Jones (editor of the journal Parliamentary History) and his contributors have produced an institutional history of British parliaments, limiting discussion of politics to when political events, as they often did, had institutional repercussions. Subjects include the membership of parliaments; constituencies, elections, and franchises; places of meeting; how business was arranged and managed in terms of such issues as the use of committees, the development of parties, lobbying, and voting procedures; recording and reporting of business and debates; balances of power between bicameral houses; and the position of the monarch in the Parliament. Twenty-six chapters discuss the Parliament of England from its origins to 1707; the Parliament of Great Britain from 1707 to 1800; the Parliament of the United Kingdom since 1801; the Parliament of Scotland to 1707; the Parliament of Ireland to 1800; the Northern Ireland Parliament; legislatures of the Isle of Man, the Channel Islands, and the Republic of Ireland; and the post-devolution legislatures of Scotland and Wales. Annotation ©2010 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
A comprehensive history of parliament in the British Isles from the earliest times, covering all aspects of parliament as an institution.
A Short History of Parliament is a comprehensive institutional history, not a political history of parliament, though politics is included where, as frequently occurred, institutional changes resulted from particular political events. It covers the English parliament from its origins, the pre-1707 Scottish parliament and the pre-1800 Irish parliament, the parliament of Great Britain from 1707 and the parliament of the United Kingdom from 1801, together with sections on the post-devolution parliaments and assemblies set up in the 1990s and on parliaments in the Isle of Man, the Channel Islands and the Irish Republic. It considers all aspects of parliament as an institution: membership of both the Lords and the Commons; constituencies, elections and franchises; where the Lords and the Commons met; how business was arranged and managed, including Speakers, the use of committees, the development of parties, lobbying and voting procedures; legal cases in the House of Lords; official recording of and reporting of business and debates; the conflict and balance of power between the two Houses; and the position of the monarch in parliament. Each section contains a chronology listing key events, suggestions for further reading and "inserts" - short anecdotes or accounts of particular figures or episodes which provide lively illustrations of parliament at work in different periods. Clyve Jones is an honorary fellow of the Institute of Historical Research. He has been editor of the journal Parliamentary History since 1986. Previously he was reader in modern history in the University of London and collection development librarian in the Institute of Historical Research. He has published extensively on the history of the House of Lords and of the peerage in the early eighteenth century.
