THE TEST OF A THEORY IS IN ITS APPLICATION. THE DIFFICULTY IS that in political theory, application is rarely a sufficient test. This is especially true of the kind of theory in which I am interested. It is abstract, highly generalized, and for this reason, tends to be illustrated by means of applications which neither prove nor disprove. A lack of clear guides for disproof is one of the more serious deficiencies of highly general theory. If that is so, what is the point of doing it? One answer is that if such theory can lead in an a priori way to logically inferred predicaments which repeat themselves in many forms in the real world, this should allow us to anticipate events. This, in turn, allows us to compare these common predicaments in diverse settings to discover the necessary and separate it from the contingent. This can represent a big step forward if it results in new types of data and different forms of linkages between variables. The ‘tests’ then are more insightful generalizations rather than ‘validations’. If such generalizations can be made subject to quantitative proof, so much the better. In any case, the route to validation is bound to be indirect. Propositions locked into a logical structure of thought will remain for long cumbersome and wearisome. Despite this, as long as not too many people waste their time with it, a general theory approach seems worth the effort.

I am beginning to wonder whether ‘free collective bargaining’ is still compatible with the traditional practices of parliamentary democracy. I am equally beginning to wonder, what, if this is indeed the case, parliamentary democracy can do about it.

Traditionally, trade unions have been regarded and consequently studied as components of a system of industrial relations. Manifestly they may also be regarded as components in a system of political relationships. In this context many union practices which are regarded as normal in the industrial sphere take on a problematical, sometimes even a mysterious aspect.

DISSATISFACTION WITH ESTABLISHED MODES OF SCHOLARSHIP IS A contemporary manifestation common to all the social sciences in varying degrees. In the terminology of Thomas Kuhn, which in its widespread adoption seems in no small measure to have contribted to the new waves of methodological consciousness, the prevailing ‘paradigms’, which were largely consolidated in the 1950s, are being explicitly and often vehemently challenged. A burgeoning critical literature is readily apparent throughout the social sciences and, for that matter, beyond.

IN THE CABINET ROOM of RICHARD NIXON'S WHITE HOUSE THERE hang two portraits, one of Woodrow Wilson and one of Dwight D. Eisenhower. Report has it that they are the personal selection of the present incumbent, representing those of his predecessors whom he most admires. If so, they constitute an interesting choice, an unusual combination. Woodrow Wilson, in the type-casting of history, is a typical ‘strong’ President, the innovative leader who rules as well as reigns, the convinced mandatory of the popular will. Eisenhower, by contrast, represents a unique attempt in our time to recreate the ‘weak’ or ‘strict constructionist’ President of an earlier age, a quasi-monarchical head of state who does not seek to rule and does not claim for himself a larger or more authoritative mandate than that of his legislative colleagues. Moreover Wilson, despite his repudiation by the American people, saw himself as an active leader of his party, while Eisenhower, despite his landslide victories, thought it improper (or found it distasteful) to use the presidency as an instrument of party advantage.

A MAJOR CLAIM OF THE TRADE UNION MOVEMENT IN THIS DIFFICULT time in Northern Ireland is that they have ‘prevented the spread of riot and disturbance into the workplace’. The claim has been consistently made and with growing emphasis since the troubles began, and Norman Kennedy at last year's annual conference of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions called it the one beacon of hope, this ‘maintaining unity of the workers, Catholic and Protestant, on the shop floor’ in what he described as largely a conflict of worker against worker, of a working-class community divided along sectarian lines. This is associated with a related claim that trade union recommendations on social and political change have a special legitimacy because the leadership is close to the people who are involved in the conflict. This political role, essentially non-party, is seen to be more significant and extensive than the traditional political activity of the trade union movement.

GENERAL ELECTIONS WERE HELD IN FRANCE ON 4 AND 11 MARCH 1973 for the renewal of the National Assembly which had been elected in June 1968. The interesting fact about them was that the public opinion polls had forecast some weeks before the date set for the elections that there was a very real possibility of a victory for the alliance concluded between the united socialists and communists, and some left-wing radicals, on a common platform of reforms and of government. This socialist-communist coalition did not, in fact, win, but the majority party's share fell from 372 to 275 seats, out of 487, while the total number of votes cast for it was less than that cast for the left.

