Test on British politics - Essay Example

British Politics Exam Q1. How has membership of the EU affected Britain’s constitution? EU is an economic and political partnership that was formed between 27 countries in 1973. Being a member of the European Union has significantly affected the Britain’s constitution. It is evident that most countries or nations that have constitutions did so due to the effect of special events that occurred such as independence. Britain on the other hand has never had a special event that prompts into writing the guidelines to governance. As a result, Britain’s constitution borrows heavily from other organizations and bodies. Other than Common Law, Acts of Parliaments, and Equity, the European Union Law has been one of the major legal sources of Britain’s constitution. In this perspective, being a member of EU has enabled Britain to have a significant legal source for her constitution. The EU Law has been incorporated into English Law by the sole virtue of European Communities Act of 1972. Therefore, Britain’s EU membership has provided the nation with a vital and significant legal source for its constitution. Due to her membership to the EU, Britain’s government is not only concerned with the internal organization but also the various international dimensions as prescribed by the stated rules and regulations within the group. EU membership has had significant impact on areas of law that European Union Law cuts across. As a result, the EU membership has resulted into significant constitutional changes in Britain. For instance, through being a member of the EU, Britain has to drop the ‘old constitution’ thereby ceasing to be a sovereign state given that most of the rules and regulations developed by the EU affected all the member states. No doubt therefore, that being a member of the European Union significantly affected the constitution of Britain. Other than being a legal source to the constitution as well as defining the activities and inclusions into the constitution, Britain’s membership to the EU has given the European Law primacy over the various national legislations developed. Impact of Britain’s constitution as a result of being a member of EU is determined by the proportion of laws in Britain that are derived from the EU laws. The proportion of laws, rules, and regulations derived from EU laws and incorporated into Britain’s constitution is significantly high hence indicating that the former has had significant impact on the latter. The higher proportion is evidence that the European Law has had primacy over the national legislation hence explaining the significant impact EU membership has had over Britain’s constitution. Another impact of the Britain’s EU membership on the constitution is the idea of task enforcing the law within Britain. Evidently, the enforcement of the constitution has been extended to the European courts and not to the Britain courts as it was earlier on. Since the majority of laws, rules, and regulations within Britain’s constitution are taken from the EU Laws, the enforcing tasks are now performed by both European and British courts. In this perspective, legal status of the British citizens has significantly changed where they can have their rights address not only by the national legal systems but also by the European legal systems. All these have led to changes in the parliamentary sovereignty within the Britain. Therefore, membership of the European Union has significantly affected Britain’s constitution in a number of ways that include being primacy over the national constitution, extending stakeholders responsible for enacting legislation, defining activities, laws, rules, and regulations in the national constitution, and interfering within the state and parliamentary sovereignties. Q2. Does Britain have a civic culture? In the past, Britain had not civil culture, which through reforms was developed and created. Therefore contemporarily, Britain has a strong civil culture. Culture is an aspect of societal relations that persists within a community or nation over time. Despite the fact that Britain had not explicit civil culture during the classical period, many changes have led to a significantly influential civil culture. Some of the historical reasons that prevented Britain from having a significant civil culture included the fact that Britain had no concept of the state but rather gave serious credit to the Crown. This was on the basis of its monarchy form of governance. On a different perspective, Britain did not have a significant civil culture given the fact that civil service role in the classical period was regarded as non-implementory. Civil servants in Britain’s tradition could only perform roles that are contemporary considered to be non-influential. Some of the functions that civil servants undertook during the traditional Britain’s governance included mobilization of society only during times of war. Nevertheless, with serious and significant changes, Britain’s governance structured incorporated civil servants hence building the persistence civil culture. After 1919, Britain’s governance had a clear structure that included administrative, executive, and clerical officials. Such structures defined the specific roles of every office hence giving room to civil culture. For instance, there was definition of ministerial responsibilities, which were different from other civil servants. Notably, this idea brought so many wrangles between ministers and the civil servants especially on the basis of arising challenges such as accountability and obtaining specialists who would be responsible for delivery of quality services. The wrangles led to the creation of the Civil Service Act, which aimed at not only protecting civil servants against ministerial wishes but also promoted the Civil Culture in Britain. The Constitutional Reform and Governance Act of 2010 assisted in clearing the air in respect to civil servants and civil culture within Britain. Indeed, after the 1919 reforms, civil service was considered a united entity that emphasized coordination with the sole aim of enhancing career opportunities as well as sanity within the government in terms of policies enactment. Today, the Britain’s civil service is considered as an institution that has great power to the extent that they can manipulate ministers. The establishment of the civil service in 1919 with distinctive features resulted into adoption and development of the Civil Culture in Britain. Nonetheless, it should be noted that civil service has been under continuous attack thereby forcing the group to enact serious reforms since the Fulton in 1968 to cushion them against the same. Other than using such reforms to cushion the institution against attack, the civil service has engaged in reforms to define the roles and structures of the organization or institution. It should be noted therefore, that despite the many attacks, civil culture in Britain has continued to grow thus wielding such great power. Therefore, today Britain boasts of a very significant and powerful civil culture unlike during the classical time when civil service was not defined. Indeed, Britain has a civil culture, which is not only influential but very powerful as well. Q3. Should pressure groups always be seen as a positive feature of the political process?   It is indisputable that pressure groups should be seen as positive features of political process. Different from political parties, pressure groups refer to collections of citizens holding similar values and beliefs that cut across ethnicity, political philosophy, religion, and common goal amongst others. In other words, pressure group is a generic term used in referring to any kind of group that seeks to influence the government in order to adopt of change specific policies that are considered to be ineffective. In most cases, pressure groups are avenues of representing viewpoints of people who are dissatisfied with existing conditions or ways of governance in a country. In this perspective, given that pressure groups represent viewpoints of citizens who are dissatisfied, they should always be considered as positive features of a political process. From the different functions that pressure groups perform, they should be considered as positive features of a political process. For instance, pressure groups permit a continuous dialogue between the government and the subjects under governance. Pressure groups also provide opportunities for political participation. Various members in a nation who may be considered voiceless find an opportunity to be engage in political participation. In addition, pressure groups provide government with information as well as expertise in influencing development of policies for purposes of making the condition favorable for every citizen. In this perspective, pressure groups should always be considered as positive features within any political process. Moreover, pressure groups within political process always articulate and defend the interest of minorities. The minorities within a political institution may not have the opportunity to actively participate in formulation of policies. Therefore, through pressure groups minorities are able to be engaged in development of policy. During this process, pressure groups act as check on possible abuses that the government power may be subjected to. Britain’s political process has shown evidence of participation of pressure groups such as the civil service in checking the abuse of government power. Checking the government power abuse, pressure groups compete with another in a bid to influencing policy and conditional outcomes. Amidst all these merits, it becomes evident that pressure groups are positive features within political process. Lastly, pressure groups are widely seen as channels of enhancing democracy. Democracy is where citizens are allowed to participate in governing their nation. Whilst offering opportunities and political voice to citizens traditionally considered as weak, pressure groups have ways of adopting a variety of strategies for achieving stated goals, aims, and objectives. It is true that within Britain, there have been significant gains in different sectors such as public health since the enhancement of civil culture in 1919. This indicates that pressure groups are able to exert pressure on such sectors through the government thereby making the living standards of common citizens better. What’s more, individual pressure groups can create larger coalitions in a bid to making them more efficient and effective. Pressure groups therefore have the capacity and capability of fulfilling a valuable function within any sector of a nation. From all the above merits associated within pressure groups, it is clear that they should always be considered as positive features within any political system or process. Read More