Simon and Eden at the Foreign Office, 1931–1935

1994 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 35-52
Author(s):  
David Dutton
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
National Government ◽  
General Election ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
Public Mind ◽  
The Public ◽  
British Foreign Policy ◽  
Standing Up ◽  
Foreign Office ◽  
The One

This is according to Protocol. More briefly ‘Dear Anthony meet me at Geneva. Yrs. Cleopatra’Very few of the figures who held responsibility for the making and direction of British foreign policy in the 1930s did so with much benefit to their subsequent historical reputations. Three of the four men who occupied the post of Foreign Secretary after the General Election of 1931 appeared in the cast list of the ‘Guilty Men’, vilified by the triumvirate of left-wing journalists who wrote under the pseudonym of ‘Cato’ in the dramatic summer of 1940. That vilification has been only partially redeemed by the efforts of later revisionist biographers. Certainly, Sir John Simon, Sir Samuel Hoare and Lord Halifax all left the Foreign Office with their political reputations lower in the public mind than at the time of taking office. The exception to this experience was, of course, the case of Anthony Eden who, at the time of his resignation in February 1938 after more than six years as a member of the National Government, stood, in Churchill's famous words, as the ‘one strong young figure standing up against long, dismal, drawling tides of drift and surrender’. The making of his reputation had begun in the early 1930s when Eden occupied only subordinate office within the administration. Yet an examination of the making of British foreign policy in the years 1931–5 will show that popular perceptions of Eden's position and of an apparently serious rift between him and his departmental superior were somewhat misleading.

Academic Freedom and the Politics of Truth

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael P. Lynch
Keyword(s):  
Academic Freedom ◽  
Democratic Deliberation ◽  
Public Mind ◽  
Epistemic Practice ◽  
The Public ◽  
The One ◽  
Rational Inquiry ◽  
The Ideal

This chapter argues that academic freedom is justified because it is an inherently epistemic practice that serves the ideals of democracy. With Dewey, it is argued that “The one thing that is inherent and essential [to the idea of a university] is the ideal of truth.” But far from being apolitical, the value of pursuing truth and knowledge—the value that justifies academic freedom, both within and without the public mind—is a fundamental democratic value, and for three reasons: the practices of academic inquiry exemplify rational inquiry of the kind needed for democratic deliberation; those practices serve to train students to pursue that kind of inquiry; and those practices are important engines of democratic dissent.

The White Papers, 1935–1936

2018 ◽  
pp. 143-172
Author(s):  
Christopher W. Miller
Keyword(s):  
National Government ◽  
League Of Nations ◽  
General Election ◽  
The Public

This chapter focuses on the attempt to ‘sell’ rearmament – which the National Government increasingly believed was necessary – to the public through a series of White Papers outlining its position on defence in 1935 and 1936. The 1935 general election, the League of Nations Peace Ballot, the Italian invasion of Abyssinia, and the appointment of further subcommittees on defence requirements (and their effects on rearmament) are all discussed. The latter part of the chapter discusses Lithgow’s business empire, part of which was built on information he received through his work as a government advisor.

Defining Dilemmas Down: The Case of 24

2009 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 4-36
Author(s):  
John M. Parrish ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Moral Dilemma ◽  
The Other ◽  
Political Ethics ◽  
Moral Conflicts ◽  
Public Mind ◽  
The Public ◽  
Moral Wrong ◽  
Philosophical Account ◽  
The One ◽  
The Cost

One of the most important concepts in the field of political ethics is the idea of a moral dilemma – understood as a situation in which an agent’s public responsibilities and moral imperatives conflict in such a way that no matter what the agent does she will in some way be committing a moral wrong. In the aftermath of the events of September 11, 2001, the notion of a moral dilemma has undergone a profound reconceptualization in American political discourse, and there has perhaps been no more important cultural forum for that conceptual revision than the quintessential post-9/11 melodrama, FOX Television’s 24. This paper first describes and then critically evaluates America’s new model moral dilemma as portrayed on 24. Focusing specifically on 24’s Season Five (the year the show won the Emmy for Best Dramatic Series), the paper shows how 24’s creators have substituted in the public mind almost a parody of the standard philosophical account of a moral dilemma in place of the traditional notion. Their methods for this conceptual revision have included both an extravagant, even baroque portrayal of the grand dilemmas which confront Jack Bauer and his fellow patriots, on the one hand, and on the other, a subtle de-valuing of the moral stakes in the more pedestrian variety of moral conflicts Bauer and company must overcome in their quest to keep America safe whatever the cost.

