Jean Blondel & Ferdinand Muller-Rommel (eds.): Cabinets in Western Europe. Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1988, 262 pp.

In discussions on the 'state of the art' during the 1970s a comment was often made about the surprising lack of research on 'the executive'. The control-room of the state was a black spot (or at leasty grey) not just in the comparative literature but also in most single country milieus. This, I think, is still a fair comment. Political scientists have in general avoided the most obvious place to look for power, possibly because it is so obvious. There is not that much fun in revealing the 'secret' powerholders in government! Also, the secrecy and closed nature of most cabinet systems does not make them the primary choice for quick, machine-readable data collection.

None of this, however, has deterred Jean Blondel in his effort during the 1980s to put the comparative study of 'political executives' on the agenda. His latest book, edited with Ferdinand Muller-Rommel, is a collection of standardized reports on the cabinet systems of thirteen West European countries. These are written by country specialists in the context of a comparative project on the 'similarities and differences, successes and failures' of cabinet government. The editors have succeeded well in making the authors of the country chapters stick to the same general outline. First they present the setting - the historical, institutional and sociopolitical factors moulding the various cabinet systems. Second, they describe the particular cabinet structure: seize, the role of the prime minister, cabinet coordination. there is the description of cabinet life as shaped by its relations with parliament, bureaucracy, parties and organizations. And, fourth, there is a discussion of decision-making in the cabinet, taking all the factors presented in the first parts into account.

This strict organization of the country chapters is both a strength and a weakness. When every author is alloted about 15 pages of text to present the individual characteristics of his or her 'cabinet system', there are limits to the personal analytical twist given to a country chapter. In other words, it is a bit boring to read the book from beginning to end. One will undoubtedly learn a lot about European governments, but in a factual, not an analytical, sense. Giving the authors a little more freedom would certainly have made the reading more lively. This becomes very clear when reading the special issue of European Journal of Political Research (no. 2, 1988) - with Blondel as a guest editor - where some of the same authors are given more leeway for their discussions. Renouncing control, however, has serious disadvantages in a project like this. Even though you may be thrilled by individual presentations, you risk losing the comparative bases - which is the explicit rationale for the whole project. In spite of the straitjacket put on the authors, however, there are certainly country chapters well worth reading in their own right. This reviewer found Andeweg on the Netherlands, Muller-Rommel on Germany and Nousiainen on Finland of particular interest.

Still, it is the uniform nature of the country presentations which is precisely what makes this book valuable. As its format is halfway between that of the data handbook and the - necessarily - idiosyncratic analysis, it is possible to pick up plenty of solid, useful and contextually explained information for everyone in need of data on 'cabinet systems'. Of course, it is already somewhat marked by the turn of time. French co-habitation is discussed in the present tense, but this is in the nature of things. I deplore, however, that neither Portugal nor Switzerland is included. It would have been useful to have information available on, for example, the Swiss executive branch - even if that is not a parliamentary or 'cabinet' system. I can, of course, see the 'comparative rational' for excluding the Swiss, but the inclusion of hybrid systems like the French and the Finnish makes the argument for West European completeness even stronger. I do not, however, hesitate to recommend the book, both as a work of reference and as a descriptive baseline. And we shall no doubt hear more from this project group as they promise 'real' comparative analysis of cabinet systems to follow. This, clearly, is much needed.