Half-remembered quotations from mostly forgotten speeches: the limits of Labour’s European policy discourse

This article uses discourse analysis to study the continuities in British foreign policy thinking within the Labour party from the 1960s to the present day. Using representative extracts from speeches by Hugh Gaitskell, Harold Wilson, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, it identifies the ideational consis- tencies in the leaders’ attitudes to: Empire; federalism in the EEC/EU; and laying down conditions that have to be met before any constructive engagement with ‘Europe’ can be countenanced. We argue that these consistencies, spanning a 50-year period, exemplify a certain stagnation both within Labour’s European discourses and within British foreign policy thinking more widely. We develop the idea that Labour party thinking has been crucially framed by both small ‘c’ conser- vative and upper-case Conservative ideology, popularised by Winston Churchill in his ‘three circles’ model of British foreign policy.

National interest to global reform: patterns of reasoning in British foreign policy discourse

Discussion of the national interest often focuses on how Britain's influence can be maximized, rather than on the goals that influence serves. Yet what gives content to claims about the national interest is the means-ends reasoning which links interests to deeper goals. In ideal-typical terms, this can take two forms. The first, and more common, approach is conservative: it infers national interests and the goals they advance from existing policies and commitments. The second is reformist: it starts by specifying national goals and then asks how they are best advanced under particular conditions. New Labour's foreign policy discourse is notable for its explicit use of a reformist approach. Indeed, Gordon Brown's vision of a 'new global society' not only identifies global reform as a key means of fulfilling national goals, but also thereby extends the concept of the national interest well beyond a narrow concern with national security.

Keeping Hertfordshire green: the implementation of strategic environmental policy 1983-1993

This paper evaluates the implementation of environmental policy in the County of Hertfordshire during the 1980's and early 1990's. It emphasises that the recent growth of interest in environmental policy and sustainable planning initiatives should not cause researchers and practitioners to ignore the long history and experience of environmental policy implementation in local government. By looking at the experience of strategic environmental policy in Hertfordshire, the paper identifies the successes and failures of a range of implementation tools utilised by the County and district planning authorities to progress policies concerned with the conservation and improvement of urban and rural environments. It concludes that the planning authorities of Hertfordshire have stabilised the deterioration in the County's environment and have established some programmes which provide good examples of coordinated action in environmental policy implementation. These types of mechanism will need to be built upon in the new policy epoch where environmental sustainability and capacity planning take centre stage.

The theme that dare not speak its name: Geopolitik, geopolitics and German foreign policy since unification

The purpose of this chapter is to trace the emergence of a new security imaginary in the foreign policy discourse in Germany during the 1990s and to determine whether it constitutes a return of Geopolitik in German foreign policy making. Does the re- appearance of geopolitical terms and expressions in the official and the academic discourses in post-unification Germany indicate such a shift? The essay will argue that the claims about a return of Geopolitik cannot be sustained. To the extent that the rhetoric of German government officials changes during the 1990s, this does not produce a coherent geopolitical security imaginary that stands diametrically opposed to the definition of political and institutional spaces of the Bonner Republik.

Location choices of multinational firms in Europe: the role of EU cohesion policy

Using data on 5509 foreign subsidiaries established in 50 regions of 8 EU countries over the period 1991–1999, we estimate a mixed logit model of the location choice of multinational firms in Europe. In particular, we focus on the role of EU Cohesion Policy in attracting foreign investors from both within and outside Europe. We find that, after controlling for the role of agglomeration economies as well as a number of other regional and country characteristics and allowing for a very flexible correlation pattern among choices, Structural and Cohesion funds allocated by the EU to laggard regions have indeed contributed to attracting multinationals. These policies as well as other determinants play a different role in the case of European investors as opposed to non-European ones.

Regulating working families in the European Union: a history of disjointed strategies

Families in market economies worldwide have long been confronted with the demands of participating in paid work and providing care for their dependent members. The social, economic and political contexts within which families do so differ from country to country but an increasing number of governments are being asked to engage, or better engage, with this important area of public policy. What seems like a relatively simple goal – to enable families to better balance care-giving and paid employment – has raised several difficulties and dilemmas for policy makers which have been approached in different ways. This paper aims to identify and critique the nature and development of the means by which legal engagement with work-family reconciliation has, historically, been framed in the European Union. In doing so, and with reference to specific cohorts of workers, we demonstrate how disjointed the strategies are in relation to working carers and argue that the EU is unlikely to provide the legal framework necessary to bring about effective change in this fundamentally important area of social policy.

Earworms ("stuck song syndrome"): towards a natural history of intrusive thoughts

Two studies examine the experience of “earworms”, unwanted catchy tunes that repeat. Survey data show that the experience is widespread but earworms are not generally considered problematic, although those who consider music to be important to them report earworms as longer, and harder to control, than those who consider music as less important. The tunes which produce these experiences vary considerably between individuals but are always familiar to those who experience them. A diary study confirms these findings and also indicates that, although earworm recurrence is relatively uncommon and unlikely to persist for longer than 24 hours, the length of both the earworm and the earworm experience frequently exceed standard estimates of auditory memory capacity. Active attempts to block or eliminate the earworm are less successful than passive acceptance, consistent with Wegner’s (1994) theory of ironic mental control.