation and Confederacy. Diamond in agreement with Madison sees no differences between State and Federal Government at this period in American political history. At this period it was the member states of the USA that gave the Federal Government legitimacy, they were not so dependant on a Federal Government and could survive should it cease to exist. All states had an equal voice regardless of size of population, State income/expenditure or geographical size. Acts of central Government were addressed to the Governments of the member States and the basis for this Federation of states was primarily that of a united military.

After 1787 there was a move towards a more unitary system, the consent to legitimate the Federal Government was no longer a power of state Government, from 1787 this power of consent was devolved to the individual citizen. Likewise both State and federal Governments become interdependent from this point, neither being a creature of the other referred to as an ‘indestructible union, composed of indestructible states’ (Texas v White, quoted in McKeever et al, 1999, p82). Changes too occurred in the representation of the states within the House of Representatives at this period in time allowances were made for State population sizes and since 1842 the members of the House of Representatives have been directly elected by the people, the 17th amendment of 1913 also allowed for the direct election of Senators by the people, each state having two Senators. Anther change in the system was that acts of the Federal Government would now be addressed to both the individual citizen and /or the member State Government, the basis for Federal Government was no longer primarily to provide a united military, there were now other objectives which required a centralised control to provide uniformity within the states.

The development of modern American style Federalism has occurred since the end of the civil war, pressure for such change was exerted through a new sense of Nationalism in combination with better infrastructure across the continent and an increase in technological advances allowing better faster methods of communication. The responsibilities of the Government in Washington D.C. has grown steadily since the civil war and since the sun set on the British Empire, the world political stage has been increasingly dominated by America, until she stands, as she does today a world super power, a role for which she is prepared and which has increased significantly since the decline of the U.S.S.R. Such changes in the global role of America have demanded that she increase here military budget. There has also been internal demand for increases in Federal Government powers, since the 1929 Wall Street crash which led to the great depression of the 1930’s, the American public has expected Federal Government to initiate new social and economic legislation and to co-ordinate such legislation nation wide to prevent such a travesty reoccurring.

The Great Depression was a dark period in American history, the flag ship of capitalism appeared to all but collapse, leaving millions out of work, starving and destitute. A new form of American politics was to rise, phoenix like from the political chaos of the 1930’s, from 1937 to 1975 co-operative Federalism transferred the ‘traditional layer cake’ Federalism into a ‘marble cake’ Federalism. The Federal dimension of American politics was no longer a clearly defined division of powers some State, some Federal instead the lines of responsibility and power were blurred requiring greater co-operation between State and Federal Government. The Supreme Court played a large part in this transformation by ruling in several instances that Congress had ‘the power to regulate local matters e.g. NLRB v Jones & Laughlin Steel Corporation’, (Kirsteen McLevy, (2003)). The Federal Government became increasingly involved in attempting to ensure uniformity in achieving national goals. She also became the focus of demands for better welfare systems, education, policing and health care. Thus the Federal Government also became a ‘virtual bank’ as it increased its financial aid to the states through the treasury to allow them to participate in the reforms, this had the unfortunate side effect of States becoming dependant on Federal handouts, although the Federal Government did not expand at the expense of the power of the individual states, the states were still free to decide exactly how to implement Federal legislation.
There were national goals, but variation on how to achieve them varied from state to state. This type of Federalism was in place until Reagan introduced a new type of Federalism in which the states were to fend for themselves becoming less dependant on Federal handouts.

From 1975 onwards the ‘fend for yourself’ federalism meant that the national Government had to rely on coercion to force states to comply with national standards, if the states comply then they are allocated approximately 25% of the state budget in block grants, however if the State Governments do not comply with national standards the block grants can be withheld. In order to have a certain amount of uniformity within the USA it is necessary to use this type of coercive tactic, certain legislations if not introduce with uniformity from state to state could theoretically cause a certain amount of chaos, examples of the type of legislation which need uniformity and therefore State Government compliance are those which involve environmental regulations and civil rights.

