no justifiable appeals to anything but majority opinion, so the impersonal
regulation of life by rules set out, ultimately by the majority, is the only
acceptable arbiter. The difficulty in practice is that no known set of legal rules
can actually abolish the role of purely discretionary decisions by those
appointed to administer law; indeed, the major theoretical debate between
‘positivist’ legal theorists, such as Hart, and the Dworkinian school is precisely
about the nature of this discretion.
Law and Order
Law and order refers to a state of society in which there is a regular process of
criminal and civil law and in which certain agencies, such as thepolice, are
responsible for maintaining domestic tranquillity. Law and order is generally
seen by most conservatives and many liberals as the basic requirement of a state,
since without these conditionscivil society, political freedom andcivil
libertiesare impossible. Law and order in common parlance has also come
to mean the provision of a strong police force and a concern with reducing
crime and vandalism. As such, law and order may become an election issue in
democracies concerned with rising crime rates. George Wallace campaigned
for the US presidency as the candidate of the American Independent Party in
1968, emphasizing concern for law and order.Conservative Partycampaigns
in the United Kingdom have often laid considerable stress on this theme. So
important do politicians regard this issue electorally that even Labour govern-
ments seek to appear, in Tony Blair’s words, ‘tough on crime and tough on the
causes of crime’.
Leadership
Leadership is a quality which in theory signifies the ability of a person or a
group of people to persuade others to act by inspiring them and making them
believe that a proposed course of action is the correct one.
Political leadership is generally thought to be a desirable property, except
when a leader becomes too conscious of his or her position and refuses to
acknowledge theiraccountabilityto the rank and file of their party or to the
electorate. Leadership may, in certain romantic orfascistphilosophies, take on
a special role, but in normal democratic politics it is seen as a routine feature of
the political process.
Sometimes the ruling e ́lite of a party may be known as its leadership (see
e ́litism). In the Soviet Union, for example, the Communist Party stressed its
‘collective leadership’ as a basic principle of government in contrast to the
Leadership