Abstract
Concepts of political leadership have been applied sparingly to parliaments, and not at all to the study of House of Commons select committees in the UK Parliament, where analysis has largely focused on their institutional capacity to scrutinise government and hold it to account. Yet examining these committees through a political leadership lens illuminates the complex role of committee chairs, a role which was significantly reshaped in 2010 with a shift to election of chairs by the whole House. This article analyses select committee chairs through the lens of political leadership, and draws on a series of interviews with chairs in order to delineate the nature of the political leadership they perform. It argues that, as chairs are now increasingly important parliamentary and policy actors, our understanding of them is significantly advanced by conceptualising their role as one of parliamentary political leadership, and that this in turn enriches our analytical toolkit when it comes to the study of parliaments.
Highlights
Political leadership analysis affords valuable insights into the key actors who have changed the trajectories of contemporary societies, and studies of US presidents and prime ministers in Westminster systems constitute fertile fields for scholars to plough
Leadership analyses have been applied to the arena of legislative politics, and many studies have been conducted on US legislative leadership (e.g. Caro, 2002; Cooper & Brady, 1981; Herrnson, 1998; Jewell & Whicker, 1994; Peabody, 1976, 1985; Peters, 1990; Smith, 2007; Smith & Deering, 1984; Strahan, 2007, 2011), the UK parliament has not been subject to any such exploration
As membership of Commons select committees is restricted to backbench MPs, they offer a valuable opportunity to examine whether political leadership is a useful conceptual lens through which to analyse the activities of the chairs who sit at their apex, and whether political leadership can be observed in the House of Commons beyond that exercised by the parliamentary party leaderships
Summary
Political leadership analysis affords valuable insights into the key actors who have changed the trajectories of contemporary societies, and studies of US presidents and prime ministers in Westminster systems constitute fertile fields for scholars to plough (for a sample see: Bennister, 2012; Blick & Jones, 2014; Foley, 2000; Greenstein, 1988, 2009; Heffernan, 2005; Hennessy, 2000; McKay, 2014; Neustadt, 1960, 1980; Weller, 2014). As membership of Commons select committees is restricted to backbench MPs, they offer a valuable opportunity to examine whether political leadership is a useful conceptual lens through which to analyse the activities of the chairs who sit at their apex, and whether political leadership can be observed in the House of Commons beyond that exercised by the parliamentary party leaderships. The article advances two key arguments: first, that the political leadership approach is of significant conceptual value for the analysis of House of Commons select committees; and, second, that those who are ‘doing’ leadership can provide us with extraordinarily useful insights into everyday leadership practices, which in turn expands our understanding of what political leadership entails for those charged with performing it
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