Disconnects are usual between leaders and the led. But nowhere is this more extreme than between the average Leave voter and the Tory Brexit Westminster elite.
According to statistics the typical Brexit voter is likely to be white-English, resident outside the large metropolitan areas, as well as older, poorer and less well-educated than Remainers. In assessing why Leavers voted for Brexit, we find miscalculation of how Brexit would affect Leavers’ own economic interests mingled with the toxic allure of xenophobic nationalism.
The Leavers’ arguments were essentially not different from those peddled against outsiders throughout history, from the arrival of east European Jews at the beginning of the twentieth century to blacks in the 1950s, or Asians in the 1970s. “They take away our jobs, they drive down wages, they push up housing costs, they strain the resources available for health and education.” In 2016 there was also the financial myth that EU withdrawal would free up 350 million a week from EU contributions which could be redirected to the NHS.
These supposed financial advantages were alloyed with xenophobia and nationalism. “We will get our country back.” “We will take back control [against them, the other].” Outsiders would go or at least stop coming. The Brexit appeal was about nostalgia, the recreation of an England long gone: the England of fish and chips and Max Bygraves shows, an England where the only foreigners were the occasional “paki” on the corner and the odd Italian barber. In short, Leavers saw Brexit simultaneously as a step to improving their lot economically and securing a more ethnically homogeneous community, both ethically and socially. Brexit for them was a sub-conscious drive to turn back the clock to the society that existed under the Keynesian state managed capitalism in the decades following the Second World War.
But the Tory Brexit elite have no intention of turning back the clock. Their main complaint against the EU is not freedom of movement, but the inhibitions that the EU places on the even further extension of neo-economic liberalism. They recognise that exiting the EU will lead to capital flight (non-investment, re-location); a mass influx of cheap low quality commodities, including food, from around the world. Unemployment will grow and state revenues will fall, bringing about a near end to welfare spending and disaster for the NHS. But the Tory Brexit elite will “solve” the problem through an internationally competitive economy of low wages with a minimal welfare state and limited employment and consumer rights - and all this while waving the Union Jack.
If Brexit was an act of desperation, driven by the worst of motives, by those marginalised and left behind in Britain, the consequences of the referendum will only tighten the noose around their necks.
Showing posts with label political economy of Britain. Show all posts
Showing posts with label political economy of Britain. Show all posts
12 January 2018
1 September 2014
Britain in and after crisis
The crisis of 2008 and its aftermath did nothing to cause capitalism to either weaken or to accommodate the needs of ordinary working people. [written September 2014]
In the period following the financial ruptures in the autumn of 2008, there has been a tendency among some on the left to talk, yet again, about a “crisis of capitalism.” If such talk is not to be dismissed as pure rhetoric, then we must examine whether we are indeed living, or have lived, in a period of crisis and whether any good can come out of it.
So what is a crisis? A crisis in a politico-economic system occurs when the practices, behaviour and structures that have allowed the system to reproduce itself hitherto are no longer comfortably able to do so. Crises may eventually resolve themselves in the restoration of the current system, or they may lead to the breakdown of the existing system and the establishment of a new state of affairs.
In the autumn of 2008 the market fundamentalist form of capitalism suffered a major ideological setback - we might even say crisis - when the banks could only be saved from meltdown by state intervention. Gone in a matter of a few days was the ruling ideological axiom of market fundamentalism, dominant for a generation, that the economy functioned best with only a night watchman state enforcing contracts, but otherwise allowing full rein to the market. The state came out of the shadows to save capitalism and received a new lease of life.
The convulsion was not just ideological. The Blair boom of the mid-2000s was fuelled by an accumulation of private and public and debt. The impossibility of the continued financing of private consumption and public expenditure through borrowing led to falling living standards, unemployment, cuts in social welfare and widespread disenchantment. Most heavily hit were the poorest and the young.
Yet, perhaps paradoxically, if we look at the situation in Britain today, capitalism is extremely strong. Never has a lower percentage of national income been allocated in wages and salaries; and the percentage is still falling. And these mega levels of inequality see next to no political threat to their continuation, with the political situation for the left worsening.