MOST STUDENTS OF SAINT-SIMON HAVE BEEN ESPECIALLY CONCERNED with his relations with the different 19th-century ideological movements; hence few have approached his work from the point of view of the incompatibility between his attitudes and those of the Jacobins. Yet such an approach re-situates his intellectual biography in its proper context – and indeed protects his work from the anachronistic interpretations which have plagued it in the history of ideas. Moreover it illuminates even more rewardingly his present relevance. His clash with Jacobinism might be taken as the startingpoint of the opposition between Jacobinism and industrialism, between the modern industrial societies and the ‘politics of power’ of the old centralized nation states. From this then derives his theory of the difference between the politics of power and the politics of abilities. The importance of this theory, especially for political science, has not been sufficiently stressed in the classic studies on Saint-Simon's work. Mostly sociological, these studies are divided amongst themselves on whether his work must be seen as socialism, Utopian or otherwise, or as elitism, technocratic or otherwise. And yet it is this theory which provides the logical link between these two seemingly contradictory interpretations.

THE PROCESS WHICH CHARACTERIZED THE POLITICAL SYSTEM OF THE Jewish community in Palestine was a process of the formation of a non-sovereign political centre which progressively increased its authority through the exercise of control over the mobilization and distribution of resources. The bearer of this process was a power conscious elite – oriented on the formation of an institutionalized national centre. The mobilization of resources outside of the system enabled this centre to allocate more resources than it had to extract from its periphery. Thus, a dynamic equilibrium was created in which progressively increasing demands were balanced by an increased mobilization of resources. The operation of the system was dependent upon a division of functions between an evolving coalitionary national centre and various particularistic sub-centres. The lack of sovereignty paradoxically contributed to the development of ‘rules of the game’ which made the resolution of conflicts possible within a quasi-parliamentary framework.

WE LIVE IN A TERRORISTIC AGE. FEW, EVEN AMONG THE MOST favoured and secure, can fail to be haunted by the ugly sights and ghastly dreams of terroristic murder, massacre, and torture and the suffering of the innocents. Numerous international organizations and the mass media at least agree in characterizing our era as one ‘full of dismal terror’. There have been repeated calls for serious scientific study of the nature and causes of terrorism culminating in the recent decision of the UN General Assembly to establish a special committee for this purpose. Many students of politics will suspect that the creation of ‘study committees’ by such organizations as the UN and the Socialist International will simply serve to reflect the self-interest of the national participants, or that they will simply turn into propaganda exercises.

At this moment in our history, most Americans have concluded that government is not performing well. It promises much, but it does not deliver what it promises. The great danger, in my judgement, is that this momentary disillusionment with government will turn into a more profound and lasting loss of faith.

THIS ARTICLE ATTEMPTS TO DISCUSS A NUMBER OF QUESTIONS RELATED to the development of a working-class movement of dissent under non-democratic conditions. In this discussion particular attention will be given to the consequences of economic development. It is not that economic development will be considered as a cross-culturally invariant factor in the explanation of social and political conflict and dissent, but that given i) a non-democratic political context and ii) social and economic conditions allowing for working-class movements whose open manifestation is hence restricted by the political set of constraints, the effects of economic development upon such contradictory conditions, and the way they influence the pattern of development of the working-class movement will be especially considered.

THE OPUS DEI WAS FOUNDED AS A RELIGIOUS ORGANIZATION IN 1928 by Father Escrivá de Balaguer in Spain. Its existence is public but its membership has always been secret. During the period of the Civil War it went briefly underground, to re-emerge in Nationalist Spain. In 1947 it was recognized as the first Secular Institute by the Pope and the centre of the organization moved to Rome. It has been most successful in Spain where it profited from the extremely favourable conditions created by Franco's government for Catholic groups. Its aim was the re-conversion of all social classes and especially intellectual and bourgeois groups to a universal Catholic spirituality. It worked towards this aim through the positioning of its members in places of power within society: preferably in university chairs, banking, business or bureaucratic positions. Each member had the duty to lead an upright Catholic life and at the same time to convert the maximum possible number of his fellows to active Catholicism (or to membership of the Opus Dei), through the example of his life. This implied not only proficiency and diligence at work, but also the traditional spiritual values such as humility, chastity, obedience, etc. Escrivá de Balaguer argued that the further Opus members could rise up the social ladder the more influence they would have on society in general and on their fellows.