The British Admiralty Records as a Source for African History

1986 ◽  
Vol 13 ◽  
pp. 161-175
Author(s):  
Melvin Hendrix
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
National Defense ◽  
Royal Navy ◽  
Traditional Role ◽  
Naval Power ◽  
British Foreign Policy ◽  
Policy Objectives ◽  
Tropical Areas ◽  
The One

What is more characteristically English than the Navy?The relationship between naval power and British sovereignty is one of long standing in British foreign policy. This was especially evident in the nineteenth century, when Britain achieved almost unchallenged global naval pre-eminence following the Napoleonic Wars, keeping order in a world that British commercial interests were creating. As a consequence, the traditional role of the navy as a national defense force was changing dramatically to that of an international policeman on the one hand and surrogate statesman on the other. These two roles were generally most pronounced in the emerging tropical areas of trade in Asia, Africa, and South America.It is in relation to Africa that this essay is concerned, and over the course of the nineteenth century, the influence of the Royal Navy on African societies was an evolving, but considerable, force--as surveyor, policeman, employer, ally, adversary, diplomat, and enforcer. On the whole, Britain's Africa policy throughout much of the century was based on the suppression of the slave trade, while simultaneously providing protection for British citizens promoting “legitimate” commercial interests.Since the trade in slaves from Africa was chiefly a maritime enterprise, its navy became the chief instrument for implementing these foreign policy objectives, a role that shifted in the second half of the century to a more direct imperialist posture.

‘I am going through a mental hell’: Political crisis and the Admiralty, August – December 1931

1995 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
pp. 377-397
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Significant Role ◽  
Young Men ◽  
Self Esteem ◽  
National Government ◽  
Foreign Affairs ◽  
Political Crisis ◽  
The Political ◽  
Foreign Office ◽  
Eventual Outcome

Austen Chamberlain did not play a significant role in the events leading up to the political crisis or the decision to form a National Government on 24 August 1931. The eventual outcome of those developments, however, delivered a bitter blow to his self-esteem and marked a major watershed in his career. Had the Conservatives won the 1929 election, Chamberlain believed Baldwin would have returned him to the Foreign Office as he had promised. He continued to nurture this expectation throughout the period in Opposition. Even after being struck forcibly by the ‘violent animus against the “Old Gang”’ and the very specific attacks upon his foreign policy in Egypt and China at the Caxton Hall meeting in October 1930, he still consoled himself with the thought that none of his colleagues were excluded from criticism; that the critics consisted mainly of reactionary, disreputable or disgruntled groups (often all three) without ‘many young men of a decent type’; and that such grousing was symptomatic of the frustration engendered by Baldwin's lack of leadership and a natural impatience for youth to have its chance. As a result, he remained content to believe that not only did he still have much to contribute in foreign affairs but that there was no one else with a comparable claim to the portfolio.

Das russische Verfassungsexperiment 1906–1918: Zum Verhältnis von Tradition und Modernität

2008 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 88-115
Author(s):  
Dietmar Neutatz
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
The Public ◽  
Peter The Great ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Public Sphere ◽  
The Russian Empire ◽  
The One ◽  
Special Circumstances ◽  
The Relationship

The Russian Constitutional Experiment, 1906–1918: On the Relationship between Tradition and Modernity The revolution of 1905 turned the virtually unlimited autocracy of the Russian Empire into a constitutional monarchy. However, this experiment survived the fall of the Tsar in 1917 by only a few months and was obliged to give way to the Bolshevik dictatorship. This article investigates how far the failure of constitutionalism in Russia was due to the special circumstances surrounding the crisis of 1917, or whether it is better explained by the ill-conceived application of a notion imported from Western Europe that could not be grafted onto indigenous Russian traditions. The article discusses the competing concepts of Western-style parliamentarianism on the one hand and a ‹Russian› ideal of direct popular representation on the other (i.e. the ‹Zemskij Sobor› dating from the era before Peter the Great). It investigates the constraints within which the State Duma worked, and the social and political practice of Russian constitutionalism between 1906 and 1918, in order to analyse how deeply rooted constitutional concepts were in late Tsarist society. Special attention is paid to the following themes: the capacity of the Duma to address practical problems; the changing character of political culture; new forms of the public sphere and the growth of civil society; the relationship between parliament and the peasantry; the activities of both supporters of a parliamentary order and their right- and left-wing opponents; and finally the importance of ‹Russian›-style counter-proposals to ‹Western›-style constitutionalism during the crisis years of 1917/18.

scholarly journals THE LESSONS OF ABADAN AND SUEZ FOR BRITISH FOREIGN POLICYMAKERS IN THE 1960s

2006 ◽  
Vol 49 (2) ◽  
pp. 525-547 ◽  
Author(s):  
PETER J. BECK
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Pilot Project ◽  
Radical Change ◽  
Historical Narrative ◽  
Change Of Direction ◽  
British Foreign Policy ◽  
Foreign Office ◽  
The 1960S

Responding positively to the 1957 ‘funding experience’ initiative encouraging Whitehall departments to use history more systematically in their everyday work, the Foreign Office commissioned a pilot project centred upon the 1951 Anglo-Iranian Abadan crisis. The resulting study, completed by Rohan Butler in 1962, included a lengthy section drawing lessons from the historical narrative. During the early 1960s Butler's Abadan history, attracting interest and comment from both ministers and officials, fed into ongoing reviews of British foreign policy and methods stimulated by the 1956 Suez debacle and Britain's initial failure to join the Common Market (1963). Confronting policymakers with the contemporary realities affecting Britain's role in the world, the history prompted serious thinking about the case for a radical change of direction in both foreign policy and methods. Generally speaking, the Foreign Office has made little use of history in the actual policymaking process. From this perspective, this episode, centred upon Butler's Abadan history, offers a useful case study illuminating any appraisal of history's potential as a policy input, most notably concerning the role of historical analogies in the formulation, conduct, and presentation of British foreign policy.

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