What Is New about ‘Network Governance’ and Why Does It Matter?

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. A. W. Rhodes
Keyword(s):  
Prime Minister ◽  
Policy Networks ◽  
Network Governance ◽  
The State ◽  
Accurate Description ◽  
British Government ◽  
The Core ◽  
Core Executive ◽  
Court Politics

This chapter replies to key criticisms about policy networks, the core executive, and governance. On networks, the chapter discusses the context of networks, and the ability of the theory to explain change. On the core executive, it discusses a shift away from a focus on the prime minister to court politics. On governance, the chapter returns to redefining the state, steering networks, metagovernance, and storytelling. It restates the case for the idea of the differentiated polity. This is edifying because it provides a vocabulary for a more accurate description of British government. Finally, the chapter provides a link to Volume II by summarizing the decentred approach to the differentiated polity.

On Court Politics

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. A. W. Rhodes
Keyword(s):  
Prime Minister ◽  
Political History ◽  
Historical Analysis ◽  
Contemporary History ◽  
Distinctive Features ◽  
The Core ◽  
Interpretive Approach ◽  
Core Executive ◽  
Court Politics ◽  
New Research

This chapter considers contemporary history, arguing for convergence between the core executive and predominant prime minister theses on the idea of ‘court politics’. It draws on the genres of presentation and thought found in the discipline of contemporary history. It suggests that marrying the notion of court politics to the historical analysis of high politics opens a challenging new research agenda for executive studies. The tools of historical analysis deployed by the New Political History provide a toolkit for accessing these insights. The chapter briefly summarizes an interpretive approach in historiography and makes the case for drawing on the New Political History, sketching its distinctive features, with examples, and explaining its relevance to executive studies. It reviews, with examples, existing literature on court politics; James Bulpitt on statecraft, and Donald Savoie on court government. Finally, it identifies the advantages of using an interpretive approach to study court politics.

Intelligence and the Core Executive

2010 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-28 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin J. Smith
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Policy Process ◽  
Policy Making ◽  
Security Policy ◽  
Prime Minister ◽  
Policy Outcomes ◽  
Considerable Influence ◽  
British Government ◽  
The Core ◽  
Core Executive

Much of the analysis of intelligence and security in British government has treated it as a separate and distinct sphere. This article argues that the core executive framework provides a useful mechanism for integrating security policy making with other aspects of the domestic policy process. The article analyses the changing nature of the core executive and its impact on decision-making. The article argues that if we look at intelligence through the core executive framework we can analyse intelligence as a particular form of knowledge that can provide the Prime Minister with considerable influence on policy outcomes. This is not, however, to suggest that the Prime Minister is presidential.

From Prime Ministerial Power to Core Executive

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. A. W. Rhodes
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Prime Minister ◽  
Central Government ◽  
Government Policies ◽  
Approaches To Studying ◽  
The Core ◽  
Executive Politics ◽  
Core Executive ◽  
The Government ◽  
Different Parts

The core executive is a new concept replacing the conventional debate about the power of the prime minister and the Cabinet. It refers to all those organizations and procedures that coordinate central government policies, and act as final arbiters of conflict between different parts of the government machine. In brief, the ‘core executive’ is the heart of the machine. The chapter reviews the several approaches to studying the British executive: prime ministerial government; prime ministerial cliques; Cabinet government; ministerial government; segmented decision-making; and bureaucratic coordination. It then discusses several ways forward by developing new theory and methods. The Afterword discusses the core executive as interlocking networks, and the fluctuating patterns of executive politics.

Transformation of the Japanese State in Antimonopoly Regulation after the 1980s

2018 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
MASAHIRO MOGAKI
Keyword(s):  
Policy Making ◽  
Power Relations ◽  
The State ◽  
State Transformation ◽  
Major Topic ◽  
Japanese Politics ◽  
The Core ◽  
Collective Group ◽  
Core Executive

AbstractAlthough state transformation after the 1980s has been a major topic of debate in political science, the transformation of the Japanese state has not been fully explored, with the pluralist and rational choice approaches dominating within the Japanese politics literature. This article addresses the lacuna by exploring state transformation in Japan's antimonopoly regulation after the 1980s, focusing on the state at the macro level through analysing evolving power relations within the core executive in response to the challenges of governance. The case study reveals the flexible change of power relations within the core executive; the core executive retained its dominance within policy-making arenas through this adaptation, which is regarded as the reconstitution of the state. Drawing on that, the article argues that the nature of state transformation in Japan is the sustained dominance of the core executive as a collective group over the sector through reconstituting the state.

