Bilitate the cabinet in any way from the criticisms

bilitate the Cabinet in any way from the criticisms we have already
levelled at it. As Rhodes has stressed in a later work: ‘At best, it is con-
tentious and, at worst, seriously misleading to assert the primacy of
the Cabinet among organisations and mechanisms at the heart of the
machine.’
2
184
The Prime Minister and Cabinet

The core executive: a useful model
As a working model, the core executive is useful to all students and
observers of the British political system as it extends analysis beyond
the axis of Cabinet and Prime Minister and acknowledges the exist-
ence of a larger and less fixed network of power relationships that
embraces Westminster, Whitehall and key players outside of these
two traditional key areas of power and influence. By embracing and
engaging with the concept of a core executive, we allow ourselves a
di ff erent dimension on the traditional triangular debate of prime
ministerial, presidential and cabinet power.
As we have already suggested, the concept of the core executive
has been developed by political scientists in response to the endlessly
frustrating debate on the issue of prime ministerial versus cabinet
government. Rather than see the Cabinet and Prime Minister
engaged in a seemingly endless struggle for political supremacy, the
idea of a core executive o ff ers us the idea that, in fact, both institu-
tions are embedded in a network of relations with other influential
bodies and people. It is the peak, or apex, of this power network that
is labelled the ‘core executive’.
We have already seen how writers such as Dunleavy and Rhodes
have focused on the notion of a core executive as a way out of the
impasse on prime ministerial versus cabinet government. Ignited ini-
tially by Bagehot in the 1860s and thereafter stoked occasionally by
influential works, such as a Richard Crossman’s 1960s introduction
to Bagehot, and later works such as the highly influential ‘British
Cabinet’ by John Mackintosh 3 , the debate has rumbled on in its
current form for the best part of fifty years. At the centre of the core
executive model is the belief that that the Prime Minister versus
Cabinet argument no longer fits the reality of modern politics. There
are two key reasons why this is the case:
• The focus on Prime Minister and Cabinet is too narrow and there-
fore ignores the range of institutions and players within the core
executive that have a central role in the policy-making process.
• The traditional debate is based on a misunderstanding. Past
observers have misjudged and misinterpreted the connections
between the various actors and institutions within the core executive
The Core Executive
185

and have therefore failed to recognise that the operation of the core
executive is not about the Prime Minister commanding players but
about building alliances, exchanging resources and adapting to pre-
vailing circumstances. More recently, Rhodes has argued that the
traditional debate is a product of academic focus on Westminster