The Oxford Handbook of Scottish Politics

2020 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Public Policy ◽  
United Kingdom ◽  
Party System ◽  
Essential Difference ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
European Nation ◽  
New Phase ◽  
Scottish Politics ◽  
Constitutional Issue

Politics in Scotland has changed massively in recent decades. Since 1999, there has been a devolved Parliament and Government. Scotland is of interest, not because of some essential difference from England but as a European nation, with its own history and society, within the larger union of the United Kingdom. Devolution, once a contested issue, is now broadly accepted. Since devolution, the party system and voting patterns have changed. Scotland’s capacity to make its own public policy has grown. The constitutional issue was not resolved in the Independence Referendum of 2014 and has entered a new phase with Brexit.

Party Constraints on Leaders in Pursuit of Change

1993 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 151-176
Author(s):  
Patricia Sykes
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Public Policy ◽  
United Kingdom ◽  
Significant Influence ◽  
Party System ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Late Nineteenth ◽  
The U.S

Since the late nineteenth century, dissatisfaction with the U.S. party system has led political scientists to look across the Atlantic for ”responsible parties,” cohesive teams with leaders who articulate and promote distinctive programs for public policy. Yet U.S. political scientists have been misguided when they have searched for a different, superior set of parties in the United Kingdom. British parties have never possessed the internal cohesion characteristic of the responsible-parties model. Nor have they, for that matter, empowered their leaders to pursue change. When parties prove significant, influence operates in the British environment much as it does in the U.S. context—as a commodity bargained for among groups within the two major parties.

Surrogacy and public policy

2021 ◽  
Vol 72 (3) ◽  
pp. 588-595
Author(s):  
Elaine O’Callaghan
Keyword(s):  
Public Policy ◽  
United Kingdom ◽  
Supreme Court ◽  
Legal Framework ◽  
Commercial Surrogacy ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
The Law

The Supreme Court in the United Kingdom has held that it is not contrary to public policy to award damages in tort to fund a commercial surrogacy in another jurisdiction where this is lawful. This significant decision, in the case of Whittington Hospital NHS Trust v XX [2020] UKSC 14, will potentially have an impact on the regulation and reform of surrogacy law in the United Kingdom, Ireland and internationally. The judgment delivered by Lady Hale draws attention to multiple inconsistencies in the law, and it highlights, in particular, the need for effective regulation of domestic surrogacy. Legislators face an important and imminent challenge to reconcile the reality of commercial surrogacy with a deficient legal framework. This article seeks to highlight some of the important issues which this case has raised when considering regulation and reform of surrogacy law.

Are “Stranger Donors” Irrational?

2021 ◽  
pp. 55-60
Author(s):  
Martha Gershun ◽  
John D. Lantos
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Public Policy ◽  
United Kingdom ◽  
The United States ◽  
Federal Legislation ◽  
Organ Donors ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Transplant Registry ◽  
Altruistic Donor ◽  
Psychological Benefit

This chapter seeks to understand the motivations of people who offered to donate a kidney to a stranger. It explores the degree of emotional relationship that was essential to justify the claim that donation provided a psychological benefit to the donor. The chapter also mentions a law in the United Kingdom called the Unrelated Live Transplant Registry Authority which required organ donors to provide proof that they had a relationship with the recipient. In the United States, however, there is no federal legislation or public policy regulating stranger donors. The chapter then turns to discuss a study led by nephrologist Aaron Spital showing how attitudes within the transplant community gradually shifted from almost universal rejection of stranger donors to their gradual acceptance. It assesses the struggles that nephrologists went through in trying to determine whether such altruists were noble or irrational. Ultimately, the chapter offers a unique glimpse into the motivations of an altruistic donor and into the forms of skepticism that doctors and psychologists bring to evaluations of such donors.

The Lex Fori

2019 ◽  
pp. 172-194
Author(s):  
Adrian Briggs
Keyword(s):  
Public Policy ◽  
United Kingdom ◽  
International Law ◽  
Private International Law ◽  
English Court ◽  
Conflict Of Laws ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Foreign Law ◽  
The Law

This chapter examines of the role of the lex fori in English private international law before proceeding to examine the rules of the conflict of laws applicable in an English court. Issues for which the rules of the conflict of laws select the lex fori as the law to be applied include grounds for the dissolution (as distinct from nullity) of marriage, even if the marriage has little or nothing to do with the United Kingdom; or settlement of the distribution of assets in an insolvency even though there may be significant overseas elements. Where the rules of the conflict of laws select a foreign law, its application, even though it is proved to the satisfaction of the court, may be disrupted or derailed by a provision of the lex fori instead. The remainder of the chapter covers procedural issues; penal, revenue, and public laws; and public policy.

Some Implications of the Commodification of Information and the Emerging Information Economy for Applied Geographical Analysis in the United Kingdom

1987 ◽  
Vol 19 (11) ◽  
pp. 1423-1439 ◽  
Author(s):  
S Openshaw ◽  
J Goddard
Keyword(s):  
Public Policy ◽  
United Kingdom ◽  
Research Agenda ◽  
Intrinsic Value ◽  
Information Economy ◽  
Data Bases ◽  
Computer Data ◽  
Geographical Analysis ◽  
Analysis Techniques ◽  
The United Kingdom

This paper contains a consideration of some of the implications of the emerging information economy for quantitative geography. The vast increase in computer data bases creates exciting new prospects for applied analysis relevant to public policy and private organisations. An attempt is made to identify where these new opportunities are located, to discuss some of the reasons for previous failures, to exploit the intrinsic value of geographical analysis techniques, and to outline a research agenda for the future.

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