The Future of Literature....

In the meantime, I feel I need to tell someone that I have been getting an enormous amount of junk e-mail recently. Since there is no-one here but me right now, however, I will rattle on about it here where no-one will ever see it. I never used to get much of this stuff at all because it seemed I had some good filters set-up. I was puzzled about this sudden new development, blaming my service provider etc. Very soon, however, whilst weighing up the respective benefits of five cent shares in some five cent company, a £200,000 loan and 'improved squirting' (I kid you not), I discovered the phenomena of inserting random text from novels, stories and other sources into the e-mail to confuse the filtering system. Far from being annoyed, I now look forward to seeing what bizarre and wonderful gems I have along with my investment recommendations, viagra sales-pitches and various other suggested medical solutions to normal human sexuality. It may also have worrying consequences for the future of literature and the publishing industry (hurray!).

Rosabel Greene was the first I noticed, who confided in me that she had 'a premonition that some day I'll throw the teapot at him.' At who, she didn't say.

Shoufty Wasalty has been following a Burroughsian line: 'Jazz Goodbyes Saddest Falling Beast Been Misled Vous Oublie Pour Maimes Encore Think Twice Sais'. Hasn't anyone told him/her that the cut-up method is sooo twentieth century. Mind you, perhaps William B was just way ahead of his time... (this is not an attempt to start a discussion).

Nina MacDonald was telling a worryingly scatalogical story: 'He turned as he sat, and pulled a stool from under the caravan for Yvette. Come, would you like to go in the caravan, where nobody hears? Yvette knew that the old woman was telling a cool, barefaced lie.' Strange that one of the protagonists seems to change gender half way through. Is this about a meeting between Mark Oaten in drag with an elderly Pre-op Transexual?

Susie Berreira has interesting theory about the human impact of monetary policy: 'On the contrary' she says (contrary to what, I am not sure) 'appearance, voice, and manner combined to give an impression of calmness and poise. This was chiefly due to foreign exchange difficulties.'

Loyd is a man after my own heart: 'My idea of housework is to sweep the room with a glance.' he says. He should patent those eyes.

Needless to say, I have saved the best until last. This sheer poetry arrived from my good friend Madge as she promises me ‘an improved tool’. Great, I could do with a new electric screwdriver, I thought. It appears she was being metaphorical. ‘Just imagine’ she says ‘how wonderful your life would become… with such a huge gun down your pants you will be able to conquer any female fortress!’. Quite. And she should know. She adds - rather appositely I thought - in the now customary anti-spam confusing post-script, and with a weariness clearly born of experience: “They Brag Most That Can Do the Least”. And as if to remind customers to act responsibly with their new found hardware: “Although the Sun May Shine, Leave Not Thy Cloak at Home”. Extra large, please.

Ostrogorski

Just reading now. Always forget that this takes time. Ostrogorski is actually quite entertaining. If you like that sort of thing. It is a good history of the development of the Conservative and Liberal parties into modern organisations more like political parties as we understand them today. It was written in 1895 or thereabouts - before the rise of the Labour party and the schism and then collapse of the Liberals, so one therefore gets a different kind of perspective compared with later works on parties. Good stuff with some good detailed history that might be useful for charting contingencies and concrete events that were crucial in the development of disciplinary organisation. I have been marking pages with post-its vociferously. I will write something up on this very soon...

The next stage of research

Now that I have the broad outlines of my theory, I think I need to begin a review of the major literature on political parties, which will form the basis of a third chapter. This chapter will examine the development in thought on political parties over the years since Ostrogorski and Michels and suggest that a new development is needed which keeps the best of the 'Weberian' approach and develops his ideas in a later modern context using Foucault. I have gone over Michels' work two or three times by now and have more notes to work from. Definitely included on the list should be:

Ostrogorski (ugh dreading this one: huge book, small print, written by a Russian)
Michels
Duverger
Kirchheimer
McKenzie

von Beym

Ware

Panebianco
Sartori

In addition, I will also consult some specific academic Labour Party histories for examples. Especially Shaw, Russell, Hayter.

Other sources will no doubt arise as I go along. The good news is that I have done quite a bit of work on the general party references already - about a year ago.

Serious work begins tomorrow afternoon, with an update possibly appearing here tomorrow or certainly within the next two or three days.

Where Am I and Where Am I Going?

Not an ontological question, but a practical one. So, to reiterate, I am here:

1. Power becomes apparent in action, interaction and relations between people and networks.

2. Actions congeal into practice and thence into procedure and process.

3. This becomes the basis of (a) social organisation and what Foucault refers to as 'instutional crystallisations', providing a context for future action.

4. Modes of organisational power emerge out of actions beneath the surface of these crystallisations or congealments that reinforce, challenge and cut through existing states-of-play. This is the aspect of relations of power that is constantly shifting and circulating.

5. Relations affecting the shape of organisational power may also be ones that run over the boundaries of particular institutional crystallisations. This is particularly important for political party relations with the state, the electorate, the media and so on.

6. These modes of power develop through concrete, specific and contingent events rather than historical imperative or ontological necessity.

7. A specifically modern form of power, as related by both Foucault and Weber (albeit with slightly different points in mind) is 'disciplinary' power, which has had particular affects on the organisation of political parties and thus the practice of formal politics.


And I am going here, I think:

1. To define this specifically modern form of power.

2. To trace its emergence in the formal party political context, making use of examples.

3. To discuss how it has changed or how it is different from the definitions respectively set out by Weber and Foucault.

4. To assess its impact on the practice and the investigation of party politics and government.

Now all I need is the beginnings of a route there....

Easing Myself Back In...

So, after a month of almost completely ignoring my thesis and giving my time over to tiling the bathroom and doing up the kitchen, it's time to continue. I must say it has been useful to have this site to revisit and remember where I was all that time ago. My next steps are:

1) To tighten up my theory a bit (though I should leave room for iteration);
2) To plan the next stage of research in the light of that - this is likely to be a closer investigation of the more directly political science and historical texts about parties and political organisation. After that, and assessing its implications for my theoretical work so far, I suspect that I will want to investigate more of the detail whether through memoirs, interviews, archive research etc. or perhaps some combination of all three.

Really, do I know what I am doing? I feel like I am making this up as I go along. Although, perhaps this is the point. A thesis like this (of any kind?) is a creative act. Certainly it is not entirely free. I am bound by rules and discipline myself. I am restrained by practice, supervision, method and assessment. But in not being 'free' (what does this word really mean anyway?), I have room to be creative. How can I say what I want to say within the boundaries that are set me? How can I use the structures built around me to push outside and beyond them, just a little? Structure is useful because it gives us something to work with or against, to reinforce or to pull down. In any case, there is little choice in the matter because a) we cannot escape from forms of order or structure or power [and would we in any sense want to? what would we be without it?]; b) I want to get a PhD; c) I am being unnecessarily pretentious and really ought to get on with some work rather than speculate like a sixth form philosophy student. Just easing myself back in...

Will London ever be finished?

Been away a while, taking a break. While I write at my desk there are workmen outside cutting up slabs of paving stone with circular stone cutters, replacing the old mess of tarmac and concrete with a decent looking pavement. I have to ask the question, when will London ever be finished? I am truly grateful that they are smartening up what was once a very spooky East End street (although that is what attracted me to the place to start with!), but nonetheless this has been going on for months now and it's driving me crazy! Most mornings I wake up to drilling, digging, buzzing...

Anyway, enough. I'm not complaining. Really. Back to work...