MISSION GOVERNMENT

A recent post on working class writers involved a fair amount of googling on the subject of CLASS which unearthed quite a few articles worthy of sharing but further reflection made me wonder why on earth anyone (apart from sociologists) would be interested in the minutiae of the UK class system. Readers who don’t agree are advised to go the bottom of the post . 

I was far more interested in this guest post on the Comment is Freed blog 

(by Dan Honig) about how the new government might approach public services 

The Institute for Government’s most recent Whitehall Monitor paints a picture of 

declining morale, with increasing numbers of civil servants heading for the exits. 

The tools the UK government employed to achieve  behaviour change are what I call 

“managing for compliance”.  The system is (over)burdened with rules, procedures, 

sanctions, and incentives. All are attempts to get bureaucrats to do what they 

otherwise would not. Compliance puts control and authority, those who set the targets 

and monitor the behaviours, at the top of the pyramid. Those lower down are meant 

to follow orders and respond to the reporting frameworks, carrots, and sticks dangled 

from above.
Tools of compliance sometimes fail to generate the behaviour they seek. Often, 

however, they succeed but only by generating behaviours and actions that can be 

monitored, measured, rewarded or sanctioned. Using compliance to change behaviours 

generates good performance where what is to be done is observable and verifiable. 

This is why fast food restaurants and package delivery companies heavily use the 

tools of compliance: what can be monitored about a burger or a package on a doorstep 

is pretty close to all the firm cares about. Unfortunately, most things Government 

strives to do are not so easily monitored and measured. A teacher with a student, 

doctor with a patient, social worker with a vulnerable child can all be monitored. 

So too can health or education outcomes far down the line. But long-term outcomes 

are very hard to attribute to the individual teacher, doctor, or social worker. 

Too many other factors contribute to their individual performances. It is impossible 

to get those workers to do the right thing through pure compliance.
Indeed, what the ‘right thing’ is also differs. Observably similar patients and student 

will need different amounts of time and strategies from providers. Those strategies 

ultimately require the informed judgment of a skilled practitioner. A heavy reliance 

on compliance does limit the damage an ill-intentioned employee (e.g. one who 

otherwise would not show up) can do, but it often does so at the cost of lowering 

overall performance. If you want systematic evidence that this is the case, in 

Mission Driven Bureaucrats I document how bureaucracies around the world 

over-rely on compliance.

The new British government has bought the idea of Mission Government - 

as espoused by Mariana Mazzucato - hook, line and sinker. She developed her 

ideas a few years ago in Mission Economy – a moonshot guide to changing capitalism 

(2021) which reminds us that governments face -

…. problems ranging from poverty to polluted oceans. To address them, we need a very different approach to public-private partnerships from the one we have now.

This requires a massive rethink of what government is for and the types of capability and capacity it needs. But, more importantly, it depends on what sort of capitalism we want to build, how to govern the relationships between the public and private sectors and how to structure rules, relationships and investments so that all people can flourish and planetary boundaries are respected. It is, as will be argued, about creating a solutions-based economy, focused on the most ambitious goals – the ones that really matter to people and to the planet. This is not about invoking the concept of a ‘moonshot’ as a siloed pet project. It is about transforming government from within and strengthening its systems – those for health, education, transport or the environment – while giving the economy a new direction.

I’ve only now downloaded the book – an oversight on my part since it makes a 

powerful case for government action which has been sorely lacking in the past 

few decades. She then identifies and discusses 5 myths

• Businesses creat value and take risks – government only facilitate

• The purpose of government is to fix market failures

• Governments need to run like a business

• Outsourcing saves taxpayer money and lowers risk

• Governments shouldn’t pick winners

Dan Honig has brought a similar vision to his new book Mission-Driven Bureaucrats 

(2024) which he discussed in this recent interview at the Centre for Policy 

Research. This reminds us all of McGregor’s Theory X and Theory Y – viz whether 

you can trust employees or not.