ELECTIONINS THE FEDERAL STATES (Länder) OF WEST GERMANY are frequently interpreted as indicators of national political opinion in much the same way as by-elections in Britain are examined for pointers to trends in the fortunes of the major political parties. Similar factors seem to operate in both cases: a general swing against the party in office; a tendency to see these elections as confidence votes with consequent effects on the morale of the government and opposition parties; and the use of them to register a protest vote since voters are free of the responsibility of having to choose a national government. National ministers intervene in both countries to speak on behalf of local candidates in order to enhance their parties’ chances, while the mass media usually view these elections in national terms, for interest tends to focus more on the impact of the elections on national politics than on any serious estimation of the actual part played by national issues during the course of the election campaigns.

ANY ASSESSMENT OF THE PERFORMANCE AND VIABILITY OF THE contemporary Congress presents formidable problems. This is because criticism of Congress has been an almost constant feature of American political discussion, long before current political tensions produced wider comment on the institutional structure as a whole, and also because such an assessment must consider not only the existing capacity and will in Congress to respond to contemporary demands but also the nature of the relationship of Congress to other branches of government, and in particular to the executive. One further difficulty is that there has been, and remains, wide disagreement among observers as to the virtues and defects of Congress.

RECENT YEARS HAVE SEEN THE RECRUDESCENCE OF AN HISTORICAL dimension in comparative political studies, which is almost certainly a reflection of the increased interest in problems of political development that began to be seriously displayed from the early 1960s onwards. Among the more interesting contributions in this respect have been Lipset's, and, in particular, Rokkan's, working-out of a diachronic analysis of patterns of political cleavage and resulting party systems, the increasing focus on crises and sequences in political development, and, of course, Barrington Moore's historical analysis of the Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy. All these approaches have in common an attempt to infuse the generalizing and typological approach so typical of the modern social sciences with a deeper historical appreciation of the particular contexts within which political change occurs.

THE WARY WRITER COVERS HIMSELF IN ADVANCE AS BEST HE CAN against the most obvious lines of criticism. Let me say, therefore, that this article is not intended to break, or even blunt, a lance in the methodology debate of comparative politics, nor is it put forward as a contribution in its own right to the science of comparative politics. The intention is much simpler. I want to argue that there are practical forms of comparison which the political scientist can use when in a less than scientific mood and that useful ends can be served by such practical activity. What is offered here, then, is a series of personal reflections and no more. To prevent the appearance of scholarly intent, scholarly reference to the literature has been avoided. A plausible argument to forestall the critic, but probably sensible, is that the case for an unsophisticated approach to comparative politics should be presented in an unsophisticated way. Put another way, it may be that to be practical one should sometimes be naive.

THE AMERICAN PARTY SYSTEM, LONG CONSIDERED TO BE DOMINATED by two decentralized, non-programmatic and non-governing parties, is once again at the heart of empirical and normative arguments about the adequacy of government in the United States. Political developments since 1948 have revitalized the longstanding debate about the causal links between the constitutional and social bases of American politics, the definitive features of the party system and the attributes and outcomes of the governmental process.

THE DIVERSIFICATION IN THE SOCIO-ECONOMIC ORGANIZATION AND the growth of the political system have increased the number of instances of decision-making and intensified the relations between social and political forces. Parties and pressure groups are not enough in themselves to channel the interests, ideologies, and stresses, originating in the social system, into the political system. Nevertheless, during the last forty years, other, less familiar channels have broadened considerably and of these it is what we call the consultative councils which have made the greatest impact. So much has their importance grown in recent years that they must be considered as a mechanism of systemic interaction, comparable in weight to those of the pressure groups or parties. The consultative councils have, in fact, become a major cog in the political system and any attempt to exclude them is doomed to failure.