The Westminster Labour Party, led by the insipid Ed Miliband, has made no meaningful break with its own past in government 1997-2010, and is ensnared by its own market fundamentalist inheritance. Electoral organisation to the left of Labour is virtually non-existent. Yet, the political right has strengthened in three ways. In the 2010 General Election the Conservative party emerged yet again as the largest party and re-entered government. The Liberal Democrats, who through much of the New Labour years had masqueraded as an alternative centre left party, entered government in coalition with the Tories and demonstrated their commitment to market fundamentalism, anti-working class politics and state authoritarianism. And thirdly, the only new development in English party politics has been the growth in the early 2010s of UKIP, a right-wing xenophobic party.
The 2011 riots aside, popular protest against existing conditions in favour of equality and liberty has so far been the preserve of the educated young, and has taken the form of theatrical demonstrations and occupations of public squares and private offices and shops. The so-called Occupy Movement based its strategy on grabbing media attention through circus-like protest, which often involved the participants engaging in masochistic displays, such as camping in public places in sub-zero temperatures, as if the amount of discomfort they were experiencing equated with their level of political success.
Occupations and demonstrations, particularly those by students, were crushed and contained by a combination of police violence and harsh penalties. Demonstrators faced arbitrary beatings and containment for hours in street holding pens (kettling) and even the slightest misdemeanour, e.g. throwing an empty plastic bottle, landed the culprit in jail for several months. Political activity itself attracts the label of “domestic extremism” and is monitored by intrusive police photographing, internet surveillance and the deployment of police spies in civic organisations. The result is that political protest ends up as a ludic-tragic duel with police that does nothing to engage ordinary working people or build a political movement.
Yet by the mid 2010s even these forms of protest had more or less petered out. At the same time 2014 saw modest levels of growth in the economy as the recession bottomed out - but with wage levels still falling in real terms none of the benefit ends up in the hands ordinary working people. The worst off stave off starvation thanks only to charity food banks.
Socialism and social democracy are disappearing as ideas from popular memory. Three decades ago if you has asked people in Britain the meaning of socialism - or Labour’s then version of social democracy - a majority could have told you, whether they themselves agreed with the aims of the left or not. The idea of organised structural social improvement based on notions of equality was embedded in the populace, and it was a narrative to which even the Tories had to respond. Today, mostly thanks to New Labour, the idea of socialism has vanished from popular consciousness. We cannot move forward to a place when ordinary working people do not know where that place is.
Yes, capitalism has gone through a kind of crisis, but to me, it seems improbable, in the absence of socialist organisation or ideas, that capitalism - or even the market fundamentalist variation of it which has been dominant in the past three decades - will implode in the near future; and even if it did, it seems even less likely that any kind of socialism would emerge from the ruins. How one responds to that situation is a matter of choice. One can join or support the anomic protest movements, go into one of the far-left micro-parties, work with a single-issue campaign, write comments on Facebook, make jokes, or do nothing. We can enjoy with Schadenfreude the current difficulties of capitalism, but to think that those difficulties will deliver socialism - or even a better world is a delusion.
In the period following the financial ruptures in the autumn of 2008, there has been a tendency among some on the left to talk, yet again, about a “crisis of capitalism.” If such talk is not to be dismissed as pure rhetoric, then we must examine whether we are indeed living, or have lived, in a period of crisis and whether any good can come out of it.
So what is a crisis? A crisis in a politico-economic system occurs when the practices, behaviour and structures that have allowed the system to reproduce itself hitherto are no longer comfortably able to do so. Crises may eventually resolve themselves in the restoration of the current system, or they may lead to the breakdown of the existing system and the establishment of a new state of affairs.
In the autumn of 2008 the market fundamentalist form of capitalism suffered a major ideological setback - we might even say crisis - when the banks could only be saved from meltdown by state intervention. Gone in a matter of a few days was the ruling ideological axiom of market fundamentalism, dominant for a generation, that the economy functioned best with only a night watchman state enforcing contracts, but otherwise allowing full rein to the market. The state came out of the shadows to save capitalism and received a new lease of life.
The convulsion was not just ideological. The Blair boom of the mid-2000s was fuelled by an accumulation of private and public and debt. The impossibility of the continued financing of private consumption and public expenditure through borrowing led to falling living standards, unemployment, cuts in social welfare and widespread disenchantment. Most heavily hit were the poorest and the young.
Yet, perhaps paradoxically, if we look at the situation in Britain today, capitalism is extremely strong. Never has a lower percentage of national income been allocated in wages and salaries; and the percentage is still falling. And these mega levels of inequality see next to no political threat to their continuation, with the political situation for the left worsening.