Federalism provides the framework for a division of powers showing clearly which institution hold which powers, however it is the Constitution itself that delegates the powers to the individual institutions of the Federal system of Government.
Express Powers have been explicitly given by the Constitution, to the National Government, these express powers consist of Legislative, Executive and Judicial Powers, also given to National Government are the inherent powers and all powers concerning Foreign affairs including the right to declare war, appoint ambassadors and receive ambassadors and the right to make treaties with other nations on behalf of the USA. Other powers constitutionally delegate to the National Government relate to trade & commerce, taxes and public spending. As stated earlier the Federal Government may impose conditions of compliance on the individual states in order to ensure a certain amount of uniformity with regard to these National matters, this is achieved by use of a Federal Mandate. The states are constitutional bound against using their reserved powers to override National Policies on these matters by the 10th Amendment to the Constitution. However in areas where Jurisdiction over State and Federal Matter come into conflict there is often grid-lock which requires in depth arbitration or new legislation, these matters are sorted out through the courts.

Supporters of the Federal System believe that this system of Government makes Government more accessible to it’s citizens and therefore actively encourages Political participation by the citizens.
S.McGonigal (2005)McKay David, American Politics & Society, Fifth Edition (2001), Blackwell Publishers Ltd, Oxford.

McKeever Robert, Zvesper John, Maidment Richard, Politics USA, 1999, Pearson Education Limited, Harlow.

McLevy Kirsteen, 2003, federalism

Sociological problems
Introduction

The study of sociology encompasses a wide perspective of society free from the binds of ethnocentrism.
What is a sociological problem?
A sociological problem is the wider perspective of problems that occur within entire societies, not small groups within society.
A sociologist uses objectivity when studying problems within the whole of society.

How do sociologists approach this topic?
Role
Norm
Institution
Class
Culture
Subculture
society
Examples of sociological perspectives
Functionalist – a social problem occurs when a society becomes so disorganised that it’s basic functions cannot be performed as well as they should be

Conflict – social problems occur through power relationships

C.Wright Mills
Private troubles

Public Issues

E.G. when a person loses their job for them this is a social problem.

When 3 million lose their jobs it becomes a sociological problem.

Sociological research identifies Social problems
The Government uses Sociological research to devise strategies for tackling social problems
The result is social policy which is implemented through Social Welfare.

Sociologists conduct research.
Sociology provides a theoretical basis for the research.
Ethnocentrism
Objectivity
Value freedom

Sociologists want to investigate the general cultural significance of the socio-economic structure of the human community
and its historical forms of organisation.
Treatment of these social problems will (hopefully) result in solutions for social policy.

This essay will examine four theoretical perspectives concerning the sociology of the media, the theoretical perspectives being Pluralism, Feminism, Marxist and Neo-Marxist, two of these perspectives will be evaluated. The essay will also examine four case studies based on the sociology of the media and evaluate two of them.

The Case studies the essay will examine are J. Whale (1977), “The politics of the Media” extracted from P. Trowler (1987) ‘Active’ Sociology, Unwin Hyman, London, R. Miliband (1973) “The state in Capitalist Society” extracted from P. Trowler (1987), ‘Active’ Sociology, p203-208, 210, Unwin Hyman, London, Angela McRobbie ‘Teenage Girls, Jackie, and the ideology of adolescent “Femininity”’ and finally Stanley Cohen ‘The Amplification of Deviance’. The latter two of these case studies are primary sources not extractions.

In order to understand what this essay is concerned with it is necessary to define what we mean by the media. Media is literally the plural of medium, which is any method by which we transfer and communicate information and ideas. The media is used to entertain, educate, inform, misinform, propagate, communicate and discuss. A blank sheet of paper is a medium for communicating, as is a television set, a newspaper, a magazine, a book, a journal, micro film, a cinema screen, a video, a radio, the internet, a dvd, a telephone, a song, a painting, a photo etc. It is through these mediums that the human being transfers his thoughts, knowledge, experiences and ideas, and it is out ability to do this that separates us from the other species which inhabit our planet.
Man has always sought to communicate, the medium of the cave man was the wall of his cave, and for the ancient Egyptian it was the walls of the great pyramids and the papyrus scrolls. Today with the ever expanding technological advances that are being made our media has developed to reach a far greater audience than the cave man could ever have envisaged and thus through our media certain individuals attempt to influence every facet of our lives. It is this influence that sociologists seek to explain through their individual perspectives.

The first perspective that this essay will examine is that of the Pluralist.

