What is the State of Britain - Essay Example

Introduction Nation states adopt a global and local structure of political power that organise and preserve historically entrenched and well particularised paradigms of governance, a paradigm of institutional uniqueness that symbolises autonomous identity. The growth of industrial capitalism in Europe ever since the industrial revolution in Britain has seen the emergence of a consolidated group of autonomous entities that shape and govern the nation-state’s approach. The state of Britain has three unique attributes that strongly influence its institutional arrangement in the 21st century. First, the British state was the first to become industrialised; second, the industrialisation process progressed smoothly; and third, Britain has witnessed a stable sovereign standing and control over its land ever since the industrial revolution.1 Within the present concept of a British state, these attributes seem profoundly entrenched, ideologically and historically.2 This essay analyses the concept of the ‘State of Britain’ with reference to the notions of public sector, civic culture, governance, and globalism. The State of Britain The modern British state, similar to all other modern states, possesses massive resources. At current rates of spending and taxation, a significant portion of the national revenue is blocked by the government. Moreover, the modern British state manages a vast mechanism of income transfers through subsidies, tariffs, welfare fees, and progressive taxation.3 Due to its strong economic status, the modern British state remains tremendously influential in Western Europe. Mostly, the weight of taxation in Britain has grown during and after Thatcherism, whilst the percentage of national revenue blocked by the government has not substantially dwindled. The outcomes of the rise of the state as a holder and overseer of massive resources with a stake in all parts of endeavour are massive without a doubt. Within the perspective of mass democracy, it will practically always be in the interest of politicians to provide resources for current and emerging interest groups.4 In the modern British state, therefore, the government is inclined to satisfy private interests. In contrast to the classical view of the state as the source of public services, the modern British state is essentially a provider of private resources. Whilst in the classical theory of the state the duty of the government is to promote civil order, the modern British state mostly fulfils the private demands of deceitful interest groups.5 In enduring this transformation, government has deviated from its established tasks of safeguarding the territory, keeping order and restoring and mending the foundations of civil society. Generally, theories of state can be classified into four wide-ranging categories: pluralism, new right theories, elite theory, and Marxian perspectives.6 Pluralism provides an account of political power that stresses its relatively equal sharing between representative groups and institutions. Within the pluralist perspective, the function of the state is policymaking and resolution of conflicts, functions that generate the need for economic and legislative involvement to capture the failure of the private sector market.7 Pluralism justifies the rise of Thatcherism as a rearrangement of the prevailing political ideas in Britain which weakened liberal collectivism to build liberal individualism.8 On the other hand, new right theories of the state originated from a broad array of groups that have in common a refusal of social democracy as a traditional and relative effect on the British state since 1945. The political initiatives related to the new right support a removal of a collectivist model of the public sector and state intervention in the economy. This perspective formed much of the basis for deregulation and privatisation of state-owned enterprises and the public sector.9 The impact of the new right perspective was dominant in the 1980s’ economic management. An economic approach that focused on solid resources required reducing public spending to guarantee a mitigation of the tax burden on organisations and the people. Consequently, this rationalised the curtailing of the public sector through obligatory competitive tendering and privatisation, which consequently rationalised additional reductions in local and central taxation.10 The relationship of solid resources with the economics of supply stressed the necessity of building an effective capitalist economy by rigid regulation of cash supply to reduce inflation. Furthermore, public spending was rejected based on efficiency, the delivery of public goods is incompetent due to monopoly government.11 By placing emphasis on the development of government, public choice thinkers have been highly powerful in fuelling the movement towards privatisation in the British state. Even though the emphasis varies from one thinker to the next, interpretations reach the same assumptions: first, public expenditure is enhanced by aspects beyond the power of the major party; and, second, the public delivery of services is unproductive.12 Political parties and policymakers are believed to be motivated by the principle of party competition. Parties try to win votes by pledging to enhance the loves of the voting public, thus raising the expectations of the voters about what government is ought to and can do. Policymakers employ a political cost-benefit analysis to develop public programmes and policy. Tax-subsidised programmes’ costs and benefits are either widely allocated among the people or the benefits consolidated and the costs are dispersed.13 As regards civic culture, the people of the British state were never fully contented with their political standing. Nevertheless, they perhaps were as satisfied as any nation in the 21st century. There was almost common belief that the political system rooted in cabinet rule and parliamentary power was valid. Almost everybody recognised the right to rule of the government. The British were exceptionally charitable of one another and of the individuals who govern them.14 Most adults believe in their ability to influence the political decision-making process. There could be a particular context where in the civic culture is unstable. Since the latter part of the 1960s, ‘British-ness’ altogether has weakened, particularly among the Welsh and the Scots. A 2000 survey asked citizens about the extent of their identification with the British state. 