The Westminster Labour Party, led by the insipid Ed Miliband, has made no meaningful break with its own past in government 1997-2010, and is ensnared by its own market fundamentalist inheritance. Electoral organisation to the left of Labour is virtually non-existent. Yet, the political right has strengthened in three ways. In the 2010 General Election the Conservative party emerged yet again as the largest party and re-entered government. The Liberal Democrats, who through much of the New Labour years had masqueraded as an alternative centre left party, entered government in coalition with the Tories and demonstrated their commitment to market fundamentalism, anti-working class politics and state authoritarianism. And thirdly, the only new development in English party politics has been the growth in the early 2010s of UKIP, a right-wing xenophobic party.
The 2011 riots aside, popular protest against existing conditions in favour of equality and liberty has so far been the preserve of the educated young, and has taken the form of theatrical demonstrations and occupations of public squares and private offices and shops. The so-called Occupy Movement based its strategy on grabbing media attention through circus-like protest, which often involved the participants engaging in masochistic displays, such as camping in public places in sub-zero temperatures, as if the amount of discomfort they were experiencing equated with their level of political success.
Occupations and demonstrations, particularly those by students, were crushed and contained by a combination of police violence and harsh penalties. Demonstrators faced arbitrary beatings and containment for hours in street holding pens (kettling) and even the slightest misdemeanour, e.g. throwing an empty plastic bottle, landed the culprit in jail for several months. Political activity itself attracts the label of “domestic extremism” and is monitored by intrusive police photographing, internet surveillance and the deployment of police spies in civic organisations. The result is that political protest ends up as a ludic-tragic duel with police that does nothing to engage ordinary working people or build a political movement.
Yet by the mid 2010s even these forms of protest had more or less petered out. At the same time 2014 saw modest levels of growth in the economy as the recession bottomed out - but with wage levels still falling in real terms none of the benefit ends up in the hands ordinary working people. The worst off stave off starvation thanks only to charity food banks.
Socialism and social democracy are disappearing as ideas from popular memory. Three decades ago if you has asked people in Britain the meaning of socialism - or Labour’s then version of social democracy - a majority could have told you, whether they themselves agreed with the aims of the left or not. The idea of organised structural social improvement based on notions of equality was embedded in the populace, and it was a narrative to which even the Tories had to respond. Today, mostly thanks to New Labour, the idea of socialism has vanished from popular consciousness. We cannot move forward to a place when ordinary working people do not know where that place is.
Yes, capitalism has gone through a kind of crisis, but to me, it seems improbable, in the absence of socialist organisation or ideas, that capitalism - or even the market fundamentalist variation of it which has been dominant in the past three decades - will implode in the near future; and even if it did, it seems even less likely that any kind of socialism would emerge from the ruins. How one responds to that situation is a matter of choice. One can join or support the anomic protest movements, go into one of the far-left micro-parties, work with a single-issue campaign, write comments on Facebook, make jokes, or do nothing. We can enjoy with Schadenfreude the current difficulties of capitalism, but to think that those difficulties will deliver socialism - or even a better world is a delusion.
30 January 2014
Britain: the end of recession?
In Janury 2014 the British economy boasted 1.9% growth. What does this mean?
So the British economy has grown by 1.9%. Apparently, the recession following the financial crisis of 2008 is over, and economically the country now stands a shade short of where it was at the end of the boom of the early 2000s.
Marxists always feel happier and more confident when the economy crashes and sinks. But in a recession - now as in the early 1930s or 1980s - low commodity prices and labour costs mean that a point is reached when capital finds new investment opportunities and an upward spiral begins again.
But does the fact that the economy overall in monetary terms is 1.9% richer than it was a year ago mean that ordinary working people are 1.9% better off? Well, not if inequality is rising so that all, or a large part, of that increase just benefits the richest. Indeed, wealth at the top end, rather than trickling down, results in pushing up property and service prices to the detriment of ordinary people.
We have reached a point in the advanced capitalist countries where the overriding problem is not the total amount of wealth in the society, but its unequal distribution and miserable usage. Yet sadly there is no serious socialist project to even highlight the problem let alone rectify it.
So the British economy has grown by 1.9%. Apparently, the recession following the financial crisis of 2008 is over, and economically the country now stands a shade short of where it was at the end of the boom of the early 2000s.