The Pluralist perspective relies on many forms of media offering a range of ways we can all access the same information, we are free to choose how we acquire the information and how we interpret what we are told, to ensure that the information we receive through the media is impartial it comes from many sources, thus allowing us to make a judgement for ourselves. The public is free to choose the sources that they feel they can best identify with and thus the media has to provide the information in a way that the public wants, if it cannot do so then it will become defunct. Pluralists argue that the media are not all encompassing, all-powerful organisations that lead us to interpret the world as they see it, but are simply diverse sources from which we can read and disseminate information to allow us to make up our own minds. This perspective argues that the multitude of media organisations is necessary to allow freedom of interpretation and that the powerful media organisations must not be allowed to monopolise all aspects of information delivery. Many Governments have introduced laws to prevent this monopolisation of the media. The pluralists also point out that many Journalists come from varied backgrounds and will refuse to toe the official line of the media owners or the Government and that this too allows for greater freedom of choice. Finally Pluralists point out that much news reporting is actually targeted against the Government in power and does not simply reflect the Governmental views. Recently in the UK the main News channels have begun to make greater use of public opinion polls in their reports, this allows the public to air their opinions with greater regularity than was previously available, it also allows the Governments and the owners of the media to see where the interests and thoughts of their audience lie and thus interpret market forces and develop marketing strategies.

The next perspective this essay will examine is that of the feminists.

Feminists view the media as yet another element of a patriarchal society, where views and opinions are dominated by men and male attitudes, they will point to the way stories are delivered and what is given prominence, often female stories are given a small separate section within a publication or television programme as if insignificant to the ‘real’ issues, which concern men. Similarly reporting of crime against women particularly those crimes of a sexual nature are reported in such a way as to titillate the reader/viewer/listener and thus women receive a raw deal from the media, being portrayed as wanton sex objects rather than victims of patriarchy. Janet Street Porter described the media as being ‘a male, mediocre, middle-aged, middle-class broadcasting boys club’ (Kirsteen McLevy, (2002), this opinion pretty much epitomises the feminist viewpoint. Liberal feminists argue that there is a solution to this male dominance of the media, which is that women need to compete with men for power within the media and that when this has been achieved there will be a significant change in the dominant sexist attitudes. Socialist feminists argue that because the media is directly linked to the economic infrastructure of society, the liberal solution is not achievable because it is not commercially viable, although according to a recent UK census Women over the age of 21 now out number men. More radical feminists see any female involvement in the media as a colluding with the patriarchal enemy, although they support all female publishing as an alternative solution i.e. female ownership, female editorial, female writers, female designers etc.

The next perspective this essay will examine is that of the Marxist.

According to Marx religion was the opium of the masses, a form of social control, the modern classical Marxist has modified this notion and believes that it is the mass media that has replaced religion, controlling the proletariat. Herbert Marcuse of the Frankfurt School, states in his work One Dimensional Man that the ‘hypnotic power of the mass media deprive us of the capacity for critical thought which is essential if we are to change the world’, (Source: ‘ The Mass Media’). This is the basis for the belief in false consciousness within modern society, we are controlled by the Bourgeoisie through what we read see and hear and thus have no idea of the reality of the society in which we live. This has been referred to as the hypodermic model, the proletariat are viewed as controlled beings who are injected with information in the way that the ruling powers wish them to see it, they are not free beings with freewill although they believe they have a choice and are informed they are in fact being distracted from reality by greater powers through the media. Marxists see the work of the media as propaganda machinery through which the dominant ideologies are filtered down to the masses, distracting the individuals from their oppression and exploitation. This perspective allows us to evaluate the mass media in relation to a capitalist society and connect the dominant ideologies with those who control the economic infrastructure, questioning who in society gains from the mass media and its content. However this perspective is based on social control and thus presumes that the audience is passive, and will digest the dominant ideology without question, it also presumes that media ownership directly influences the passive audience.

The final theory that this essay will examine is that of the Hegemonic or Neo-Marxist.

This perspective introduces the concept that the bourgeoisie are involved in a constant struggle to maintain control and that they do so by controlling the media and its output. The ruling classes do this by not only providing entertainment as a distraction with ‘hidden’ messages of how life is or should be contained in innocuous TV programmes such as soap operas but by actively structuring how the news is presented so that it gives prominence to stories concerning white, middle class men and marginalizes any news which is a perceived threat to the social order controlled by this group. Thus we identify with the group in power who control the media and sympathise with their views and mistrust opposing views. This neo-Marxist view explains the capitalist/ media relationship and allows for research into media content, furthermore it also supports feminist and anti racist perspectives. However, the pluralist counter this theory with an argument that there is constant change within the media and that those groups who were under represented within the media now receive a fairer deal. This perspective also fails to express whether in fact audiences are accepting the definitions of minority groups the way the media portrays them. Finally this perspective does not address the fact that editors do not always share the views of their employers and thus some editorial differences may have greater influence on the content and structuring of news and other items than that of the proprietor.

