For an increasing proportion of the United Kingdom population, protests and direct action have now replaced voting as a way of achieving political goals.

The first 200 words of this essay...

Assess the view that, for an increasing proportion of the United Kingdom population, protests and direct action have now replaced voting as a way of achieving political goals.

It is believed that for an increasing proportion of the United Kingdom population that protests and direct action have now replaced voting as a way of achieving political goals. However how true is this?

During the 1950s, it seemed like there was a degree of political consensus.

Functionalist argued that class struggle was on the decline and that the worst excesses of capitalism had been overcome by the mixed economy and the welfare state.

Classical pluralism is a theory of political power that claims that in western democracies power is dispersed amongst many competing groups. Pluralists argue that Power is diffuse rather than concentrated and that in society a large number of groups represent all the significant and different interests of the population. These groups compete with each other for influence over government. All these groups accept the legitimacy of the decision making process and of its outcome, and the competition between groups ensures that no one group dominates.

This classical pluralist position is