86 Book Reviews/Comptes Rendus an important story extremely well. He has broken it off in 1957, a natural place to pause, just when McMaster was becoming a provincial university. But it is also just the period when Canadian universities were beginning to heat up, intellectually and sociologically, and when stormy years were ahead for everyone. It is to be hoped that he will continue the good work and give us a third volume which will deal with the 'knowledge explosion' of the later fifties, sixties, and seventies, and which will tell us how McMaster fared in the days of 'the student revolt'. He may even tell us whether there was yet some lingering odour of sanctity, or whether it all disintegrated in Henry Thode's reactor. It is also to be hoped that for a third volume McMaster will be rather more generous in the way of publishing subsides. The physical production of the two volumes, particularly with regard to the illustrations, leaves much to be desired. Dr. Johnston's work deserves a much better presentation. Stanley B. Frost History of McGill Project McGill University Peter Aucoin, ed., The Politics and Management of Restraint in Government. Montreal: The Institute for Research on Public Policy, 1981, 268 pp. $17.95. Universities in many Canadian provinces have become a prime target of government fiscal restraint in recent years. As well, there has been wide discussion of the federal government's suspected intentions to reduce its contribution to post-secondary education as a means of attacking its budgetary problems. While The Politics and Management of Restraint in Government refers only in passing to universities and post-secondary education, it offers to readers who are concerned about the future of the university some useful insights about the nature, causes and incidence of and possible reactions to government fiscal restraint. The Politics and Management of Restraint in Government records the proceedings of a conference sponsored by the Institute for Research on Public Policy in Toronto in the fall of 1979. It features presentations by thirteen contributors and also contains brief commentaries by other invited participants and short summaries of the open discussions which concluded several of the Conference's sessions. The presentations, all in English, range from Martin Goldfarb's fascinating analysis of public attitudes towards government spending to a dull piece by William Teron on some of his experiences at CMHC to Fred Cleverly's fulsome commentary on Donald Craik's description of recent government practices in Manitoba. Besides Goldfarb, W.T. Stanbury on deregulation, Michael Krashinsky on user charges and E.S. Savas on contracting out of government services are worth reading. For those interested in political aspects, pieces by Darcy McKeough and John Sewell may be rewarding. The highlight of the book is Peter Aucoin's masterful overview. Provided in both English and French, this 24-page introductory chapter conveys on its own almost everything of significance discussed at the Conference. As well as sum- 87 Book R e v i e w s / C o m p t e s Rendus marizing and linking together the proceedings, Aucoin has added short initial and concluding sections in his overview which provide an excellent background to and summation of the discussions. Readers whose time is at a premium would not go far wrong in concentrating on the overview, while dipping only briefly into selected presentations for greater detail. The strength of the book is its discussion of the politics of government fiscal restraint, particularly the question of what the public wants of government (which may well be reflected in what governments are currently demanding of institutions, like universities, which they fund). Several themes emerge: an economic motive expressed as a demand for better government, for reform rather than reduction, for greater accountability and efficiency, for more service at less cost but not less for less. Related and allied is a strong counter-reaction to perceived unresponsiveness, incompetence and waste in government. This reaction produces much of the driving force behind the Proposition 13 movement, the broad symbolic gesture which aims at punishing and subjugating politicians and government employees to the public will. Perhaps by failing to recognize this second motive, by concentrating on general cost-cutting rather than more conspicuous eliminations, universities have omitted the penance required to free themselves from fiscal purgatory. The third element in public attitudes which is identified in the book is described by Goldfarb as "a growing sensitivity on the part of the middle class that people in government and the civil servants are setting themselves up as an elitist group." (p. 68) A feeling that civil servants have obtained for themselves special privileges, such as indexed pensions, and growing power over the lives of other citizens threatens "part of the fundamental value structure and beliefs of the middle class.. . that people who work outside the government should have more status, power, and wealth than people who work in the civil service because they feel they work harder and contribute more to society." (p. 69) Do politicians and civil servants in turn reflect this reaction to their dealings with the university community, where tenure, sabbaticals, limited student contact hours and, more recently, job security clauses in collective agreements, are easily interpreted as special privilege at the public expense? This last theme echoes one of Thomas Courchene's who in describing the movement towards a protected society and the politicization of economic life (Canadian Journal of Economics, November 1980) suggests that current antigovernment sentiments together with the public's desire for protection, security and the maintenance of its property rights to the status quo will lead in future to less expenditure intervention in the marketplace by government and more regulation and suppression of market forces. This trend does not augur well for institutions such as universities which rely on government for funding. The Politics and Management of Restraint in Government, unfortunately, falls short in its discussion of the negative effects of government restraint. John Sewell argues that restraint really "means passing on costs to those least able to absorb the pass-through,. . . the traditional ploy of moving against the least 88 Book Reviews/Comptes Rendus powerful." (p. 242) However, Sewell's response of organizing a vocal reaction to restraint has apparently succumbed to the realities of the electoral process. Other than Sewell's short piece and Gerald Regan's account of the problems of restraint in a have-not province, there is little rebuttal to the case for restraint. The conference and book would have benefitted from the inclusion of some analysis such as Daniel Chall's recent study of the cost of budget cutbacks in the New York City subway system, published in the spring 1981 Quarterly Review of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Chali attempted to measure the total cost of the deterioration of subway service, resulting from a prolonged period of curtailed maintenance. He estimates, for example, that the total annual time lost by workers because of slower service and delays is equivalent to roughly 166 million dollars of output or one-third of the annual corporate tax bill of New York City employers. Other costs, some even higher, also result from this form of government fiscal restraint. In summary, The Politics and Management of Restraint in Government is worthy of examination, particularly for Aucoin's skilful summary. The book fails to present a complete picture of the broad issue of government fiscal restraint. There is little discussion of the costs of restraint. And that may well be the most important message of all. Brian D. Christie Saskatchewan Universities Commission The Shrinking Maze. Report of the University of Calgary Program Review Committee. The University of Calgary, October 1980. pp. iii + 297. University planning studies frequently make for boring reading, especially to the outsider. Rhetoric is abundant, hard facts in short supply. Difficult issues respecting priorities tend to be glossed over under safe and woolly generalities about the university's "mission". If there is self-criticism, it usually is of a rather limited and perfunctory kind. The Shrinking Maze, however, is an exception to these strictures, and presents a model which other universities might well emulate. The report, developed by a group of eight academics from diverse disciplines within the framework of a committee chaired by the University's President himself, is broad in scope but thorough at many points of detail. There is a good balance between the analytic and the synthetic: the discussion is buttressed throughout by relevant empirical data contributed by the University's office of institutional reseach, yet there is a genuine attempt, particularly in the opening and closing chapters, to achieve a philosophical perspective on the university enterprise in general and the situation of the University of Calgary in particular. To be sure, some of the report's observations and recommendations do not completely escape the charge of being on the bland side; but many, though couched in reasonably diplomatic language, are of a refreshing candour and cannot have been particularly welcomed by those internal constituencies to whom they are directed. The inquiry sustains