The first case study this essay will examine is The Politics of the Media, Whale, J, (1977) (Source: Trowler, P ‘Active’ Sociology, (1987)). This case study seeks to explain why certain newspapers appeal to certain groups within society, it shows how the consumer controls the content and that far from having strict editorial policy newspaper’s can and do change as market forces demand. The study also shows that there are class issues involved in determining which paper the consumers chooses to purchase and how the class issues determine the style of reporting and language contained in the different newspapers. The study is written from a pluralist perspective using secondary sources, research methods employed are both qualitative and quantitative therefore a tenuous links exists between method and theory. The study is useful in providing a pluralist perspective on the media and Whale achieves his aim of strengthening the pluralist argument however, Whale can be accused of bias in his approach by only introducing evidence which contributes to the pluralist perspective and not providing clarity regarding his sources, he also tends to underplay the role of those who control the media leaving the reader with the impression that it is the consumer who controls the media and not vice versa. The study was written in 1977 and is therefore somewhat dated.

The second case study this essay will examine is The State in Capitalist Society, Miliband, R, (1973) (Source: Trowler, P ‘Active’ Sociology, (1987)). This case study attempts to show how the political environment is affected by the mass media, written from a Marxist perspective Miliband attempts to show how the political ideologies of the Media moguls affect the political climate of society. He argues that the employees within the media will conform to the political motivation given to them by the owners of the media, through indirect downward seepage of ideology. Miliband also addresses the influence of advertisers in influencing the political ideology of media content. The research methods employed in this case study are not obvious and thus we can assume that this is a personal analysis by Miliband. The study accentuates the views of editorial staff and owners not those of the public and Miliband’s argument that the staff are controlled by fear of losing their employment has validity, he allows for the fact that total consensus is not demanded but a general consent is necessary for the owners to maintain control. Miliband also shows that the media moguls may encourage the opinion that we are living within a dictatorial state when political opinions fly in the face of their own ideologies. He negates to show how political parties manage such conflicts by using spin-doctors and public relations experts and how some employees who attempt to address balance in reporting do not automatically lose their employment but are allowed to continue for the sake of an appearance of impartiality. This study is also dated.

The third case study this essay will examine is Teenage Girls, Jackie, and the Ideology of Adolescent ‘Femininity’, Angela McRobbie. The study is written from a feminist perspective and is taken from a primary source. It illustrates how teenage magazines attempt to instil the capitalist ideal of femininity on their readers and how this process continues from adolescence into adulthood by the reinforcement of the messages into adult women’s magazines, McRobbie interprets this form of entertainment as an agent of socialisation. Apparently the prime objective for a female in a capitalist society is to find a man and then become subservient to his wishes, the magazines according to McRobbie, teach girls to conform to the male ideal of femininity and womanhood through illusion. The illusion that getting a man is the prime objective for every female, is made possible by the editorial techniques employed in the design and content of the magazine. Each topic is covered over and over in different guises within the magazine the man is the hero and in each story, the girls prime objective is to make him fall in love with her. The study places emphasis on the fact that magazines such as Jackie influence teenage girls and addresses issues that parents may feel uncomfortable discussing with their daughters by the use of problem pages etc. This study highlights both gender socialisation and media manipulation and it achieves its aim of strengthening the feminist perspective. However, the study uses only one magazine as a source and shows women to be stereotypes who are willing to be brainwashed and will not question what they are reading. An element of bias can be inferred on the part of McRobbie simply because she did not use another magazine for comparison, however the study is dated and Jackie was a typical magazine of its time.

