NOTES AND COMMENTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20679, 26 September 1930, Page 10

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

THE IN T CUBUS OF BUREAUCRACY. "Britain contains 45 millions of more or less sensible people. Every one of thoso individuals possesses some quality, some power, some possibilities," says Sir Ernest Bonn, in the Sunday Tirqes. "The only inference to bo drawn from political discussion is that all these people are helpless, powerless idiots, and that they depend upon the guidance and tion of innumerable bureaucrats .working in conformity with Acts of Parliament. Is it any wonder, then, that theso 45 millions feel a little discouraged ? If, guided by the true principles of economy, tho politicians would add only 5 per cent, to tho effort, hope or productivity of each of theso 45 millions of tho best human creatures ever produced, tho wliolo complexion of trade and industry would bo changed. Seeing, however, that our political devices deliberately take 20, or 30, or 40 per cent, or more of tho energy or hope or productivity of all these people, is it any wonder that things are bad ? Economy ajid liberty go together, and between them would givo us prosperity beyond anything that anybody can hope from our present ways." THE BASIS OF CIVILISATION. "Wind and rain, sun and soil, Aristotle's elements—earth, air, lire and water—are the real raw materials of our organic chemical industries. A little sulphur we must have; a little of tho halogens; some sodium and lime. Tho rest is derived from tho growing plant or from the animals which grow by feeding on plants," said Dr. Albert Levinstein in his presidential address to the Society of Chemistry Industry. "If yon except mining and metallurgy, the various applications of metals and of a few rocks and minerals, this is true of all our main industries, whether it be our paper, our soap, our food, our clothing; whether wo go in silks and satins or in sackcloth and ashes; .whether we wear boots or clogs. It is true of our medicines, dyes and perfumes; our furniture, our papers, beer, or tobacco; our cinema films and gramophone records. Above all, it is true of our very important raw material, power. . . . llow we govern ourselves, how wo arrange the exchange of our labour for goods or services, how we arrango our quarrels and our hates, social, racial, or international, all are merging into or depend on the greater problem of how wo shall make the earth supply us with what we must have; how we can make the sun and the air do tho maximum for us. This we may regard as ono of tho two great tasks of science. World politics, great issues, depend on the method by or degree lo which science and scientific technology solve it.''

JiItITISH JOURNALISM. "It would bo difficult to think of any profession or branch of commerce that lias changed its conditions and mothods more completely within a working lifetime than journalism has done," says Mr. S. Iv. liafclifie, in the Nineteenth Century. "In respect of many very important matters (hese 30 years make a dismal story; but it has, of course, to bo recognised that in some departments the gains balance or outweigh tlio losses.' The best newspaper of 1930 is an incalculable advance upon the best Victorian product. If it is news we have in mind, the morning paper as a mirror of tjio world's doings, then the reader of 1880, or even 1900; had nothing to compare in merit and interest with today's Times or Observer, Manchester Guardian or' Glasgow Herald. . . . But what of the other side ? Twenty years ago ono could have named a dozen English editors occupying positions of national importance, mon of high distinction—publicists to whom the most powerful statesmen were and had to bo respectful. It is tlio newspaper magnate, not the editor, before whom Prime Ministers tremble now, and upon whom, as a matter of course, they bestow titles. Tlio ranking of tlio manager, and oven tlio' advertisement manager, above the editor is to be counted a major tragedy of journalism as governed by circulation. And when, on behalf of tlio millionaire owner or tlio financial syndicate, it is argued that management has meant higher rates of pay for newspaper men. and women of nearly' all grades, the journalist must answer that the new system lias brought into Fleet Street a terror of speculative change which medns for him and his family a desolating sense of insecurity."