Two judicial biographies

C. H. Currey: Sir Francis Forbes: The First Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of New South Wales, Angus and Robertson Sydney, 1968, pp. 586, $10.00.

C. H. Currey: The brothers bent: Judge‐Advocate Ellis Bent and Judge Jeffery Hart Bent. Sydney University Press, Sydney, 1968, pp. 176, $4.75     

Progressive and reactionary rhetoric in the municipal reform debate in New South Wales,Australia

Albert Hirschman's rhetoric of reaction is a potentially powerful typology of the arguments made by both proponents and opponents of reform (1991. The rhetoric of reaction: Perversity, futility, jeopardy. Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press). However, scholars have identified a number of gaps in the typology, in particular that it has struggled to explain the lines of rhetoric associated with disputed empirical evidence. This paper reviews Hirschman's typology before applying it to the contentious municipal amalgamation debates currently unfolding in New South Wales, Australia. We then examine the lines of attack open to progressives and reactionaries on the basis of empirical data. We conclude that the use of empirical data opens new lines of rhetoric for both ‘progressives’ and ‘reactionaries’ generally, but that both information costs and complexity significantly affect the timing and penetration of the arguments.     

The Trouble with Peace: The Royal Army Medical Corps’ Cold War Recruitment Conundrums

This article examines the Royal Army Medical Corps’ (RAMC) recruitment problems throughout the Cold War (1945–1980s). It explores why the RAMC experienced difficulties in attracting new personnel, how the army tried to alleviate these shortages, and the impact of chronic understaffing on the quality of military health care for generations of soldiers and their families. It concludes by reflecting on the enduring dilemmas of recruiting professionals in peacetime.     

Reviews

Australian

Scott Bennett, Aborigines and Political Power. Sydney, Allen and Unwin, 1989, pp.167. $ 17.95 (paper)

Jim Downing, Country of My Spirit. Darwin, North Australian Research Unit, Australia National University, 1988, pp.181. $ 12.50 (paper)

Hugh V. Emy and Owen E. Hughes, Australian Politics: Realities in Conflict, Melbourne, Macmil‐lan, 1988, pp. 554. $29.95 (paper)

Paul Finn, Law and Government in Colonial Australia, Oxford University Press, 1987, pp. 216. $40.00 (cloth)

Ross Fitzgerald and Harold Thornton, Labor in Queensland From the 1880s to 1988. St Lucia, University of Queensland Press, 1989, pp.422. $34.95 (paper)

Brian Galligan (ed.), Australian Federalism, Melbourne, Longman Cheshire, 1989 pp. 228. $15.95 (paper)

Brian Galligan (ed.) Comparative State Policies, Melbourne, Longman Cheshire, 1988, pp.303. $21.25 (paper)

Helen Gardner (ed.). The Politics of Health. Melbourne, Churchill Livingston, 1989, pp. 492. $29.50 (paper)

Brian W. Head and Allan Patience (eds), From Fraser to Hawke: Australian Public Policy in the 1980s, Melbourne: Longman Cheshire, pp.525. $19.95 (paper)

Dean Jaensch (ed.), The Flinders History of South Australia — Political History, Adelaide, Wakefield Press, 1986, pp.533. $40.00 (paper)

Dean Jaensch, Power Politics: Australia's Party System, 2nd edn, Sydney, Allen & Unwin Australia, 1989, pp.226. $18.95 (paper)

Jonathan Kelley and Clive Bean (eds), Australian Attitudes: Social and Political Analyses from the National Social Science Survey, Sydney, Allen and Unwin, 1988, pp.206. $ 15.95 (paper)

D.A. Kemp, Foundations for Australian Political Analysis: Politics and Authority, Melbourne, Oxford University Press, 1988, pp.488. $29.95 (paper)

Clem Lloyd: Either Drought or Plenty: Water Development and Management in New South Wales, Sydney, Kangaroo Press, 1988, pp.311. $37.50 (cloth)

Ian McAllister and John Warhurst (eds), Australia Votes: The 1987 Federal Election, Melbourne, Longman Cheshire, 1988, pp.284. $19.95 (paper)

G.S. Reid and Martyn Forrest, Australia's Commonwealth Parliament 1901–1988: Ten Perspectives, Melbourne, Melbourne University Press, 1989, pp.572. $29.95 (cloth)

Comparative and international

Mike Bowker and Phil Williams, Superpower De‐tented Reappraisal, London, Sage, 1988, pp. 277. £10.95 (paper)

Charles Chatfield and Peter van den Dungden (eds), Peace Movements and Political Cultures, Knoxville, University of Tennessee Press, 1988, pp.317. US$39.95 (cloth)

Ronald W. Clark, Lenin. The Man Behind the Mask. London, Faber & Faber, 1988, pp.564. £17.95 (cloth)

David Lane (ed.), Elites and Political Power in the USSR, Aldershot, Edward Elgar, 1988, pp.299. £28.50 (cloth).