The final case study that this essay will examine is The Amplification of Deviance, Cohen, S, (source: extract from Cohen, s, Folk Devils and Moral Panics). This study illustrates Becker’s idea that deviance is socially created, and is written from symbolic interactionist perspective. The study explains how Moral Panic is created viewing the development of a news stories and how they exerts a form of social control on their audience. Quite simply a minority commits an act of deviancy which is then reported, identifying the problem group, this is sensationalised by reporting similar stories and the minority is then demonised by the media, this then leads to more acts of deviancy among the minority group which creates moral panic, people want more law and order to prevent the deviancy and thus there is greater social control. Cohen uses the Mods and Rockers as an example of how this is achieved and tells how the media influenced the way the stories concerning them were reported, for example encouraging acts of deviancy and then reporting them in a sensational manner and often out of context. This style of reporting led to copycat acts of deviancy, which were then reported until the whole concept of what was really happening had become distorted, the Mods and Rockers had become demonised and the town of Brighton in particular had a new infamy. Cohen uses several examples to illustrate this theory in action. Although this study is dated modern equivalents are the name and shame campaign reporting on paedophiles and the reporting on Asylum Seekers and the attempts by the press to link them to terrorist organisations.

It can be said that all of the studies used in this essay achieve their objectives although all are open to criticism and the theoretical perspectives examined each have their own validity, however only by using a combination of all of the perspectives can we get a clear picture of our media, how it operates and the influences it has upon society. Furthermore with the advent of the Internet, people are now free to discuss their ideas and communicate with people of other nations without interference from the Media moguls and their editorial ideologies.

S.McGonigal (2003)

REFERENCES

The Amplification of Deviance, Cohen, S, Folk Devils and Moral Panics.

Kirsteen McLevy, 2002 Sociological examination of the Media.

Kirsteen McLevy(2003), The Mass Media,

Teenage Girls, Jackie, and the Ideology of Adolescent ‘femininity’, Angela McRobbie.

The Politics of the Media, Whale, J, (1977),(from Trowler, P, ‘Active’ Sociology (1987), Unwin Hyman, London).

The state in Capitalist Society, Miliband, R,(1973),(from Trowler, P, ‘Active’ Sociology (1987), Unwin Hyman, London).

This essay will examine four theoretical perspectives concerning the sociology of health, the Marxist perspective, the functionalist perspective, the Interactionist perspective and the Feminist perspective. The essay will include evaluations of two of these perspectives and will also examine four case studies concerned with this topic, evaluate two of them and show the constraints associated with the studies.

In order to examine this topic it is appropriate to define health as it is defined by the public. Mildred Baxter, ‘Health & Lifestyle’, (1990) found that in a survey of 10,000 members of the public three clear categories emerged these being;
· Positive definitions – health is defined as being fit and able to undertake any reasonable task.
· Negative definitions- Health is defined in terms of being free from pain and discomfort.
· Functional definitions- health is defined as being able to perform a range of tasks
( Kirsten Mclevy, 2002).

Historically, hospitals in the UK had very little impact on the health of the general public, diseases such as polio, tuberculosis and rubella were major killers, changes in health and hygiene policy and mass vaccinations have virtually eradicated these killer diseases although some of them are on the increase due to lack of faith in the vaccination system. The governing powers within the UK realised that public health, welfare and poverty were important issues and thus the Beveridge Report (1942) was
commissioned to attack the ‘five giants’; want, disease, ignorance, squalor and idleness. The post war economy was to be organised to provide a welfare system that would look after the individual’s health and welfare ‘from the cradle to the grave’. Providing universal benefits, to pay for this a system of National insurance was established which did not vary according to income but was to be affordable for all.
This is the system, which now takes income levels into account and provides the state benefit system and National Health Service that is taken for granted. In other Capitalist nations such a system does not exist.

