As the panacea for their political ills, Southern states frequently have been counseled to develop competitive two-party systems. Presumably the very demonstration of the superiority of the bipartisan system in itself would go a long way toward achieving that desideratum. Not the least of the unhappy consequences of this uncritical approach was the accompanying tendency to lump non-two-party Southern states into the single category of “the one-party South.” Fortunately, the rich diversity of Southern political processes recently has been uncovered and subjected to systematic analysis. For those states of the South which lack an effective opposition party, it has been shown that Democratic politics runs the gamut from multifactional chaos to a structured and disciplined bifactionalism. Louisiana is properly classified in the latter camp, which attests to at least some beneficial by-products of charismatic demagogy. In the absence of any reasonable expectation of the imminent rejuvenation of the Republican party in Louisiana, a realistic appraisal of the state's politics must eschew exhortation and concentrate upon an empirical examination of the operation of Democratic bifactionalism.

Some revision of the present Japanese constitution probably cannot long be put off. Often referred to as the “MacArthur Constitution,” it is open to the charge that it needs to be brought into accord with Japan's restored status of independence.

Although the immediate pressure for change is directed at the existing constitutional ban on rearmament, a more important change that can be anticipated will concern the position of the emperor in relation to the locus of sovereignty. This bears directly on the basic nature of the Japanese state, the central problem of the most bitter controversy in Japanese constitutional history. This problem, now dormant, is likely to be revived very soon, for the present constitution's treatment of the status of the emperor is highly vulnerable on substantive, procedural, and historical grounds.

In order to understand the nature, evolution, and basic conceptions of French administrative law, it is essential to study the role of the Conseil d'État, the supreme administrative tribunal. Creative and dynamic, often even bold, the jurisprudence of this remarkable body remains nevertheless prudent and fundamentally evolutionary. One would search in vain for the major principle of French administrative law in the legislative texts; they have been developed by the jurisprudence of this Council as it proceeds, by a series of successive decisions, from specific cases to ultimate yet flexible generalizations, establishing basic legal concepts not only by the skillful interpretation of texts, but also by creative construction when the texts are silent. Together with its doctrinal achievements, the Council's usus fori or judicial practice forms a flexible source of principles applicable to specific cases. The legislator may regulate according to circumstances and the necessities of the moment, without concerning himself with general principles or even conforming rigorously to those created by jurisprudence and theory. But the administrative judge, in administering justice, performs a genuinely creative task and establishes bases for legal thought.

Among the various forms of indigenous political activity in Africa today, that of the nationalist parties of the British West African colonies is perhaps the most prominent. In the Gold Coast and Nigeria these parties have almost achieved self-government for their territories; they now form the government or opposition parties in elected parliaments. They should be clearly distinguished from other types of nationalist movements, such as nativistic uprisings or syncretist movements of religious or tribal associations. As Coleman says: “African nationalism is not merely a peasant revolt …. Where it is most advanced [it] has been sparked and led by the so-called detribalized, Western-educated, middle-class intellectuals and professional Africans; by those who in terms of improved status and material standards of living have benefited most from colonialism; in short, by those who have come closest to the Western World but have been denied entry on full terms of equality.” Many of the members of these nationalist parties had, in their acceptance of a European style of life, turned their backs on the politically inert peasant mass from which they had risen, although in recent years there has been a growing interest on the part of the intellectuals in indigenous culture and history. In other parts of the world, such parties achieved power through revolution; in West Africa, the British colonial governments, in collaboration with these parties, drew up new constitutions and the party members were elected to power by ballot. To retain power the politicians have had to take party politics to the smallest towns and villages, where even nationalism had scarcely existed.

The New Zealand Labor party came into being after years of indecision and disunity, and many false starts. The history of this movement lies outside the scope of this article, but a brief discussion of the basic cleavages which divided labor before 1916, and of the circumstances under which the party was organized, may help to clarify some of the points in the analysis of its present-day structure and problems which is attempted in the pages ahead.