Articles about Class
Beyond Class? D Cannadine British Academy (1998) article which offers a good overview
Class in the 21st Century – a review of “Social Class in the 21st Century (LSE 2013)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_British_Class_Survey which describes the survey 

carried out in 2011
On Social Class anno 2014 Mike Savage et al – which describes the subsequent book
review of Savage book 2015
Breaking the Class Ceiling Sam Friedman et al 2015
End Class Wars Mike Savage 2016
The Class Ceiling date?? 
Elites in the UK – pulling away Mike Savage et al (Sutton Trust 2020) 
Social Mobility – past, present and future (Sutton Trust 2022)

In Praise of the Bibliographical Essay

Readers are aware of the rather eccentric stress this blog puts on the importance of books having annotated bibliographies. Penguin have just published Why Politics Fails – the 5 traps of the modern world and how to escape them Ben Ansell (2023) which ends with a rare essay which covers, for each chapter, the key books the author has found essential as themes for the lens through which he examines democracy, equality, solidarity, security and prosperity. 

The only other book I’ve come across with such an essay is Peter Gay’s 680 

page magnum opus Modernism – the lure of heresy (2007) which has a stunning 

32 page  bibliographical essay which, he warned, was “highly selective”! 

Peter Gay was born in Germany in 1923 but his family came to the States via 

Havana in 1941 where he became a prolific US historian – as is evident from 

this Wikupedia entry. One of his books is My German Question: Growing Up in 

Nazi Berlin (1998), a powerful and insightful account of his teenage years in 

Berlin. Another which also has an extensive bib essay is Freud – a Life for our 

Times (1988) whose bib essay extends to 76 pages. The book does, after all, have 

1350 pages! For me, such bibliographical essays are rare gems which offer an opportunity 

to understand an author’s preferences.

  
Why Politics Fails reviews

• https://czechpolsci.eu/article/download/37409/31968/61942 

• https://www.persuasion.community/p/ansell podcast

• https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/dec/17/reith-lectures-miss-point-politics-

• fails-when-avoids-issue-of-class

In Praise of the Essay/Book Review

I have always been a fan of tables and matrices – reducing ideas to the simple format of a 2x2 or 6x3 (or whatever) table. They not only relieve the text but force you to whittle text down to the bare essentials. Perhaps that’s why I love these Central Asian and Russian miniatures so much. And it might also explain my preference for ESSAYS as against books - for which I’m developing increasing distaste. London, of course, from the 16^th to the 19^th centuries, was home to the great Englosh essayists - Francis Bacon. (1561-1626); Joseph Addison (1672-1719) William Hazlitt (1778-1830) and Charles Lamb (1775- 1834)

But, these days, I am more interested în the political essayists – two of 

whom I would like to draw to me readers’ attention, a Brit and a German
William Davies is one of my favourite political scientists with several books 

to his credit. He’s just penned a review of two important books about the 

apparent decline of the left and some of his other essays can be found here
This is not normal – the collapse of Liberal Britain is a collection of his 

essays which appeared in 2020.
Wolfgang Streeck is a German sociologist whose writing has been celebrated 

several times on this blog. But I have failed to mention the essays he gave us 

in  Critical Encounters – capitalism, democracy, ideas (2020) which reviews 

books by the likes of Mark Blyth, Perry Anderson, Quinn Slobodian, Yanis 

Varoufakis, Jurgen Habermas and Peter Mair. It’s

... a collection of essays on political economy, stimulated by reading books for review. It is also a celebration of the book as a medium of communication among scholars and with a wider public....

Different book reviews by the same author, as collected in this volume, are only loosely connected: by accident of personal acquaintance, of time believed to be free, or of the reviewer’s sense of adventure.

How to review a book that is worthy of being reviewed? For me it requires deep reading, beginning usually with the last chapter, then the introduction, then several expeditions into the interior. This takes time. During reading sessions, I highlight what I find remarkable and sketch my own emerging views in the margins, or on the last pages where the publisher advertises other, often related, books. When I am finished with a book, it looks a little deranged. Having let it sit for a while in this condition, I return to it and read my notes. Where they yield a pattern, for example by repeating themselves, is where the reading has left an impact. Then I begin writing. Writing book reviews means taking the book seriously as a vehicle of scholarly communication; or, as in my case, even extolling it. In the social sciences, journal articles have come to predominate, which I find deplorable.

