Anyone who has any knowledge of politics, PLEASE help?
At the moment I’m studying the Edexcel Unit 2 topic ‘Prime minister, cabinet and executive’ for AS level government and politics, and I’ve missed a few lessons so just trying to catch up by reading the text book.
1) Firstly, I don’t understand what is meant by ‘government policy’. The book says “The executive is, technically, responsible for executing or implementing government policy” and “it controls the policy process.” I know it might sound stupid but what actually is policy? As in, is it a law or what? Because nothing can be created without the support of Parliament, so I’m confused.
2) What is the ‘core executive’? The definition it gives in the book is “an informal network of bodies and actors that a play a key role in the policy process.” Not very clear lol.
“Government policy” simply means what the elected government wants to do while in power and government policy is summarised each year in the Queens Speech made in the autumn of each year. The government “executive” comprises the Prime Minister and the Ministers the PM chooses to run his government. So in the present government “the execution” of the government’s Foreign policy is under the control of David Miliband, the execution of government policy on justice is under control of Jack Straw and the execution of financial policy under control of Alistair Darling etc. etc. They will report to Prime Minister and other government Ministers at Cabinet Meetings about the execution of their own particular government department’s execution of the whole government’s policies.
But I am puzzled by your term “core executive”. It is not a term I have come across before in references to our function of government. Yes we have an Executive of government and the Cabinet is in effect “the core executive” although that is not really a term that is normally used. But I can assure you there are no “actors” involved in control of the execution of government policy in the UK, although in the USA they do have a history of choosing the likes of Ronald Reagan and Arnie Schwartzenger to be chief executives of State or national governments. But we do not really equate to that in Britain although we sometimes elect clowns like Boris Johnson or Ken Livingston to be Mayors of London.
Introduction to AS Politics
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Edexcel Government & Politics in the Uk for As: Success in Politics $60.94 No Synopsis Available |
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