TRADE QUARRELS BETWEEN THE UNITED STATES AND EUROPE have featured as a daily item in newspapers for some time, often even on the front page. Thus the New York Times in June 1986 carried a headline: ‘Reagan's tougher trade stand – policy shift angers Allies’. At the same time, the EC Council of ministers meeting in Luxembourg rejected American criticism of EC trade practices; in particular, the ministers underlined that EC support for exports of agricultural products could only be discussed in the framework of GATT, and only if other direct and indirect support schemes were also submitted to that forum. That same day, the Uruguayan leader Mr Sanguinetti complained bitterly that he did not manage to sell meat on his traditional markets, as the Americans and the Europeans undercut prices by more than 50 per cent. . . One could go on and on like this.

BRITISH POLITICAL SCIENTISTS HAVE RECENTLY AWAKENED from their pragmatic slumbers to discover a dragon loose among them: the dragon of evaluation. The University Grants Committee has just been grading the quality of research in university departments, and some have been found ‘below average’. (To be merely ‘average’ hardly seems much better.) How were these gradings arrived at? We do not know, but we do know that among the documents available to the committee was a paper by Ivor Crewe analysing the publications record of all British departments of politics over a six-year period from January 1978. (It will be published in Political Studies next year.) Professor Crewe's paper reveals, to no one's surprise, that there are immense differences in publication rate both between individuals and between different departments; his revelation will not enhance his popularity. But it is clear that these events are just the beginning. The dragon of evaluation is on the loose and there's no St George in sight.

IN 1986, THE FRENCH PRESIDENT FRANÇOIS MITTERRAND reminded us that neutralism in Germany was not just a simple reaction to political facts but a very complex constant in recent German history. Is the idea of a neutral Germany or of two neutral German states of any political importance today? Are there still supporters for neutrality in Central Europe? Would it not be normal for some people to think in those terms?

In today's relatively tension-free period of East-West relations, the fact may be overlooked that the German situation remains exceptional and that the Germans have a burden to carry which other nations do not have. The Federal Republic of Germany does not have full freedom of choice like for instance, Norway, which is a member of NATO without being a member of the EC, or Ireland which is an EC-member without belonging to NATO. What is considered as a normal option for any other nation might not be permitted for the Germans. Thus the frontline state at the frontier of the two world ideologies cannot claim normal freedom of action.

FOUR YEARS AGO THIS JOURNAL INITIATED AN OCCASIONAL series on the development of political science in different countries. To date four articles have appeared covering West Germany, Japan, France and the United States of America. Reading them together one is struck as much by the similarities as by the differences between the four countries. The main distinction of a comparative kind to be made, of course, is the fact of the sheer size and corresponding influence of American political science in relation to that of any other country or indeed all other countries taken together. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that commentaries on the contemporary character of American political science are almost exclusively concerned with its own methodological and professional considerations, while analogous exercises on the recent development of the discipline in other countries invariably dwell at length on how each has responded to the paradigmatic changes that have been pioneered from time to time in the USA; and as often as not they will admit of a hint of apology either for not embracing the new American modes fully enough, or, if positively disinclined so to do, for not developing a sufficiently considered critique of their shortcomings, or, again, for not themselves innovating alternative approaches and techniques of similar import and magnitude.

POLITICIANS LIKE TO BE REGARDED AS EFFECTIVE IN THE WORK THEY do. They insist that the promises they make and the programmes they decide on are more than mere declarations of goodwill. To practise what they preach is of special importance to governments which stress that their policies are substantially different from the policies of their predecessors. Thus, a departure from conventional politics on the model of the social-democratic consensus was asserted by the previously more pragmatic, now more ideologically minded, Conservative governments in Britain (1979), the United States (1980) and to some degree also by the electoral successes of Conservative parties in West Germany (1983) and France (1986). The conservative ground-swell in current government policies in Western democracies is, however, not restricted to the countries mentioned here, although Britain and the United States have played a special role as pathfinders for the political reorientation process.

Throughout this century, the Marxist Left in Europe has emphasized an economic interpretation of history, with state ownership of the means of production as the key element in their prescription for society. Political polarization is depicted as a direct reflection of social class conflict, with the working class the natural base of support for the Left. This diagnosis has become increasingly out of touch with reality in recent years, which have seen the decline of orthodox Marxist parties in Western Europe and the diminishing credibility of the ideology on which they are based. For as advanced industrial society emerges, economic determinism provides a progressively less adequate analysis of society, and class-based parties and the policies they advocate become less central to politics. Economic development reduces the impact of economic determinism. Though economic factors tend to play a dominant role in the early stages of industrial society, in advanced industrial society their relative importance diminishes; and self-expression, ‘belonging’ and the quality of the physical and social environment become increasingly important.