Diarist in Power

Abstract

Richard Grossman had already been keeping a diary for about a dozen years when he became a member of the cabinet that Harold Wilson formed in 1964. He hoped to use it as the basis of a book about the theory and practice of British politics written from the unique standpoint of one who had taught political science and had then been a practising politician. His death before he did so may have been a personal tragedy rather than a loss to political science there is always Wilson's The Governance of Britain to show that a book by an ex-academic who has become a very adept politician may not contain many profound insights. As the diaries stand they will be of immense value to historians but on the theoretical side they simply accept and give ample evidence for accepting the view put forward by John Mackintosh in The British Cabinet. In the realm of practice, Crossman's concern about setting up an inner cabinet may have pointed the way to a step back from prime ministerial government, but in what he writes he accepts the fact that Wilson ruled in the manner established by previous holders of the first place. Diaries of a Cabinet Minister gives an excellent account of the way a normal though not a very successful cabinet operated and, far more novel, tells us what a minister does when running his