This piece was created in collaboration with Chatham House. The views expressed are the authors' own.
It has been a tumultuous 18 months for British and American politics. Perhaps inevitably, as each country’s domestic political scene has been fundamentally transformed, the relationship itself will change.
In the US and the Americas Programme at Chatham House, our primary focus is on US foreign policy. But foreign policy is never completely disconnected from domestic policy: How a country acts abroad may not be a direct reflection of its population’s interests, but it is certainly shaped by domestic constraints. Especially in a close-knit partnership like that between the United States and Britain, the state of domestic politics shapes the relationship, cross-pollinating ideas and trends that impact approaches to other aspects of foreign policy.
So to better understand what lessons American and British politics might learn from each other, we reached out to political commentators on both sides of the political spectrum and on both sides of the Atlantic. We asked themwhat aspects of the other country’s politics they saw as worthy of emulation. The responses are reproduced below in lightly edited form:
From the British right: The rigid US electoral cycle helps prevent chaos
Katy Balls
To see what Westminster can learn from Washington, one only need look at the current state of politics in Britain and consider how this chaos came to be.
After Theresa May's decision to call an early election backfired spectacularly, Parliament is in a state of flux. The Conservatives must try to govern without a majority, the country's negotiating position on Brexit has been weakened, and the opposition is able to repeatedly claim there will be another election within months. Indeed, the Labour Party has been in campaign mode ever since the surprise result of the June 8 election.
May is not the first British prime minister to indulge in the folly of an unnecessary election. Former prime ministers Edward Heath and Stanley Baldwin also called snap elections for self-serving motives. Like May, both were punished by the electorate.
Across the pond, a more sensible system is in place that serves to prevent politicians risking national stability for political advantage. In America, presidents cannot move the goal posts just because they feel like it. Once elected, they have a four-year term in which to achieve their legislative program before voters return to the polls to pass judgment on their efforts. Nor can power-hungry presidents outstay their welcome, with a maximum stay of two terms – eight years – in place to prevent an 'elective dictatorship'.
This system provides a solid foundation for good government. It means executives are more likely to focus on the tasks at hand than plot a shortcut to staying in power. It also means more planning can go into the transfer of power.
When a new president is elected, a transition period of a few months follows in a bid to enable a smooth shift from one administration to another. This means that nominees can be thoroughly vetted for positions and that new and old personnel can meet, allowing new staffers to become familiar with the operations of the executive branch.
Compare this with what happens in the United Kingdom and the hurried – and often humiliating – manner in which those who once held the highest office in the land are rushed out of No. 10 the day after the election. Other than a few pre-election meetings with the civil service, little preparation is made for the new regime. Had the UK a transition period, the shock result of this year's snap election would have been cushioned.
The Queen's Speech would have been scheduled far enough in the future that it did not have to be delayed when talks with the DUP, the Northern Irish party that supports the Tories in the governing coalition, stalled a few days in. What's more, these negotiations would have gone on while the United Kingdom continued to have a functioning government taking care of daily business.
Once a government is formed, the British system is less prone to gridlock than the back-and-forth that tends to form between the White House and Congress. But the loose electoral cycle means this opportunity for change can be too easily squandered when the going gets tough.
In 2015, voters plumped for a Conservative government that promised a lot. Two years later, that program has been replaced by an ineffectual minority government, and the nation is suffering from election fatigue. The Fixed Terms Parliament Act has proven worthless.
In America, this could not have happened. The mother of parliaments ought to take note.
From the British left: Britain is missing the checks and balances that have stymied Trump
Abi Wilkinson
Many of the things I dislike most about politics in my own country also exist in the United States, and sometimes in exaggerated form: Disproportional electoral systems which frequently produce perverse outcomes; a punitive and inadequate welfare state; vast inequality between rich and poor; a powerful donor class which uses its wealth to influence policy outcomes.
In the age of Trump, though, one thing stands out about the American system: the various checks and balances that limit executive power. If Trump became prime minister in the United Kingdom – representing a party with a parliamentary majority – he’d have faced far fewer barriers to enacting his agenda.
Take healthcare reform, for example. The National Health System is immensely popular (indeed, polling regularly finds it’s the institution that makes people most proud to be British), and any prime minister attempting to repeal free-at-the-point-of-access healthcare in the UK would probably face a rebellion within their own party. However, the lack of separation of the legislature and executive has allowed many other harmful bills to pass with little pushback. Though the House of Lords does scrutinize and suggest amendments to legislation, there is an implicit limit on the extent to which an unelected second house can block the government’s agenda.
It is often suggested that the United Kingdom’s system is superior because the concentration of power avoids legislative deadlock. The weaknesses of this argument become clearer when you take it to its logical conclusion. The most frictionless method of passing legislation would be, of course, dictatorship. Though it’s possible that UK MPs might give a vote of no confidence in a government that behaved similarly to Trump’s administration, I don’t think there’s any reason to assume that would be the case. Party discipline leads most MPs to follow the whip even when they vocally disagree with their party’s official policy – Anna Soubry’s vote to trigger Article 50 to leave the European Union, when she has been outspoken against Brexit, immediately springs to mind.
The power of state governments in the United States to push laws forward is also of great interest. The legalization of cannabis in individual states is something that wouldn’t be possible in the United Kingdom. (A couple of years ago, the Green Party unsuccessfully attempted something similar in Brighton.) If these sorts of progressive reforms are introduced in specific locales – and shown to be effective – it helps build the case for the same policies to be rolled out nationally, including in areas with more conservative voters.
