David Philips and Robert D. Storch, Policing Provincial England 1829-1856. The Politics of Reform. London-New York, Leicester University Press, 1999, 342 pp., ISBN 0-7185-0112-8

Like all really good books, this one falls to be appreciated on a number of different levels. On the one hand, it deals at some length with a relatively neglected period of English – a point itself to come back to – policing history. On the other, it examines and explains very significant shifts in both the attitudes and the political positioning of contemporary rural political elites in a rapidly changing society. Yet again, it is a reflective meditation by two of the most original and longs...