The first perspective this essay will examine is the Marxist perspective. Marxists divide society into classes, which are linked to the economic base of the society. With regard to health and the social welfare system in general, the Marxist perspective regards health care and social welfare as a method of preventing revolution, by giving the proletariat adequate health care, housing, education etc, the bourgeoisie are ensuring that Capitalism survives and that the workforce remains healthy enough to work and contented enough not to revolt against the ruling classes. Marxists believe that it is not however the capitalist society that pays for these social welfare compensations but the individual worker through taxation and Marxists further argue that the greatest burden of taxation falls on those who can least afford to pay it. Marxists do acknowledge that it was probably ‘working class pressure’ which caused the welfare state to be born. Focusing on health Marxists argue that it is Capitalism itself that is the cause of many ailments and health problems, the working conditions for example, which cause many ailments such as stress, can lead to heart attacks and strokes, headaches and depression. There is also the issue of work related industrial diseases such as white finger and repetitive strain injury. Marxists argue that rather than treating the causes of these illnesses i.e. the working conditions, Capitalist societies treat the symptoms of the illness in order to make life within a Capitalist society more bearable for the workers. In many cases place the blame for the illness occurring on the dietary and lifestyle choices of the individual, labelling these lifestyle choices as unhealthy and stupid and it is the medical profession who act as agents of social control, deciding just who is allowed to have time off with pay when they are sick by grouping some illnesses as acceptable and others as unacceptable. Marxists also regard the huge Drug corporations as controlling just which individuals in society can be cured, those with the most money are able to afford the best medication and treatment, while the Governments turn a blind eye to the massive profits accumulated at the expense of the sick. Marxists also argue that the Government is contradictory with regards to it’s stance on the tobacco industry spending millions to educate people not to smoke tobacco while allowing companies to produce tobacco and raising taxes from the sale of tobacco products.
These views are open to criticism because they do not explain all illnesses such as genetic conditions, mental and physical disabilities and other illnesses, which are found in all social classes. Since the creation of the welfare state infant mortality rates have fallen, life expectancy has risen and continues to rise, working conditions for many have improved, with health and safety at work becoming an important issue. Good health can however be linked to social class, the lower down the class scale an individual falls the greater the chance that the individual will experience mental or physical health problems. These problems can be directly linked to economics, less money means poorer housing, the consumption of cheaper, less healthy foods, greater stress and possibly a greater consumption of alcohol and cigarettes, a manual or physically strenuous job and worse working conditions, which are all contributory factors to poor health. Marxism tends to concentrate on capitalism without actually examining the medical process in addition to this Marxism fails to address the diversity of capitalist systems and how they deal with health, for example in the USA a different system of health care exists, individuals have to take out private health care, the issue of Medi care is currently a hot potato in American politics. Wilkinson (1996) argues that it is not Capitalism itself that perpetuates inequalities in health but the inequalities in the distribution of wealth, he shows that in societies such as Sweden and Japan, where a more even distribution of wealth exists, all citizens enjoy better levels of health. Marxists also do not address the issue of gender in relation to health; furthermore Marxists do not acknowledge the actions of individual governments within Capitalist society that attempt to educate the people about the risks of adopting unhealthy lifestyles, such as the HEBS campaigns in Scotland. Marxists also fail to address the issue of positive discrimination in the workplace with regard to disabled individuals.

The next perspective that this essay will examine is that of the functionalists.

Functionalists believe that every part of society has a function like the organs and limbs of a body, every individual within society has a use and that those that are of no use are eliminated by nature, drawing from Darwin’s theory of Natural selection. It is the work of Talcott Parsons (1952) that explains the function of poor health in society. Parsons views illness as being psychosomatic because an individual either consciously or unconsciously makes a decision to be ill, because they can no longer meet the demands that society is placing on them; the individual assumes what Parson’s calls the ‘sick role’. In doing this the individual is removed from their responsibility to contribute towards society, the individual cannot wish themselves better and the individual must agree to take the role of a patient, accepting that medical intervention of some sort is required to make them better so that they can then re-assume their responsibilities within society. Illness is viewed by Functionalists as being a disruptive element within society, which could develop into a sub culture of non working, incapacitated, dependant, fatalist individuals, according to Parson’s the ‘sick role’ is necessary within society to prevent the formation of such a sub culture. The ‘sick role’ does this by illegitimating illness itself, the patient has to want to get better and co-operate with the medical experts in order to do so, it is the co-operation with the medical profession that gives the illness a legitimacy and allows the individual time to recuperate and thus resume their role in society. This prevents large numbers of individuals becoming sick in order to avoid work and responsibility. Thus the sick role keeps society integrated and functioning, so long as the level of sickness within society is neither too high nor too low and the health care system is constantly monitored and adapted to ensure balance. Parsons ignores the fact that not all illness is psychosomatic and that for some medical conditions there is as yet no recognised legitimate medical treatment or cure, this issue has been addressed by Freidson (1970,) who named this the unconditionally legitimate sick role. Freidson also recognised another sick role which he named the illegitimate sick role this refers to individuals who are expected to take some blame for their illness, such as AIDS sufferers, because these individuals are expected to take some blame they are not automatically given the same rights and privileges as those in the other two categories. Functionalists also see only conventional medicine as having a part to play in the ‘sick role’, ignoring alternative treatments and remedies which are playing an increasing role within the health care of individuals. This perspective does not explain the experience of being ill or take into account those illnesses, which do not require normal life to be suspended and assumes that the ‘sick role ‘ is a process that is straightforward; common sense tells us that this is not always the case. Neither does it account for misdiagnosis or the scenario in which the individual disagrees with diagnosis or treatment, in the case of misdiagnosis the individual is denied the ‘sick role’ often for prolonged periods. Parson’s perspective also fails to address gender, race and class and how this can affect the ‘sick role’ from being granted by the establishment. This perspective is also contradictory because it infers that the individual although not responsible for the illness is totally responsible for the outcome of the illness through the ‘sick role’.

