No description available.

Abstract not available

This study examines the lobbying by the Japanese automobile industry in the European Union. It investigates how the Japanese automobile industry interacts with the decision-making authorities in Brussels in its attempts to influence the policy process of the European Union. In the post-war period the Japanese automobile industry has expanded into all major world markets and plays an important economic and political role in these. However, until the 1990s, the Japanese automobile industry enjoyed hardly any interaction with the policy making institutions of the European Union. This has changed dramatically in the last decade but, thus far, the process has not been subject to any empirical investigation. This study, which is largely based upon interviews with the major actors in the process of interaction between the governing institutions and the automobile industry in the EU, aims to correct this deficiency. This thesis employed the policy network concept as a framework to develop an understanding of this particular case of government-interest group interaction. The thesis investigated whether the Western concept of policy networks could successfully be applied to the Japanese automobile industry as a non-western actor in the unique system of governance of the EU. By doing so, the thesis has demonstrated that the policy network concept is not a purely Western construct, but can be applied with equal validity to the case of Japan. Therefore, this thesis has taken an importani. a step towards proving the universal applicability of the policy network concept.

The purpose of this thesis is threefold: firstly, to serve as a contribution to the history of the Marseilles working class; secondly to illustrate the impact of the Popular Front at local level; and thirdly, to act as a case study of working-class mobilisation. In the first section of the thesis the Marseilles working class is briefly described. It was highly heterogeneous, being made up of various racially, occupationally, and spatially-defined communities. The divisions between these communities were to some extent neutralised by a strong sense of the local community of Marseilles. Marseilles' claim to special status within the nation was, however, increasingly coming under challenge. Prior to the Popular Front the most successful political organisations on the Left in Marseilles integrated themselves into the rich community life of the town by playing down ideological issues and by practising the politics of locally-based clientelism rather than those of class. The movement for the Popular Front encouraged a new mood of militancy within the Marseilles working class which both contributed to, and was itself encouraged by, the growth of Communist influence within the Popular Front alliance. At different moments the strikes of the period facilitated or prejudiced the unity of the working class and its integration into the nation. Initially (1934-1937), the strikes which were undertaken advanced the interests of workers against those of employers whilst increasing working-class unity and support for the Popular Front. At the same time the election of a Popular Front Government and its success in resolving strikes to the satisfaction of workers aided the integration of the working class into a new, enlarged, national political consensus. The fragility of this consensus was, however, later revealed (1938-1939), as the Government called for sacrifices in the workplace and the Communists called fcr the launching of an unpopular war against fascism.

Most writing about "Red Clydeside" has come from writers overtly sympathetic to revolutionary ideals - whether the Clydesiders themselves or later academic admirers. It is hoped that a wider use of outside sources will help to provide a more detached view.