https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7274-1690
![Sample our Humanities journals, sign in here to start your FREE access for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/5939/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Humanities.jpg"})
ABSTRACT
A parliamentary perspective on the politics of the academic political science connects my former interest in the history of the discipline with parliamentary studies. This article continues the discussion in a previous article of mine on the German Bundestag. The conceptual point lies in a mutual suspicion between parliamentarians and academics regarding politics. In this present study I analyse Westminster debates on the concept of ‘political science’. Possible similarities between British and (West-)German debates appear in how this applies to academic authorities, in the increasing number of parliamentarians having studied political science at university, as well as in the distance towards academic political scientists. However, in the Bundestag political science is understood in academic and disciplinary terms and references to it serve for the members’ politicking. In Westminster a concept of political science frequently refers to a intellectual tradition persisting also in the late twentieth century and it emphasizes analysing political changes as challenged to political science.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Correction Statement
This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.
Notes
1 K. Palonen, ‘Political science as a topic in the post-war German Bundestag debates', History of European Ideas 46, (2020), pp. 360–73.
2 S. Collini, What Are Universities for? (London, 2012) and Speaking of Universities (London, 2017).
3 Palonen, ‘Political science as a topic in the post-war German Bundestag debates'.
4 J.-M. Jansson, Politiken teori (Borgå, 1969).
5 S. Collini, D. Winch and J. Burrow, That Noble Science of Politics: A study of nineteenth century intellectual history (Cambridge, 1983).
6 For more on Seeley, see J.R. Seeley, Introduction to Political Science. Preface H. Sidgwick (1896) (London, 1923).
7 Collini, Winch and Burrow, That Noble Science, p. 360.
8 See R. Wokler, ‘The Professoriate of Political Thought in England since 1914: A tale of three chairs’, in D. Castiglione and I. Hampsher-Monk (eds), The History of Political Thought in National Context (Cambridge, 2001), pp. 134–58, and J. Stapleton, Political Intellectual and Public Identities in Britain since 1850 (Manchester, 2001).
9 J. Bryce, The American Commonwealth I–II (1888/1914) (Indianapolis, 1995).
10 J. Bryce, Modern Democracies I–II (London, 1921).
11 G.E.G. Catlin, The Science and Method of Politics (London, 1927) and A Study on the Principles of Politics (London, 1929).
12 I. Jennings, Parliament (Cambridge, 1939).
13 House of Commons, 2 December 1909.
14 House of Commons, 31 July 1939. On Barker’s support for appeasement, see Stapleton, Political intellectual, pp. 132–34.
15 House of Commons, 5 April 1911.
16 House of Lords, 4 May 1938.
17 House of Commons, 5 November 1940.
18 House of Commons, 9 March 1931.
19 House of Commons, 16 February 1954.
20 House of Commons, 6 November 1951.
21 House of Commons, 5 April 1950.
23 House of Commons, 21 August 1945.
24 House of Commons, 3 July 1953.
25 H. Morrison, Government and Parliament: A survey from the inside (Oxford, 1954).
26 House of Commons, 31 March 1960.
27 House of Lords, 23 April 1963.
28 House of Commons, 24 January 1963.
29 House of Commons 1 March 1966.
30 House of Lords, 12 February 1969.
31 House of Lords, 12 February 1969.
32 House of Commons, House of Lords, 23 January 1973.
33 House of Commons, 15 October 1968.
34 House of Commons, 23 January 1973.
35 House of Commons, 15 January 1976.
36 House of Lords, 29 March 1971.
38 House of Commons, 9 May 1966.
40 House of Commons, 16 August 1946.
41 House of Commons, 16 August 1946.
42 House of Commons, 16 August 1946.
43 House of Commons, 16 August 1946.
44 House of Commons, 22 November 1965.
45 15 November 197215 November 1972.
46 See K. Palonen, Political science.
47 See K. Palonen, Politik als parlamentarischer Begriff. Perspektiven aus dem Deutschen Bundestag. (Leverkusen, 2021).
48 House of Lords, 1 March 2011.
49 Both quotes, House of Commons, 13 December 2006.
50 House of Commons, 19 April 1993.
51 House of Commons, 16 June 2004.
52 House of Commons, 13 September 2010.
53 House of Commons, 29 October 2002.
54 House of Commons, 22 March 2011.
55 House of Lords, 13 June 2019.
56 House of Lords, 6 December 1983.
57 House of Commons, 25 March 1998.
58 House of Lords, 19 June 2008.
59 House of Commons, 3 December 1984.
60 House of Commons, 22 June 2004.
61 House of Commons, 20 June 1985.
62 House of Commons, 12 February 1992.
63 House of Lords, 15 July 1981.
64 House of Lords, 27 March 2001.
65 House of Commons, 1 December 1989.
66 House of Commons, 19 October 1990.
67 House of Lords, 16 May 1986.
68 House of Lords, 29 March 2004.
69 House of Commons, 18 June 2002.
70 House of Commons, 8 June 1993.
71 House of Lords, 25 September 1992.
72 See Palonen, Politik als parlamentarischer Begriff, pp. 80–81.
73 On laughing and ridicule in British politics see Q. Skinner, ‘Why Laughing Mattered in the Renaissance’, History of Political Thought 22, (2001), pp. 418–47 and ‘Political Rhetoric and the Role of the Ridicule’, in K. Palonen, T. Pulkkinen and J. M. Rosales (eds), The Ashgate Research Companion to the Politics of Democratization in Europe: Concepts and Histories (Farnham, 2008), pp. 137–49.
74 M. Weber, ‘Parlament und Regierung im neugeordneten Deutschland’ (1918), in Max-Weber-Studienausgabe I/15, W. J. Mommsen and G. Hübinger (eds), (Tübingen 1984, pp. 202–302), on the interpretation see K. Palonen, ‘Was Max Weber Wrong about Westminster?’, History of Political Thought 35, (2014), pp. 519–35.
75 Q. Skinner, The Foundations of Modern Political Thought, 2 vols. (Cambridge, 1978), vol. I, xi.
76 Palonen, Politik als parlamentarischer Begriff, pp.134–36.
77 See K. Palonen, The Parliamentary Model of Rhetorical Political Theory, in N. Gutenberg and R. Fiordo (eds), Rhetoric in Europe: Philosophical Issues (Berlin, 2017), pp. 157–78.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Kari Palonen
Kari Palonen is a Professor Emeritus of Political Science at the University of Jyväskylä, Finland. He has published extensively in English, German and Finnish on the concept of politics and its history, on the principles and practices of conceptual history, on the political thought of Max Weber and on the political theory, rhetoric and procedure of parliamentarism.