The next perspective that this essay will examine is that of the interactionists.

Interactionist deal with self perception and the perception of others to individuals because of the labels placed on them by society therefore, when dealing with the issue of health in society Interactionists tend to place their focus on the social stigma caused by labelling individuals as sick and how the medical profession uses labels, titles and symbols to control the patients responses.
On a hospital ward it is the Consultant who has the highest label conferred upon him, all other staff and patients are controlled by his opinions, it is assumed that his knowledge of the illness and the treatment of the illness is greater than that of everyone else, therefore the consultant indirectly controls every encounter between staff and patients on the ward from the treatment and diet required to the admissions and release of patients. Many patients can feel intimidated and therefore they are unlikely to question the consultant about the treatment unless he directly asks them too (source: Tim Robinson (1978)).
The interactionist approach gives a strong insight into how chronic illness impacts on the everyday life of an individual, recognising that the onset of chronic illness can be profound, that the process of getting a diagnosis can be both unpleasant and prolonged. Interactionists also acknowledge that individuals respond in different ways to a diagnosis, there may be relief at being able to put a name to a condition, or shock at the severity of the condition or a feeling of stigmatisation once the diagnosis has been given depending on the type of illness, its severity and the expectations of the individual. Some patients may not be able to come to terms with the diagnosis especially if it is that of a terminal or degenerative condition which is untreatable. This can result in long periods of uncertainty for the individual, who may go one to collect as much information as possible regarding their condition and thus become the ‘expert’. Interactionists also recognise that some medical treatments such as chemotherapy can have nasty side effects, which actually increase the symptoms of illness or introduce new physical and mental symptoms, and how people develop coping strategies to enable them to live as normally as possible when they are diagnosed as being ill M. P. Kelly (1992).
This perspective gives a strong insight into the cultural processes of health and how people cope when ill. It also explains how chronic illness impacts on everyday life. Some critics feel however that Interactionism does not focus enough on power with regard to health and supplements structuralist perspectives rather that giving a ‘stand alone’ perspective.

The final perspective that this essay will examine is that of Feminism. According to Feminists the Health system like every other part of society is a patriarchal institution. Dominated by male ideologies at the expense of females. To illustrate this they point to the fact that women were excluded from the insurance system that was introduced between the two world wars and afterwards were ‘allowed’ to pay a half stamp. Feminists draw comparisons between the welfare state and the family unit, which they consider exploits women and the work they do. Feminists argue that they are expected to take care of ill relatives without pay; indeed until the mid 1980’s women could not claim attendance allowance for doing so. Feminists also use statistics to make their point; they show that although women have a longer life expectancy than men they also have a higher incidence of poor health. Feminists also agree that material circumstances play a vital role in determining health, the lower the income the poorer the health, this can be seen in statistics concerning the health of single parents, single mothers fare worse in the health stakes than single fathers. This could be because of the multiple roles women take on in their domestic and proffessional lives in conjunction with child birth and regulation of fertility, which increase stress on the woman and thus increase risks of poor health. Another bone of contention for the feminist movement is that men ascribe to the biomedical view of health that is that the body is a machine, which should be repaired if it breaks down, and that the medical profession is male dominated and therefore women have been disempowered by a patriarchal establishment in relation to looking after their bodies. According to Doyal (1995:22),‘any analysis of women’s health should consider the interaction between social, psychological and biological influences).

This essay will now examine four case studies and evaluate two of them.

