POLITICS AND ECONOMICS.
French Parties and Politics. By Roger H. Soltau. (H. Milford. 2s. 6d. net.) Mr. Soltau, who is the Lecturer on French History at Leeds University, has done a real service to both France and England by explaining simply and clearly the French Republican Constitution and the evolution and present state of French political parties. The actions of French Ministries are often misunderstood by English readers who do not know the domestic difficulties which hamper a French Premier. We have to realize, for instance, that the existing Cabinet, like its immediate predecessors, is a Coalition of dissident parties, so that its policy must be a very unsatisfactory compromise between rival principles. Mr. Soltau reminds us that the Chamber is all-powerful during its fixed term of four years, for no President since McMahon in 1877 has dared to exercise his right to dissolve the Chamber before its term has expired. Consequently, the life of any Ministry is pre- carious ; a chance majority in the Chamber may end it at any moment. Further, there is "the Republican reluctance to entrust to any man for a long time powers which he might use for the overthrow of the Republic "—a traditional pre- judice which accounted for what many Englishmen regarded as the inexplicable failure of M. Clemenceau to become President in 1920. Mr. Lloyd George's virtual dictatorship would have been impossible in modern France.
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