On the logic of minimalism, I should be a fan of poetry but draw the line at Brecht, Burns, Eliot and Mitchell (Adrian)

Ivan Illich - why the attraction?

I am still trying to puzzle over the power Illich’s writing had for me in the 1970s.

1968 had been, of course, the year of rebellion against the forces of power and tradition. My first thought was to go back to ask who else had been competing for attention in those days? C Wright Mills had been a dominant figure with his “The Power Elite” of 1956 an attack on established power.

Illich’s work was some 15 years later and went deeper – with no obvious target to blame. But I do remember some New Statesman cartoons of “Pillars of the Establishment” (as in Grosz’s painting) tearing off their masks to reveal evil and savage faces. Illich’s books were short and an essay in The Challenges of Ivan Illich – a collective reflection; by L Hainacki (2002) suggested he used epigrammatic assertions rather than persuasive arguments – which would probably have impressed me in the 1970s.

What do I now make of his legacy? It was his critical message which made the impact on me but this seems, however, to have been taken up and morphed into a widespread cynicism about anyone exercising any sort of power. This has been a deeply dangerous development which simply serves the interests of those with the real power

update; https://www.bollier.org/blog/why-ivan-illich-still-matters-today

https://www.bollier.org/blog/why-ivan-illich-still-matters-today

BOOKS WHICH FORM A WORLD VIEW

One of the most thoughful and well-read bloggers is Aurelien whose latest post is an annotated list of the books which have helped him develop his particular world view which, sadly, he makes no attempt to describe. But it’s clear that he’s a bit of a contrarian – rubbishing mainstream literature and clearly enjoying, as I do, the writings of people such as Richard Evans and EP Thompson whose 1978 “The Poverty of Theory and other Essays” I downloaded as a result of the mention. I would strongly recommend reading Aurelien’s post in full - its book references reflect a life of reading and are quite fascinating.

I recently posted about my response to a challenge thrown down by the Cultural Tutor to identify the book which everyone should read. That, of course, is not quite the same as listing the books which helped form your world view. But for what it’s worth, these are the books I mentioned for the challenge -

It’s not surprising that the books I remember are from the early 1960s – for example EH Carr was a favourite, not just his “Twenty Years’ Crisis” (1946) which introduced me to Realism but What is History? EH Carr (1961) which I vividly remember for its story of how you caught fish (facts) depended on the type of reel you used and the spot you chose to fish at.

Peter Berger was another writer who made an impact – first for his prescient postmodern analysis in The Socal construction of Reality P Berger and T Luckman (1966) and then Pyramids of Sacrifice – political ethics and social change (1975)

More recently, writers such as Francis Fukuyama, David Graeber, Michael Greer, Roman Krznaric, Kate Rawarth, Wolfgang Streeck and Yanis Varoufakis have also impressed . One book, however, stands out for the variety of explanations it offers for the difficulties we have in agreeing and acting on global warming – viz Why We Disagree about Climate Change by Mike Hulme (2009). But, at the end of the day, I tend to fall back on Bertrand Russell whose Sceptical essays still delight although published in 1925

Aurelien’s post has spurred me to do three things

• to try to describe my own world view

• to identify the books which helped form that

• to see whether I could list some books which challenged that world view 

My World View (WV)
My WV is not static – I have become more radical in my old age. In my youth, 

I was powerfully influenced by the likes of Karl Popper and Tony Crosland. 

My initial experience of municipal government made the tactics of Saul Alinsky 

attractive but then I became more of a liberal technocrat. The new millennium 

saw the scales drop from my eyes and this is how I described the situation in 

2014.

