The role of the judiciary in British government has given rise to considerable controversy. Commentators disagree on two important questions, one empirical, the other normative. The empirical question relates to what judges do, and the normative one concerns what judges should - or should not - do. Although these two questions are logically independent of each other, in practice empirical assessments of the judiciary are often laden with normative assumptions and preferences. As a result, the debate surrounding the modern British judiciary is highly polarised. In the light of this debate, a comprehensive account of the courts' contemporary role is urgently needed. To that end, this thesis addresses the following question: to what extent do judges voluntarily intervene in the conduct of British government? In answering this question, I provide an empirical analysis of what I term the courts' autonomous governmental role - that is to say, judges' propensity to develop and expand - or indeed restrict - the scope and depth of their interventions in relation to other governmental institutions. In order to study the role that the courts choose to play in the British political system today, I analyse public law decisions, lectures given by senior judges and interview data. The argument presented in this thesis is threefold. First, judicial powers - whether granted by Parliament or developed by the judges themselves at common law - should not be confused with what judges actually do. Powers only become effective if the judges are willing to make use of them. Second, the courts' degree of involvement in the political system is not uniform: judges are more assertive in some areas than in others and these differences can be only identified by means of an in-depth study of the judicial process. Third, far from being power hungry, as they are sometimes portrayed, judges exercise a considerable degree of restraint in their judgements.

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This thesis explores radical left-wing documentary produced in Britain since 1990. Despite constituting a lively and diverse part of contemporary British film culture, oppositional documentary has been overlooked by film and media scholars for much of the last twenty-five years. Indeed, the last book-length study of radical British filmmaking was Margaret Dickinson’s Rogue Reels: Oppositional Film in Britain, 1945-90 (1999). The lack of subsequent research on the topic suggests that a politicised documentary film culture in Britain is now all but non-existent. Yet, on the contrary, the thesis reveals oppositional documentary to be a thriving aspect of alternative British culture, albeit one that has undergone significant changes as it has adapted to the major technological, socio-economic and political developments that have taken place since 1990. As well as recovering this history, this thesis also suggests some reasons for its neglect in the first place. Asserting an admittedly problematic yet necessary distinction between the aesthetic and the political avant-garde, I claim oppositional documentary as a manifestation of the latter: an explicitly partisan and committed kind of filmmaking in which the need for aesthetic innovation is subordinate to the communication of political ideas. The legacy of a trend dominant in political film theory since the 1970s, I argue that the values and priorities of the aesthetic avant-garde have become the benchmark of political film practice such that the very existence of the political avant-garde has been effaced altogether. Exploring both the video-activist and feature-length efforts of oppositional documentary filmmakers over the last two decades, this thesis re-claims the political avant-garde as an important part of contemporary radical filmmaking in Britain.

Classical and contemporary scholarship on leadership has referred to political performance and the ability of political actors to deploy the self to political purpose. Literature on contemporary British politics (Hennessy, 2001; Marquand, 2008, King, 2009) has highlighted the qualitative shift in political leadership from the mid-1990s towards a focus upon the image, style, celebrity and performance of political leaders, and the shift towards the presidentialisation or semi-presidentialisation of the prime minister (Foley, 2001). However, the literature has lacked a focus upon political performance and a methodology for assessing leadership performance within cultural and institutional contexts. This thesis assesses British political leadership performance from 1997-2010 through the proposal of a framework of political performance to suit comparative purpose. The framework consisting of culture, institutions and performance is used to assess the performance of the case studies (Tony Blair, Gordon Brown and David Cameron, and Gordon Brown, David Cameron and Nick Clegg in the televised Leaders’ Debates of 2010). The application of the framework to the case studies will allow us to a) analyse political performance within given cultural and institutional contexts; b) establish the character traits and other aspects of a politician’s political persona; and c) appraise the role and effects of performance and persona upon the political process.

Between 1766 and 1773 issues related to the East India Company were a dominant theme in British politics: in 1767 and 1772-3 there were major parliamentary inquiries into the affairs of the Company. This thesis is a study of why this was so. It is a study of the response of politicians and those within the Company to the changing nature of British activity in India. Attention is focussed upon two legislative bodies: Parliament and the General Court of the Company. Such an approach is necessary as much of the East Indian legislation enacted during this period originated in the General Court. The nature of this political proceHS is reflected in the organization of the thesis. Part one is devoted to a consideration of the political structure and decision-making machinery of the Company. Particular attention has been given to the factional struggle for control of the Company, and to the growth of a ministerial 'interest' in the executive body, the Court of Directors. Part two is a study of the intrusion of Company issues into parliamentary politics. It is argued that shortcomings in the Pratt-Yorke legal opinion of 1757 conditioned the nature of parliamentary intervent ions into the Company's affairs. The motives behind, and scope of, the first inquiry of 1767 are examined, as are the failures to reform the Company between 1768 and 1772. Finally, in the wake of the financial crisis of 1772, detailed consideration is given to the second parliamentary inquiry and the passage of Lord North's East Indian legislation in 1773.

