50 Book Challenge: book four
Success in Politics: a comparative study by Neil McNaughton
This is, not to put too fine a point on it, a student textbook full of difficult concepts, dense information and plentiful context. It is not by any stretch of the imagination an easy read. You would probably have to be very interested in the subject to pick it up.
[Buy from Amazon
However I am very interested in the subject and, after a few weeks of having my own political ideas and assumptions challenged, I decided I wanted to read it from cover to cover instead of just dipping into it as I had previously. I was particularly impressed with the way that it lays out the ideological similarities and differences between the various British political traditions, the history of those traditions and the practical workings of the British state and government. These are the kinds of things that every informed and politically active citizen ought to understand.
Who am I kidding? Probaby not as many of those around as we’d all like. Still, I found it a stimulating and thought-provoking read and the time reading it was time well-spent.