Governing beyond the Centre: A Critique of the Anglo-Governance School

2003 ◽  
Vol 51 (3) ◽  
pp. 592-608 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mike Marinetto
Keyword(s):  
Central Government ◽  
Policy Networks ◽  
Processes Of Change ◽  
Central State ◽  
The Core ◽  
Governance Model ◽  
Governance Theory ◽  
Core Executive ◽  
Recent Developments ◽  
Governance School

One of the more intriguing theoretical discussions of recent years involves the concept of governance. There is now a substantial body of work concerning the way governance has affected the contribution of central government to the policy process. Possibly the most prominent and influential account of governance theory in British political science is offered by Rod Rhodes. His most recent writings have employed governance theory to explore the institutions, actors and processes of change within the core executive. His ‘Anglo-governance’ model has emerged as a prevalent and authoritative account of how new methods of governing have emerged in society. Significantly, it is maintained that a distinct shift has taken place in government, from a hierarchical organisation to a fragmented and decentralised entity that is heavily reliant on a range of complex and independent policy networks. There is undoubted evidence that government is a fractured institution that is dependent on state and non-state actors beyond the centre. This paper questions whether such features entail the emergence of a new form of governance. Central government is still highly resourced and has, at its disposal, a range of powers with which to retain influence over public sector agencies. Historical evidence also shows that the British polity has long been decentralised. Thus, it is difficult to see how recent developments have in any way transformed the capacities of the core executive. It seems that alternative ways of conceptualising the institutions, actors and processes of change in government are required. Recent efforts to develop ‘organising perspectives’, within the intellectual parameters of governance theory, offer a more ‘conceptually cautious’ treatment of the central state.

Exploring (and Explaining) the British Prime Minister

2005 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 605-620 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Heffernan
Keyword(s):  
Prime Minister ◽  
Chief Executive ◽  
The Political ◽  
Tony Blair ◽  
The Core ◽  
Economic Context ◽  
British Prime Minister ◽  
Core Executive ◽  
Actual Degree ◽  
The Government

Institutions cannot be understood without exploring the actors who occupy them, while actors cannot be understood without examining the institutions they inhabit. Ultimately, the actions of both institutions and actors cannot be understood separate to the political, social and economic context within which they are located. Tony Blair, rightly cited as an example of a powerful prime minister, does not have a monopoly of power, but he does have an extensive authority. The prime minister requires two things to operate effectively within Whitehall and Westminster: first, power over their parliamentary majority; and second, power within the government they lead. Because this power is contested and challenged, the age-old question, the actual degree of collegiality within government, is as central to contemporary debates about the working of the core executive as to the ancient debate about prime ministerial versus cabinet government. The prime minister is therefore best modelled as a strong, but sometimes weak, parliamentary chief executive.

scholarly journals Core Executive Politics in the Cameron Era, 2010–16: The Dynamics of Whitehall Reform

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-19
Author(s):  
Patrick Diamond
Keyword(s):  
Public Service ◽  
Cumulative Effect ◽  
Resource Dependency ◽  
British Government ◽  
Political Capacity ◽  
The Core ◽  
Executive Politics ◽  
Core Executive ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Rules Of The Game

Abstract By the early 1990s, the core executive was established as the ‘new orthodoxy’ in the study of British government at the centre. Thirty years on, this article avers that its main assumptions are increasingly questionable in the light of more recent empirical evidence. The core executive approach may well have outlived its usefulness. This claim is derived from analysis of the Cameron premiership from 2010 to 2016. The focus is on how Whitehall reform radically altered the relationship between politicians and civil servants, reshaping prevailing public service bargains and rules of the game. Ministers identified mechanisms to rebuild political capacity, augmenting partisan control of the bureaucracy. They drew on resources from outside the core executive while politicians increased their sway over civil service appointments. As a result, officials felt they should be ‘responsive’ to ministers. The cumulative effect was to replace interpersonal and institutional resource dependency with a ‘them and us’ model. Consequently, the risk of policy disasters and fiascos grew.

The Prime Minister and the Core Executive: A Liberal Intergovernmentalist Reading of UK Defence Policy Formulation 1997–2000

2005 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 508-525 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Dover
Keyword(s):  
Policy Making ◽  
Prime Minister ◽  
Policy Formulation ◽  
Domestic Policy ◽  
Government Policies ◽  
Common Denominator ◽  
European Security ◽  
The Core ◽  
Defence Policy ◽  
Core Executive

This article explores the domestic formulation of UK European defence policy 1997–2000 through the intergovernmental meetings at Pörtschach and Saint Malo which set in train the development and codification of a common European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP) in 2000, through a Liberal Intergovernmentalist (LI) framework. This research leads to five conclusions: first, that the Saint Malo initiative was a tactical shift of government policies rather than core preferences; second, that the prime minister centralised European defence policy-making within the core executive; third, that the prime minister was crucial to the development of the initiative; fourth, that the presentation of the initiative was made on lowest common denominator grounds; and, lastly, that the ‘successive limited comparisons' framework provides an effective corrective to LI's domestic policy formulation hypotheses.

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