The efforts of so-called sanctuary cities to resist Trump’s immigration deportation plans have been inspiring – and I was pleased to see that Trump’s attempt to punish these cities by withdrawing funding was blocked in federal court. In the United Kingdom, the High Court recently found that the government’s household benefit cap (one example of harmful legislation that passed through parliament with little difficulty) is unlawful and illegally discriminates against single parents with young children. However, ministers are due to appeal the decision, and it’s hard to have much faith the ruling will lead to change so long as a Conservative government remains in power.
I particularly worry about what happens to judicial oversight when the UK leaves the European Union. Though the move is strongly opposed by EU negotiators, Theresa May is aiming to exit the European Court of Justice. Though the pledge was dropped from their recent manifesto, the Conservatives have also long pushed for the UK to withdraw from the European Court of Human Rights. The U.S. judicial system seems a far more genuine and robust check on executive power than UK courts.
From the American right: The US could learn from Britain’s slimmer government
Pardes Seleh
21st Century politics in the United States has taken on some characteristics of a reality television show, one in which the politicians are the distant, out-of-touch stars. Their ineffectiveness, along with the expansion of the federal government, and the sheer hullabaloo that goes into every political act all contribute to a disconnection between politicians and voters. Although it is rare for Americans to look to British politics for solutions, there are elements of British politics which produce a better relationship between the people, their elected representatives, and the effectiveness of the government overall.
Limited government is an important cornerstone of American politics, but it doesn’t always result in less government – or more faith in government. As the United States has grown into the world’s largest economy, its complexity has required more and more regulations and federal services. But the ever-increasing list of checks and balances has only really served to create an incredibly expensive and wasteful bureaucracy.
While the British government is far from limited—quite interventionist, actually—it manages to more effectively strike a balance between representation and regulation in some ways.
One notable example is the speed with which the two governments can operate. It is not uncommon for a bill to take months to pass in the U.S. Congress — in some cases, years. New laws have to pass through a gauntlet of opposition and often struggle to do so. The ever-increasing length of the campaign season means that members of Congress – who face voters every two years – have a smaller and smaller window of time during which they can seriously consider pushing major legislation.
Although recent elections have seen the UK move toward something closer to a two-party system, members of parliament are directly elected and held to their party commitments. That closeness, along with the fact that the prime minister is a member of parliament rather than a separate branch of government, makes governance more responsive and efficient – though naturally, a prime minister is going to have less trouble passing bills into law when the majority of parliament seats are of his or her own party.
In the United States, politicians can easily change their courses of action, totally independent of political party or constituents. In fact, a common complaint you’ll hear from American voters is that the politician they voted for campaigned on one platform and acted on a completely different one once in Washington. British MPs, who normally serve five-year terms but in reality might face elections on as little as six weeks’ notice, have to remain more closely tied to the views of their constituencies.
Finally, the direction of travel in terms of decentralization – which should be a priority for conservatives – is better in Britain than in the United States. The increase in mayoral power for individual regions, begun under David Cameron, promises to reduce the power of the UK’s central government and allows more freedom for local leaders to act more effectively on behalf of their own regions. This contrasts favorably with the ever-increasing complexity of U.S. politics.
From the American left : Britain’s political culture remains enviable
Nathan Robinson
At the moment, it’s difficult for many of us in the United States not to envy the British political system. There are striking parallels between the core political tensions facing the two countries: in both, a deepening cultural and economic divide has led to widespread political disaffection and fueled a resurgence of both radical leftism and xenophobic nationalism. But while both nations are grappling with similar kinds of problems, the British retain one very significant advantage over the Americans: they do not have Donald J. Trump as their head of state.
And I don’t believe that’s an accident. Trump is a uniquely American kind of creature, not just in his braggadocious and bullying personality or his tacky taste, but in the show-business origins of his political career. The United States has always been fertile ground for charismatic hucksters, from turn-of-the-century patent medicine salesmen to the televangelists peddling miracles on late-night television. And though the press have often tried to find a UK analogue to Trump (whether Nigel Farage, Boris Johnson, or Jacob Rees-Mogg), nobody quite fits. Trump is distinctly our own.
The British political system is less likely to breed a Donald Trump in part because it still retains a certain commitment to substance over image. The 2016 Republican primary debates in the United States were more like wrestling matches than policy debates, and the election itself was dominated by questions of personality and temperament. The recent UK election displayed an impressive contrast: While obviously dominated by Brexit, the discourse also centered around serious issues like social care, tax policy, and nuclear deterrence.
In the United States, after the parties promulgate their official platforms, the documents are almost never mentioned on the campaign trail. In Britain, serious debates were had around the provisions in the party manifestos, with journalists and voters taking seriously their responsibility to assess policy questions.
There is, in many ways, a much healthier political culture in the United Kingdom. I wonder if the British public fully appreciates just how remarkable it is to have a television program like the BBC’s Question Time, where journalists and political figures are challenged and held accountable by members of the voting public.
Britain is likewise fortunate in having its lively and substantive Prime Minister’s Questions, a practice many of us Americans would love to see our president regularly put through. In the United Kingdom, one can regularly catch long interviews with party leaders about their political ideas. In the United States, political television tends to consist of a series of talking heads shouting at one another for the two- or three-minute intervals between commercial breaks.
The most basic thing that an American must admire about British politics, then, is that it remains reasonably functional compared with our own troubled democracy. Of course, no generalization is completely true, and not all of British political discourse is elevated and serene. The UK tabloid newspapers are, if anything, even less intellectually edifying than their U.S. counterparts. But watching from afar, one cannot help but be jealous of a serious-minded political environment that seems incapable of yielding anything quite as alarming as a Donald Trump.