72% of the Scots said they identify with Scotland, and 18% said Britain.15 When asked about the status of their lives in the future, only a few believed that the British state would be the key political entity in their lives. However, in spite of this rise in regional identity and influence, nobody is predicting that the British state is going to collapse in the near future.16 Yet, most of the institutions and representations that have united the British state are becoming weak in terms of influence. The monarchy is losing its influence. Although the current queen or king never had any real political authority, the monarchy has been an integral representation of the British state’s integrity and solidarity.17 Nevertheless, much of the pride of the British state has vanished after a series of controversies involving the ‘royals’. The new British state is mirrored in the evolving physical facade of Britain. Britain is ever more a racially diverse state. Ultimately, identification with the British state is being weakened as an outcome of its EU membership. Traditional euroskeptics based their doubts on the possibility of losing national identity.18 In the meantime, it is the entrenched connections within and between labour, capital, and the broader state machinery of institutional and political systems that shape a governance paradigm. Particularised systems may influence the status of a nation state in the global political economy, favourably or unfavourably.19 An entrenched system of governance may manifest specific factors of historical development, like the persistent unity of the British state, its early industrialisation and the lack of a consolidated constitutional framework. Similarly, the fairly nonviolent movement from absolutist monarchy to semi-democracy is important. The monarchy discovered a similar goal with the industrial group to resist dynamic state involvement in industrial capitalism.20 An entrenched paradigm of governance may reveal strategic decisions in the political and military domain, such as attaining, building, and sustaining an empire. This led to the continuation of a major but varied manufacturing segment.21 The nation-state’s autonomy reflects the particularisation process, both globally and in domestic associations. Domestically, historically entrenched mechanisms create the foundation for institutional control, but weakly controlled by the state and institutionalised. By contrast, nation states in global affairs set out military and economic influence and incursion, building of an empire, territorial conflicts, and warfare, to sustain and reinforce autonomy.22 Power and attempt to gain power generate a global community of nations to match the market’s anarchy. The early post-war period witnessed institutionalised, historically entrenched, goals and aspirations in the state automatically restored and authorised to highlight the strategic standing of the British state in the developing Cold War.23 A political resolve to sustain national independence preserved institutionalised markets to create temporary prospects for the economy and the state, but sustaining both generated major longer-term limitations for the economy and the state. In the early post-war period market stabilities, production systems and institutionalised paradigms of management enhanced a fairly incompetent industrial relations structure and production processes.24 The contemporary period is filled with the assumption of an unstoppable movement towards globalism. Globalism is defined as the approach or disposition to give more importance to the interests of the whole world rather than the interests of specific nations. Economic orientations towards union stem from globalism or the formation of only one European market at the regional arena.25 These demands will supposedly standardise particularised paradigms of development related to specific nations. Nevertheless, formulating a historically entrenched assumption that institutionalises the unique mechanisms and systems that make a state distinctive defies the premise and progress of globalism. In the current era of economic globalisation, the relative weaknesses in the British paradigm of capital creation reveal and are the same as those of the post-war years.26 The early post-war years witnessed the outcome of unprocessed or pure industrialisation and the consequent impacts of empire restored. This was required to reinforce the broader objectives of the state and global affairs. Even though such goals linger, the post-war economic outcomes of the British state has faced difficulties sustaining them.27 Britain is a modern state, but at the same time traditional to the point of fixation with the past. The political and economic objectives of the British state were created during the post-war period. During the post-war years, the objective of economic programmes shifted from establishing the national direction of the British state to wealth to a political goal of moderating economic depression. The objective of autonomy in national policy still expresses national reaffirmation in a globalised world, previously governed by rivalry among superpowers now governed by the demands of globalisation.28 The power of globalisation has made national policies seem important and feasible, such as the preservation of institutionalised markets, management patterns, and employment regulation paradigms. Each fulfilled a function in maintaining the relatively low-investment of the British industry that has seemed important to maintain the broader objectives and interests of the British state in global relations.29 Conclusions The history of the British state, especially its progress towards industrial capitalism, is very unique or particularised. This in turn characterises the concept of the state of Britain, particularly in terms of the public sector, civic culture, governance, and globalism. The industrialisation process within the British state was very localised and crude, involving modest state intervention. The state of Britain is fixated with the past. The goals of economic, political, and social management are largely based on the security of national sovereignty. By focusing on national sovereignty, the state of Britain has moderated economic depression by sustaining decisive connection with the past. Basically, the state of Britain, as shown in the analysis of the public sector, civic culture, governance, and globalism, is a state that has three unique attributes that determines its identity until now, namely, the British state underwent the process of industrialization early on, its movement towards industrialisation was peaceful, and it has experienced strong national sovereignty since the industrial revolution. All these unique attributes of the state of Britain are historically embedded. References Bevir, M. & Rhodes, R., Interpreting British Governance (London: Routledge, 2012). Clark, I., Governance, the State, Regulation and Industrial Relations (London: Routledge, 2000). Cutler, T., Cutler, A., & Waine, B., Managing the Welfare State: The Politics of Public Sector Management (UK: Berg, 1998). Flinders, M., Delegated Governance and the British State: Walking Without Order (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008). Gifford, C., The Making of Eurosceptic Britain: Identity in a Post-Imperial State (UK: Ashgate Publishing, Ltd., 2008). Hauss, C. & Haussman, M., Comparative Politics: Domestic Responses to Global Challenges (Mason, OH: Cengage Learning, 2012). Jones, R., People- States- Territories: The Political Geographies of British State Transformation (UK: John Wiley & Sons, 2011). Moran, M., The British Regulatory State: High Modernism and Hyper-Innovation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003). Sweeney, S., Europe, the State, and Globalisation (New York: Pearson Longman, 2005). Zahariadis, N., Markets, States, and Public Policy: Privatisation in Britain and France (Michigan: University of Michigan Press, 1995). Read More