LUXURY CONSUMPTION, CULTURAL POLITICS, AND THE CAREER OF THE EARL OF ARLINGTON, 1660–1685

2009 ◽  
Vol 52 (2) ◽  
pp. 295-317 ◽  
Author(s):  
HELEN JACOBSEN

ABSTRACTHenry Bennet, earl of Arlington, is a neglected statesman. A sometime diplomat, he was Charles II's longest-serving secretary of state, held the highest household office for ten years, and married his daughter to a royal bastard. It is, however, his artistic patronage that has most conspicuously been overlooked and, consequently, its political significance underestimated. Informed by his experiences abroad, he appreciated the power of the arts to influence and impress and used the cultural mediation of the English diplomatic network in his control to help skilfully fashion his domestic political identity. Through judicious display of architecture, paintings, sculpture, and furniture, Arlington created a cultural world that confirmed both his close relationship with Charles II and his dominance of foreign affairs. Even after he resigned as secretary of state in 1674, Arlington continued to deploy artistic patronage for political ends: as lord chamberlain, he controlled the largest government department and was formally responsible for fashioning the royal image. This article reconsiders Arlington's contributions as a statesman through his considered use of material consumption and artistic patronage and thereby illuminates corners of cultural practice which are situated firmly in the political sphere.

Author(s):  
Asle Toje

We do not want to place anyone into the shadow, we also claim our place in the sun.” In a foreign policy debate in the German parliament on December 6. 1897 the German Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Bernhard von Bülow, articulated the foreign policy aspirations of the ascendant Wilhelmine Germany. This proved easier said than done. In 1907, Eyre Crowe of the British Foreign Office penned his famous memorandum where he accounted for “the present state of British relations with France and Germany.” He concluded that Britain should meet imperial Germany with “unvarying courtesy and consideration” while maintaining “the most unbending determination to uphold British rights and interests in every part of the globe.”...


Janez Lenarčič is currently serving as Commissioner for Crisis Management in the European Commission, a mandate he took up in December 2019. In this capacity, he is responsible for EU civil protection as well as humanitarian aid. Mr Lenarčič served as Ambassador and Permanent Representative of Slovenia to the European Union (EU) in Brussels from 2016 to 2019. From 2014 to 2016, he held the Secretary of State position in the cabinet of the Slovenian Prime Minister. His previous experience also includes the position of Director of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe's (OSCE) Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, in Warsaw, from 2008 to 2014. He has also served as Secretary of State for European Affairs, including representing Slovenia during the Lisbon Treaty negotiations in 2007 and later representing the Slovenian EU Council Presidency to the European Parliament in 2008. In 2002 and 2003 he held the position of State Secretary in the cabinet of the Slovenian Prime Minister, after which he served as Slovenian Ambassador to the OSCE. In 2005, he was also Chairman of the Permanent Council of the OSCE in Vienna. In 2000 he served as Adviser to the Minister for Foreign Affairs, and the following year he became the Diplomatic Adviser to the then Slovenian Prime Minister. Between 1994 and 1999 he was posted to Slovenia's Permanent Representation to the United Nations (UN) in New York, where he also served as the alternate representative of Slovenia on the UN Security Council. Mr Lenarčič holds a degree in international law from Ljubljana University.


2020 ◽  
pp. 54-87
Author(s):  
Laura J. Rosenthal

This chapter turns to the comedies of William Wycherley, which have long been taken to epitomize the libertine spirit of Restoration court culture. However, it argues that Wycherley (and others) pushed back against the court. The playwright's close relationship with the monarch enabled this resistance: he enjoyed royal patronage, had an affair with a royal mistress, and even received a personal visit from a concerned Charles II when he fell ill. The connection began before the poet's birth: Wycherley's family lost much of their wealth supporting the Stuarts during the civil wars, which gave William access to the court's inner circle. Such deep connections have often been read to suggest that Restoration plays promoted the aristocratic ideology of the Stuarts. The libertinism in the comedies, Jeremy Webster, Harold Weber, and others have argued, emerged from a libertine court culture, and the scandalous nature of the plays reflected the scandalous experimentation at court. But Wycherley did not include scandalous scenes to create libertine solidarity; instead, he exploited the leeway created by libertine envelope-pushing to critique royal ambitions with two figures that have entered standard theatrical vocabulary: in The Gentleman Dancing-Master (1672), the fop, and in The Country Wife (1675), the provincial girl shocked into sophistication. Wycherley immortalized but did not invent these two figures; in different ways they each come to embody anxieties at the heart of many comedies of the period. The chapter concludes that Wycherley is an outlier for his extremity and wit, but representative in his concerns.


Public Law ◽  
2019 ◽  
pp. 300-332
Author(s):  
Andrew Le Sueur ◽  
Maurice Sunkin ◽  
Jo Eric Khushal Murkens

This chapter examines the meaning and the continuing significance of prerogative powers. Prerogative powers are those that were originally exercised by the Monarch before the modern parliamentary system was established. While most prerogative powers have now been replaced by statutory powers, prerogative powers remain important in some contexts, especially in relation to the conduct of the United Kingdom’s foreign affairs. In this context the decision of the UK Supreme Court in R (Miller) v Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union is of particular importance. The chapter is organized as follows. Section 2 considers the various legal foundations on which central government ministers may base their actions and compares prerogative and statutory powers. Section 3 examines prerogative power—a source of power possessed only by ministers in UK government and the monarch—in more detail. Section 4 considers the progress towards the reform of ministerial prerogatives.


1966 ◽  
Vol 20 (4) ◽  
pp. 845-847

The fourteenth session of the Council of Ministers of die Central Treaty Organization (CENTO) was held in Ankara, Turkey, on April 20–21, 1966, under the chairmanship of Ihsan Sabri Caglayangil, the Foreign Minister of Turkey. Others attending the session were Abbas Aram, Foreign Minister of Iran; Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, Foreign Minister of Pakistan; Michael Stewart, Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs of the United Kingdom; and Dean Rusk, Secretary of State of the United States. The session had been preceded by a meeting of the CENTO Military Committee held in Tehran, Iran, on April 5–6.


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