The geography and economy of New Zealand encouraged small, widely scattered productive units and decentralized unions relatively weak in bargaining power. The economy is dependent largely upon agriculture and the earlier industries were concerned chiefly with the processing of primary products such as butter, cheese, and meat. The thinly scattered population, the remoteness of the “four main centers” (Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch, and Dunedin) and many of the provincial towns, the variations in conditions from locality to locality, and the absence of mass production industries discouraged the development of a cohesive labor movement ready to support its demands by unified industrial action. Among those groups of workers who were thrown together on the job, such as the “watersiders” (dockworkers) and the miners, there was greater solidarity than among others and these were more inclined to press their claims by direct action. The trades and labor councils that developed in the various centers and met in Dominion-wide annual congresses after 1891 were the stronghold of the more moderate unions. Periodically their tactics were challenged by the militant groups, and differences crystallized in the formation of rival organizations.

Recently a group of scholars, analysts, and diplomatists met for a weekend conference on theoretical approaches to international politics. Their discussion was inspired by the widespread and growing interest in conceptual and theoretical problems illustrated by parallel efforts in the study of politics, economics, law, and human relations. In the field of foreign relations the impulse toward theory comes from practitioners as well as philosophers. Indeed a former Secretary of State maintains that our most urgent need is for “an applicable body of theory in foreign policy.” Practical men with first-hand diplomatic experience point to the need for rational generalizations and intellectual structures to extract meaning from the jet stream of contemporary events. The intellectual processes by which practical judgments are made along a moving front of events clearly demand inquiry and analysis. Theory in the study of international politics perhaps derserves a special priority because of the urgency of the problem and the stridency of the debate generated by competing approaches each claiming to have preempted the field. Perhaps what is called for is a sorting out and assessment of the intellectual factors that go into diverse theories of international politics at varying levels of abstraction and generality. This sorting out was one of the objectives of the conferees. Similarly this paper seeks to review the nature and purpose of theory, its limitations, and the characteristics of the chief types of theory in international politics.

American political scientists are still teaching courses labeled “Comparative Government” with little or no attention to the government and politics of the largest states of the world today, and they are still teaching something called “Political Theory” or “History of Political Thought” with no more than casual reference to the ideas underlying non-Western civilizations. The neglect of Indian polity is particularly striking and particularly serious, for apart from Western political thought it comprises probably the most extensive and most important body of political philosophy. Moreover, it is an integral part of the Hindu civilization of the past and the present. That civilization, as Radha-krishnan and Toynbee, among others, have pointed out, is alien to Western civilization, although there are many similarities; and the present encounter between the two civilizations comes at a time when both are in a period of crisis and transition. Such considerations are basic to an understanding of the stresses and strains in the relations of India with the Western world. Behind the tensions that arise between the United States and India, for example, lie differences in views of life and modes of thought and conduct, complicated by uncertainty, inner struggle, sensitivity, misunderstanding, and inexperience in playing new and difficult roles.

Every society, sociological research suggests, has its set of myths which incorporate and symbolize its political, economic, and social aspirations. Thus, as medieval society had the Quest for the Holy Grail and the cult of numerology, we, in our enlightened epoch, have as significant manifestations of our collective hopes the dream of impartial decision-making and the cult of “behavioral science.” While in my view these latter two are but different facets of the same fundamental drive, namely, the age-old effort to exorcise human variables from human action, our concern here is with the first of them, the pervasive tendency in the American political and constitutional tradition directed towards taking the politics out of politics, and substituting some set of Platonic guardians for fallible politicians.

The political systems of American states have remained, until recent years, a neglected field of study. Students of state government have found it easier to make meaningful comparisons of administration or legislative organization than to capture on paper the dynamic political forces which appear to be unique in each state and often are completely transformed by each group of personalities that wander on and off the political stage. V. O. Key's excellent study of the political forces in Southern states pointed up the lack of similar surveys of Northern states.

In particular, the role of political parties in state legislatures has been largely ignored. The report of the American Political Science Association Committee on American Legislatures points out this problem and also notes that “it has been generally assumed that partisanship counts for less in most state legislatures than it does in Congress.” Professor Lowell's famous study in 1901, which showed a comparatively low level of party voting in all of the five states he studied except New York, provided the empirical evidence for a conclusion that has been widely shared by later writers.