Marxists always feel happier and more confident when the economy crashes and sinks. But in a recession - now as in the early 1930s or 1980s - low commodity prices and labour costs mean that a point is reached when capital finds new investment opportunities and an upward spiral begins again.
But does the fact that the economy overall in monetary terms is 1.9% richer than it was a year ago mean that ordinary working people are 1.9% better off? Well, not if inequality is rising so that all, or a large part, of that increase just benefits the richest. Indeed, wealth at the top end, rather than trickling down, results in pushing up property and service prices to the detriment of ordinary people.
We have reached a point in the advanced capitalist countries where the overriding problem is not the total amount of wealth in the society, but its unequal distribution and miserable usage. Yet sadly there is no serious socialist project to even highlight the problem let alone rectify it.
5 July 2012
Why study Marx?
Marxism is the key to understanding the society we live in today
Marxism is first and foremost a mode of analysis of capitalist society; its aim is to tell us why society is how it is. In my view Marxism is broadly correct and is worth studying in depth; but that is something that each person must do for him or herself.
The crisis which erupted in the late 2000s is not just economic; it is systemic, and it sledge-hammered the claims and assumption of the neo-liberalism which gripped the ruling elites from Thatcher to Blair. As insecurity pain and poverty mushroom, it is understandable that people, particularly the young who are the worst affected, need to analyse the society in which they live.
Understanding the cage you are in does not give you the key to the door. Marx died in 1883 and his sketch-map solutions can only be a starting point for thinking about the way forward.
.
Marxism is first and foremost a mode of analysis of capitalist society; its aim is to tell us why society is how it is. In my view Marxism is broadly correct and is worth studying in depth; but that is something that each person must do for him or herself.
The crisis which erupted in the late 2000s is not just economic; it is systemic, and it sledge-hammered the claims and assumption of the neo-liberalism which gripped the ruling elites from Thatcher to Blair. As insecurity pain and poverty mushroom, it is understandable that people, particularly the young who are the worst affected, need to analyse the society in which they live.
Understanding the cage you are in does not give you the key to the door. Marx died in 1883 and his sketch-map solutions can only be a starting point for thinking about the way forward.
.
5 December 2011
Income Inequality in Britain
Income inequality in Britain is growing even bigger.
A recent OECD report has provided some figures for income inequality in Britain. It is worth noting some of these.
In 1985 the income ratio between the top and bottom deciles of the population was 1:8. By 2008 that figure had grown to 1:12. In comparison, the ratio in other northern European countries (e.g. Germany, Netherlands) had deteriorated from 1:5 to 1:6 over the same time period.
Even that masks the growth of income of the very rich: i.e. the top one percent of the population. In 1970 they took home 7.1 percent of national income; by 2005 the figure stood at 14.3, with the top 0.1 percent alone taking around 5 percent of pre-tax income.
In the 1970s and 1980s taxation and benefits were able to re-distribute around half of the increases in income going to the richest. By the 2000s that figure fell to 20 percent.
Opinion polls in Britain show that around two-thirds of people believe that income inequality is too big.
Finally, it should be noted that the OECD report is based on official documentation. In reality, the rich receive more than is ever officially attributed to them through a variety of legal and illegal means.
14 June 2010
Public Debt and Expenditure Cuts
Much of the debate is constructed around false alternatives: unsustainable public indebtedness OR cut the services and incomes of the least well-off.
Yes, public debt levels do need to be reduced, but that can be done in ways that do not leave the worst-off relatively worse off. There should be tax increases on wealth and income and cuts in those areas which do not injure the worst-off or impede future economic growth; e.g. tax rebate on private pension contributions, or the defence budget.
Real differences of class interest are being hidden behind a false alternative, an alternative which is repeated again and again by the media.
Yes, public debt levels do need to be reduced, but that can be done in ways that do not leave the worst-off relatively worse off. There should be tax increases on wealth and income and cuts in those areas which do not injure the worst-off or impede future economic growth; e.g. tax rebate on private pension contributions, or the defence budget.
Real differences of class interest are being hidden behind a false alternative, an alternative which is repeated again and again by the media.
12 October 2009
No to more public debt
We don’t want higher levels of public debt and we don’t want a fall in aggregate demand.