Alistair Cole and Peter Campbell, French Electoral Systems and Elections since 1789, 3rd edn, Alder‐shot, Gower, 1989, pp.202. £25.00 (cloth)

Conlan, Timothy, New Federalism: Intergovernmental Reform from Nixon to Reagan, Washington, D.C., Brookings, 1988. pp.247. US$15.95 (paper)

Russell J. Dalton, Citizen Politics in Western Democracies. Chatham, N.J., Chatham House, pp. 270. US$14.95 (paper)

E. Etzioni‐Halevy, National Broadcasting Under Seige: A comparative Study of Australia, Britain, Israel and West Germany, Hampshire, Macmillan. 1987, pp. 212. $82.95 (cloth)

Roger Hilsman, The Politics of Policy Making in Defense and Foreign Affairs: Conceptual Models and Bureaucratic Politics, Englewood Cliffs, N.J., Prentice‐Hall, 1987, pp.326. $42.50 (paper)

Scott Newton and Dilwyn Porter, Modernization Frustrated: The Politics of Industrial Decline in Britain since 1900, London, Unwin Hyman, 1988. pp. 224. $7.95 (paper)

J. Mathews, Tools of Change: New Technology and the Democratisation of Work, Sydney, Pluto Press, 1989. pp.234. $14.95 (paper)

Angelo Panebianco, Political Parties: Organization and Power, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, pp.318. $39.50 (paper)

Robert Springborg, Mubarak's Egypt: Fragmentation of the Political Order, Boulder & London, Westview Press, 1989, pp.307. $39.95 (cloth)

Edward A. Tiryakian and Ronald Rogowski (eds), New Nationalism of the Developed West, Boston, Allen and Unwin, 1985, pp.394. $69.00 (cloth)

Political theory and methodology

J. Budziszewski, The Nearest Coast of Darkness: A Vindication of the Politics of Virtues. Ithaca, Cornell University Press, 1988, pp.201. US$24.95 (cloth)

Peter Grabosky and Paul Wilson: Journalism and Justice: How Crime is Reported Sydney, Pluto Press, 1989, pp.l49.$14.95(paper)

George Grant, English‐Speaking Justice. Notre Dame, Notre Dame University Press, 1985 (1974), pp.104. US$8.95 (paper)

J. Habermas, The Theory of Communicative Action, Vol. One, Reason and the Rationalization of Society, trans, by T. McCarthy, Cambridge, Polity Press, 1987, pp.465. $45.40 (paper)

J. Habermas, The Theory of Communicative Action, Vol. Two, The Critique of Functionalist Reason, trans, by T. McCarthy, Cambridge, Polity Press, 1987, pp.447. $69.95 (cloth)

J. Habermas, The Philosophical Discourse of Modernity, trans, by F. Lawrence, Cambridge, Polity Press, 1987, pp.430. $65.00 (cloth).

Les Johnston, Marxism, Class Analysis and Socialist Pluralism, London, Allen & Unwin, 1986, pp. 155. $19.95 (paper)

Bernard Daucnhaucr, The Politics of Hope, London, Routledge, 1986, pp.200. $76.95 (cloth)

Bill Jordan, The Common Good: Citizenship, Morality and Self‐interest, Basil Blackwell, Oxford, 1989, pp. 190. $29.95 (paper)

Ciaran O'Maolain, The Radical Right: A World Directory, Harlow, Longman, 1987, pp.500. £45.00 (cloth)     

The Death of Frank Wilson: Race,Crime, and Punishment in Post-Civil War Pennsylvania

In 1877, Frank Wilson, an African American man, was executed for murdering a white tramp in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. This article examines the trial, punishment, and press reporting of the case in the evolving context of race and criminal justice in post-Civil War Pennsylvania. It presents three main findings. First, it documents evidence of racial discrimination and wildly disproportionate rates of African American arrest and imprisonment in Harrisburg and surrounding counties comparable to earlier research focused on the largest northern cities. Second, it shows that views on law enforcement were diverse within both white and black communities and shaped by the exigencies of local and national party politics. Third, it makes the case that African American experiences of law enforcement in northern states are better understood as part of a national criminal justice culture than in distinctively regional terms.