American elections depend substantially on the vitality of the national economy. Prosperity benefits candidates for the House of Representatives from the incumbent party (defined as the party that controls the presidency at the time of the election), whereas economic downturns enhance the electoral fortunes of opposition candidates. Short-term fluctuations in economic conditions also appear to affect the electorate's presidential choice, as well as the level of public approval conferred upon the president during his term. By this evidence, the political consequences of macroeconomic conditions are both pervasive and powerful. But just how do citizens know whether the incumbent party has succeeded or failed? What kinds of economic evidence do people weigh in their political appraisals? The purpose of our paper is to examine two contrasting depictions of individual citizens – one emphasizing the political significance of citizens' own economic predicaments, the other stressing the political importance of citizens' assessments of the nation's economic predicament – that might underlie the aggregate entwining of economics and politics. Ours is an inquiry into the political economy of individual citizens.

The aim of this paper is to explicate the concept of manipulation, to show why it is of central importance in democratic theory, and to explain its relation to power. At first glance this might seem an unusual objective, since it remains one of the least studied of the concepts that are usually recognized as members of the power or control ‘family’. Yet allegations of the existence of manipulative practices, and demands for intervention by public agencies to prevent them, are commonplace in political life. Political science and political philosophy have contributed little to the understanding of how, for example, the following four claims about manipulation are to be evaluated.

Regimes are often preoccupied with maintaining their credibility. Great powers wish to convey to their allies the impression that they are not only strong but reliable. In limited adversary relationships, credibility is viewed as a resource to perpetuate and develop the more co-operative aspects of a fragile relationship. During war time, during the Cold War, or in other sharply adversarial relationships, leaders have an interest in conveying to their rivals a sense of what they consider important. Regimes also cherish credibility as part of their own self-image. There is yet another, more paradoxical, reason why credibility is valued: it can be used as a resource to achieve deception. On the occasions when statements are meant to deceive, the effort will not be effective if it is based on a reputation for thoroughgoing mendacity.

Charles Lindblom and Aaron Wildavsky are both prolific writers, so out of necessity a relatively brief review of their work would have to be either very selective as to the themes dealt with or quite superficial in its treatment of their many contributions to contemporary social science. I have essentially adhered to the latter strategy in this article. Any reader who expects an in-depth analysis and a critical appraisal of, for example, incrementalism will be disappointed. What I oner instead is a first acquaintance with all the major themes in the scholarly production of Lindblom and Wildavsky and also with the critiques they have provoked.

As Jon Elster remarked in an earlier review, G. A. Cohen's Karl Marx's Theory of History: A Defence ‘sets a new standard for Marxist philosophy’. In one way, the praise is too faint. Existing paradigms of continental Marxist philosophy are marred by an absence of careful definition, clear and precise argumentation, and the sort of sustained discussion that is committed to the teasing out of the intellectual difficulties of the author's own position – in short, marred by an absence of those virtues in the attainment of which the philosophy practised in Britain, the United States, and the Scandinavian countries on the whole excels. Cohen would, presumably, agree that this has nothing intrinsically to do with Marx, or Marxism, but in the main arises from the fortuitous coupling of Marxism with continental philosophical fashions. If this sounds like some sort of cultural chauvinism, it also happens to be the truth. So the ‘new’ standards for Marxist philosophy, then, are only the same standards by which it is right to judge all philosophy, wherever it is written, and which any philosophy must pass in order to be accounted good. What is perhaps less faint praise of Cohen is to say that his book is good philosophy (without the qualifying adjective ‘Marxist’). It is an ingenious and imaginative volume, in which precision and detailed attention to argument count for everything.

The first elections to the European Parliament were held on 10 June 1979 with each EEC country following its own electoral system. As in all recent elections, on-the-night forecasting was an integral part of the television coverage in Britain. This paper describes the method used by the BBC to predict the composition of the British delegation to the European Parliament. The performance of the method is discussed and some tentative conclusions are drawn about the behaviour of the British electorate.

In ‘Arms Races: External Security or Domestic Pressure?’ (this Journal, x, 121–8), Willem Saris and Cees Middendorp advance a compelling argument for the preponderance of domestic forces in driving arms races. However, the weight of the argument must be borne by the well-reasoned explanation of industrial forces and saturation levels, since the empirical analysis is fundamentally flawed in three ways. Definitions are lacking, data sources are ambiguous, and the application and interpretation of statistical procedures are inappropriate.

Although we appreciate the attention the critic has given to our paper, we are somewhat disappointed about the kind of criticism. It is said that the ‘empirical analysis is fundamentally flawed’. But if the analysis is flawed it must be very easy to show it by a reanalysis of the data. However, if one takes the time to look at the data used in this study one can see immediately that when the USSR's level of armaments is very low the USA is producing large amounts of missiles. On the other hand, when the USSR has a large number of missiles the USA's production is nil or very little. Consequently one must conclude that the USA cannot possibly be reacting to the activities of the USSR in the simple ways suggested by Richardson or Hamblin et al. This result was confirmed by our statistical analysis of the data. One can of course try other statistical procedures, as we did, but they all produce the same result: there is no reaction effect in the USA's behaviour.