This thesis argues that Oakeshott's theory of civil association and his reading of modem European history offer a plausible way of comprehending the general historical character of the British Conservative tradition. Focusing on two broad periods, it claims that as different as the facets of 19th-century 'paternalism' and 20th_ century 'libertarianism' are, they can nevertheless be understood as interpretations of the same Conservative core. A novel Oakeshottian approach is suggested whereby its subject is understood as a tradition. This draws on the Conservative structure which consists of two categorically distinct parts - philosophical assumptions and practical politics, a divide only further emphasised by the anti-ideological stance. In order to achieve a holistic view of the tradition, its philosophical and practical layers are tied together by way of considering the Conservative assumptions in terms of their historical implications and by extracting from behind the relatively long periods of Conservative politics their main philosophical positions. Based on this scheme, it is possible to juxtapose Hegel's and Oakeshott's complementary readings of societas with Disraelian Toryism and Thatcherism. It is found that while sharing the idea of civil association, the two creeds still differ significantly since they stem from different perceptions and historical contexts. This works both period-wise but also in parallel since the threat to societas was perceived as multifaceted - both collectivism and radical individualism were considered dangerous by Conservatives. As representatives of the 'paternalist' and 'libertarian' subtraditions, the thesis focuses on some salient general features of the Disraelian and Thatcherite streams and finds them representing the distinguished Oakeshottian assumptions. Likewise, the ideas of some prominent Disraelian and Thatcherite protagonists are considered. Despite the often significant differences in their views, it is argued that their broader understanding of the role of the state relies on the idea of societas.

Policy transfer is an ubiquitous feature of contemporary policy-making in the UK. Indeed, it is endorsed by central government and encouraged by a core of academics. Although, as a concept, it has proved extraordinarily adaptable to a range of empirical cases, it is nevertheless an inadequately theorised concept. New Labour's development of the New Deal is perhaps the most famous example of policy transfer in the UK, yet, despite a wealth of transfer analyses, no definitive account of New Labour's policy learning has yet emerged. This thesis seeks to accomplish two related aims. Firstly, it looks to develop a more adequate theoretical framework for the analysis of policy transfer. To do so, it roots its approach in critical realist transcendentalism and undertakes a detailed critique of the work of policy transfer analysts to produce an `emergent' model of policy transfer. Secondly, this model is then used to undertake a case study of the origins of the New Deal's policy. This empirical research draws upon government publications and primary research interviews with elite policy-makers in the UK, USA and Australia. In so doing, it develops a theoretically informed model of policy transfer which offers a fuller explanation of the overseas roots of New Labour's New Deal.

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The relationship between government and culture, in Britain, has changed dramatically since 1945. It is the principal objective of this research to understand in what way the articulation of culture, in British governmental politics, has changed over that period. The research investigates the structures of the state that have been responsible for articulating that relationship, and the rationales produced by different political parties, at the time of an election, who have expressed a position on government's engagement with culture. Using a series of indicators for the presence of cultural policy in the election manifestos of the Conservative, Labour and Liberal/ Liberal Democrat parties, this thesis begins by quantitatively mapping the frequency of those indicators during elections from 1945 to 2010. That analysis is then used to identify both those sets of elections to be investigated further, and those parts of the manifestos to be subjected to a more detailed qualitative scrutiny. A critical approach is taken to the reading of the manifestos; bringing to the surface a discernment of how culture is being construed by the parties, and the way in which they have constructed the relationship between culture, the state and the citizen. Those constructions are then contextualised by locating their emergence in the structures, operating within each party, which bring policy areas to the fore, and the historical setting to which the parties were responding. Drawing on research strategies not normally associated with cultural policy studies, this thesis develops an empirically robust approach to the investigation of rationale within the discipline. By combining techniques from discourse analysis, governance and policy process studies, it also develops a novel means of adding contextual sensitivity to critical discourse analysis. This research is of importance to anyone interested in how government engages with culture, the impact that has on us all as citizens, and on some of us as arts practitioners.

This PhD is about state capacity in the context of evolving governance structures: the capacity of the state to deliver. Focusing upon the governance debate and its many cleavages, the thesis explores the extent to which the British state has been affected by many of the challenges to its capacity that underpin theories of governance, such as hollowing-out and fragmentation.