ANTHONY SAMPSON

Forty years ago Anthony Sampson wrote his indispensable best-seller The Anatomy of Britain. Now he has felt drawn back to the task by exasperation with the lack of democracy and accountability in Blair''s Britain. How has power become so concentrated in so few hands? Whatever happened to all those alternative centres -- like parliament, the monarchy, the regions or the cabinet? Why are company directors, lawyers or accountants so unanswerable to the people they represent? Sampson follows ''the will o'' the wisp of power'' through each profession vividly describing the new people at the top: corporate chiefs in place of hereditary landowners, Islington media couples in place of Kensington toffs. He finds still more power concentrating on Downing Street, which has never been more distant from parliament -- or closer to big business. After four decades of power-watching Sampson is now more impatient with the abuses. But he is hopeful that the British people will finally reassert their democratic rights, whether as voters or shareholders.This new Anatomy provides an insider''s tour, with exceptional sources; but it is on the side of the outsider, written for ordinary citizens who want to know who manipulates their lives -- and how to make them answer.