The first case study that this essay will examine is Inequalities in Health, Peter Townsend and Nick Davidson (1988), Reading 33. This study concentrates on mortality rates in the population and uses the Registrar General’s scale of occupational classes to examine the differences between mortality rates of different occupational classes. The study discovered that infant mortality rates among children within the first month of life where the father was a manual worker was double the mortality rate for children whose father was in the proffessional classes this increased to a three times greater risk where the father was an unskilled manual worker. The study also found that gender was also an important factor, in each occupational class women had half the risk of death than their male counterparts. The risk of death prior to retirement age was two and half times that of professionals, for class V workers of any age. This study also found regional variations in mortality rates the South of Britain faring the best. The study found inequalities in the use and availability of the Heath Service despite the fundamental principle of the health service being equal access for all and suggested that cultural factors play a part in the health of immigrants and their families. This study is valuable because it shows that there are marked differences in the life expectancy and mortality rates in the Classes in Britain, it does not however show the differences of health service that may exist for disabled people within the various occupational classes. The study shows that the health service today is probably structured to meet he needs of the middle class consumer, with regional variations on waiting times for hospital appointments (see appendix A, for current figures). This report highlights inequalities in the health service and life expectancy rates in the UK therefore it is an important piece of research, examining patterns and trend it has been used as a benchmark for further research and work in this area. Recommendations had serious political implications. E.G. stressed the need to tackle socio-economic inequality at a time when the Conservative Party was attempting to tighten the welfare safety net. This study was written from a social democratic, structuralist perspective, using quantitative findings from secondary sources i.e. census returns and death certificates, therefore a link exists between research method and perspective, this study can also be said to be representative of the population because of the large sample used, therefore the study achieved its aims.
However this study would have benefited from qualitative information, giving a much clearer picture of the topic, in addition the study does not suggest solutions to the inequalities and is dated. This study did however lead to recommendations being made, Government response to the report being, ‘as notorious as its findings’, (, Kirsten Mclevy, (2002). The constraints of this study are that its value freedom can be questioned because Peter Townsend already has a strong link with studies into poverty within the UK and may have been biased towards his own political ideologies.

The next study this essay will examine is The Political Economy of Health, Lesley
Doyal and Imogen Pennell (1979, Reading 84). This study examined inequality and
Health within the United Kingdom, suggesting that some ill health is directly caused
by the pursuit of wealth within the capitalist system that exists in the UK. To
illustrate this Doyal and Pennell use industrial accidents and diseases, health matters,
which occur because the individual is at work. The study suggests that true
figures regarding the extent of industrial injury, disease and death are difficult to
obtain and therefore they used the Robens Report of 1972 and Kinnersley’s The
Hazards of Work to obtain rough estimates. They point out that one of the
reasons that exact figures are difficult if not near impossible to obtain is that some
industrial diseases do not reveal themselves until much later in life, the damage being
caused through constant contact with a chemical for instance over many years,
resulting in an illness after retirement. The study also shows that trade unions

have not been very effective in preventing industrial injuries, deaths and diseases and
that they tend to concentrate on demanding higher wages/danger money for workers
rather than improved health and safety in the work environment in conjunction
with this employers appear to work on a system of acceptable risk in the work
environment. The acceptable risk factors are easily viewed within today’s
construction industry, health and safety legislation requires employers within this
sector to carry out risk assessments for each trade and construction job undertaken,
the onus is on the employee to familiarise themselves with the risks associated with
the job and take steps to ensure their own working environment is safe, the threat of
unemployment is used by employers in an attempt to make workers do dangerous
jobs in dangerous conditions. This study was written from a Marxist perspective and
used statistical information therefore there is a direct link between the research
method employed and the theoretical perspective. The study points out that for a true
picture patterns of health and illness must be examined in a socio-economic
context. The study shows the limitations of the Health and Safety at work legislation.
This study achieved it’s aim, highlighting problems within the work environment
regarding health and safety issues, it led to further research being undertaken in this
field. The study is however dated and current Health and safety legislation is much
tighter than it was at the time of this study. The study also makes the claim
that employers attempt to ignore the risks at work without any evidence to back this
up and assumes that unions give low priority to health and safety at work issues. The
constraint for this study is its objectivity.

The next study that this essay will examine is Ulcerative colitis- an example of a chronic illness’ (Kelly 1992). This study examines how one chronic illness impacts on the lives of the sufferers, it also considers the social stigma attached to such an illness. The sufferers of this condition felt that the illness impacted on every part of their lives from engaging in sexual relationships to travel arrangements and the ability to hold down a job. It shows how people react to the label placed on them because of an illness, most sufferers of chronic conditions feel a sense of relief at having a diagnosis, but then feel stigmatised by the label they are given by society. Ulcerative colitis is a co