Political parties are a bust flush - All mainstream political parties in Europe have been affected by the neo-liberal virus and can no longer represent the concerns of ordinary people. And those “alternative parties” which survive the various hurdles placed in their way by the electoral process rarely survive.
The German Greens were an inspiration until they too eventually fell prey to the weaknesses of political parties identified a hundred years ago by Robert Michels.
More recently, “Pirate” parties in Scandinavia and Bepe Grillo’s Italian Five Star Movement have managed, briefly, to capture public attention, occupy parliamentary benches but then sink to oblivion or fringe if not freak interest.
What the media call “populist” parties of various sorts attract bursts of electoral support in most countries but are led by labile individuals preying on public fears and prejudices and incapable of the sort of cooperative effort which serious change requires.

NGOs are no match for corporate power - The annual World Social Forum has had more staying power than the various “Occupy movements” but its very diversity means that nothing coherent emerges to challenge the power elite whose “scriptures” are delivered from the pulpits of The World Bank and the OECD There doesn’t even seem a common word to describe our condition and a vision for a better future – “social change”? What’s that when it’s at home?

Academics are careerists – although the groves of academia are still sanctuary 

for a few brave voices who speak out against the careless transfer by governments 
of hundreds of billions of dollars to corporate interests …

• Noam Chomsky and David Harvey are prominent examples. 

• Henry Mintzberg, one of the great management gurus, has in the last decade broken 

ranks and now writes about the need for a profound “rebalancing” of the power structure 

- Rebalancing Society – radical renewal beyond left, right and centre. 

• Economists who challenge the conventional wisdom of that discipline are now able 

to use the Real-World Economics blog.

• Daniel Dorling is a geographer who focuses on inequalities eg his powerful 

Injustice – why social inequality persists.

Think Tanks play safe – and….think - although there are honourable exceptions such as -

• Susan George, a European activist and writer, who operates from the

 Trans National Institute(TNI)  and, amongst her many books, has produced two 

marvellous satires – Lugano I and Lugano II

• David Korton’s books and Yes Magazine keep up a steady critique.

• Joseph Stiglitz, once part of the World Bank elite, writes scathingly about 

economic conventional wisdom.

• The Pope has the resources of the Vatican behind him; and is proving a great 

example in the struggle for dignity and against privilege.

THE BOOK WHICH EVERYONE SHOULD READ??

The Cultural Tutor is am amazing blog with text and music which comes in every Friday. Its latest issue asked a simple question - which book should everyone read?. The obvious answer is The Bible or the Koran - ideally with Christians reading the second book and Muslims the first.

But its not just religion which separates people – it’s also AGE. My younger self had books whose importance I recognised (listed here) - a few of which I find on rereading don’t impress eg Social Science as Sorcery (1972). And my older self lacks the memory to do justice to some of the books from the new millennium, some of which are covered in the above list. I suspect many readers of the Cultural Tutor blog will as a result mention books they have recently read. But first I need to indicate how I make my judgement ie what criteria I use in measuring impact. That’s not actually all that easy to divulge – I suppose it’s some sort of combination of

- perennial wisdom

- causing us to look at the world in a different way

- good writing

- a sense of wry humour

- humility

It’s not surprising that the books I remember are from the early 1960s – for example EH Carr was a favourite, not just his “Twenty Years’ Crisis” (1946) which introduced me to Realism but What is History? EH Carr (1961) which I vividly remember for its story of how you caught fish (facts) depended on the type of reel you used and the spot you chose to fish at. Peter Berger was another writer who made an impact – first for his prescient postmodern analysis in The Socal construction of Reality P Berger and T Luckman (1966) and then Pyramids of Sacrifice – political ethics and social change (1975)

More recently, writers such as Francis Fukuyama, David Graeber, Michael Greer, Roman Krznaric, Kate Rawarth, Wolfgang Streeck and Yanis Varoufakis have also impressed . One book, however, stands out for the variety of explanations it offers for the difficulties we have in agreeing and acting on global warming – viz Why We Disagree about Climate Change by Mike Hulme (2009)

But, at the end of the day, I tend to fall back on Bertrand Russell whose Sceptical essays still delight although published in 1925

On Thinking for oneself

One of the faults of which I am constantly guilty is assuming that my reading will bring new insights. So I was delighted to read this morning the latest post from the marvellous Cultural Tutor

Arthur Schopenhauer is not the sort of person I usually write about in the Areopagus. 

He was a philosopher, after all, and I maintain that philosophers must be treated 

with caution! But, recently, somebody suggested that I read a few of his shorter 

essays. One of them, simply titled “On Thinking For Oneself”, caught my attention. 

Thinking and writing are in many ways synonymous: the better we think, the better 

we write, and vice versa.
So, how does one think for oneself? The thrust of Schopenhauer's advice is that 

we shouldn't rely too much on reading: “Reading is a mere makeshift for original 

thinking”.
That is not to say we shouldn't read, of course. Schopenhauer's point is that we 

mustn't confuse reading (which can be very useful) with thinking:

The difference between the effect produced on the mind by thinking for oneself 

and that produced by reading is incredibly great... reading forces on the mind ideas 

that are as foreign and heterogeneous to the tendency and mood it has at the moment, 

as is the seal to the wax whereon it impresses its stamp.

....the mind is deprived of all its elasticity by much reading as is a spring when a weight 

is continually applied to it; and the surest way not to have thoughts of our own is for 

us at once to take up a book when we have a moment to spare. This practice is the 

reason why erudition makes most men more stupid and simple than they are by 

nature and also deprives their literary careers of every success. As Pope says, they 

remain, "For ever reading, never to be read."

Scholars are those who have read in books, but thinkers... are those who have read 

directly in the book of the world. Schopenhauer uses a rather neat analogy for 

the difference between reading and thinking:

Those who have spent their lives in reading, and have drawn their wisdom from books,

 resemble men who have acquired precise information about a country from many descriptions 

of travel. They are able to give much information about things, but at bottom they 

have really no coherent, clear, and thorough knowledge of the nature of the country. 

On the other hand, those who have spent their lives in thinking are like men who 

have themselves been in that country. They alone really know what they are talking 

about; they have a consistent and coherent knowledge of things there and are truly 

at home in them.

I’m not sure if I totally agree with the thrust of his argument. Our own opinions,

 after all, are generally a reflection of the prevailing social consensus or, as 

JK Galbraith famously called it, the “conventional wisdom”  Christian Lupsa is a 

Romanian journalist who was for the past decade the editor of an interesting 

journal DoR  and now writes a weekly blog (in English) which this week challenges 

the ease with which we sink into these bubbles  

Schopenhauer goes on to argue that we must begin with our own opinions rather than 

those of other people:

Thus the man who thinks for himself only subsequently becomes acquainted with the 

authorities for his opinions when they serve merely to confirm him therein and to 

encourage him. The book-philosopher, on the other hand, starts from those authorities 

in that he constructs for himself an entire system from the opinions of others which 

he has collected in the course of his reading. Such a system is then like an automaton 

composed of foreign material, whereas that of the original thinker resembles a living 

human being.

It isn't easy to find our own opinions, of course, but Schopenhauer argues that 

effort in doing so is entirely worthwhile. These days, of course, we are besieged 

by books offering to help us to think more critically  

Even if occasionally we had been able very easily and conveniently to find in a book a 

truth or view which we very laboriously and slowly discovered through our own thinking 

and combining, it is nevertheless a hundred times more valuable if we have arrived at 

it through our own original thinking. Only then does it enter into the whole system 

of our ideas as an integral part and living member; only then is it completely and firmly 

connected therewith, is understood in all its grounds and consequents, bears the 

colour, tone, and stamp of our whole mode of thought, has come at the very time 

when the need for it was keen, is therefore firmly established and cannot again 

pass away

I shall leave it there for now. Schopenhauer, though he has been accused of many 

things, is rarely accused of not being an original thinker. In an age when the internet 

makes it all too easy to pass our time consuming the words (and, therefore, the thoughts 

and opinions) of others, he offers a timely reminder to step back and put in the work 

ourselves. As always, I recommend reading the essay in full.