The only solution is a hard pill to swallow and is certainly not on offer from New Labour, let alone the Tories: i.e. an increase in government expenditure on capital projects funded by tax increases, not borrowing. Such an expansion in public investment would help cut unemployment while the high rates of tax on income, land, capital, inheritance, etc would help bring about greater social equality in Britain.
The only solution is a hard pill to swallow and is certainly not on offer from New Labour, let alone the Tories: i.e. an increase in government expenditure on capital projects funded by tax increases, not borrowing. Such an expansion in public investment would help cut unemployment while the high rates of tax on income, land, capital, inheritance, etc would help bring about greater social equality in Britain.
28 August 2009
Regulating Finance Capital in Britain
The financier Adair Turner has raised himself above his particular interests to make some radical proposals (e.g. the Tobin tax) to curtail the destructive economic and political power of finance capital in Britain.
The essential reason why New Labour can’t defend working people against finance capital is that the propaganda of the government since 1997 has been the notion that there is no conflict of interest between the needs of finance and those of working people.
In the upswing of the mid 2000s that lie could be concealed behind the credit boom; now Brown is left naked, and working people see that New Labour has nothing to offer them.
The leopard doesn’t change its spots at the eleventh hour. Today, New Labour waits only for defeat; the electorate has raised the cane high and Brown has only a few months to choose when to move into position and lower his trousers. That reality makes a weak government even more cowardly. It’s no time for bold measures.
The essential reason why New Labour can’t defend working people against finance capital is that the propaganda of the government since 1997 has been the notion that there is no conflict of interest between the needs of finance and those of working people.
In the upswing of the mid 2000s that lie could be concealed behind the credit boom; now Brown is left naked, and working people see that New Labour has nothing to offer them.
The leopard doesn’t change its spots at the eleventh hour. Today, New Labour waits only for defeat; the electorate has raised the cane high and Brown has only a few months to choose when to move into position and lower his trousers. That reality makes a weak government even more cowardly. It’s no time for bold measures.
26 August 2009
Climate Camps do play a positive role
What the climate camp movement is essentially about is holding festivals of opposition. Two things make the movement particularly important.
The first is the failure of New Labour’s market fundamentalism. In addition to supporting the commercial destruction of the environment, Blair and Brown have created the most unequal society in Britain since 1945; a society characterised by mass unemployment, poverty and hopelessness.
Second, there has been a collapse of political activity across the country. The Labour Party itself has been de-democratised and has emptied of activists. No mass movements for progress exist, and we have today a police force that regards any political activity against the status quo as a criminal activity.
If the climate clamp plays any role in drawing attention to these deficiencies, it is well worth it.
Child Poverty in Britain
It has now been revealed that one in five households with children In Britain are surviving only on New Labour’s meagre state benefits, and with a no-hope future.
Both the Thatcherite and New Labour versions of market fundamentalism told us that growth was taking place and that any pain that we suffered in the new market-led society would lead to material rewards tomorrow. The truth is the exact opposite: businesses and those professions that serve them grew richer, while working people ended up only with mortgage and other debts, unemployment, poverty and the threat of destitution.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/aug/26/more-children-in-workless-homes
13 August 2009
Working people left without hope
Mass indebtedness and sky-rocketing unemployment, show that capitalism, or at least the market fundamentalist variant of it peddled first by Thatcherism and then copied by New Labour, cannot serve the needs of ordinary working people.
The three decades of market fundamentalism (1979-2009) are ending as they began; i.e. with mass unemployment and human misery.
The Labour Party at one time sought reform: to bring about greater equality and security for ordinary working people. Tony Blair and New Labour betrayed that goal and turned the Labour Party into a vehicle for market fundamentalism – and a servant of business interests.
People today are left without hope.
The three decades of market fundamentalism (1979-2009) are ending as they began; i.e. with mass unemployment and human misery.
The Labour Party at one time sought reform: to bring about greater equality and security for ordinary working people. Tony Blair and New Labour betrayed that goal and turned the Labour Party into a vehicle for market fundamentalism – and a servant of business interests.
People today are left without hope.
31 July 2009
No opportunities for the young
Hard working young people will seek to go to university after school, partly for the qualification of having a degree and partly to expand their intellectual grasp of the world. Nothing wrong in that.
The rupture lies in the transition from a world where exam marks count to one governed entirely by capitalist power. There are only a certain number of professional jobs available and these are allocated on the basis of the economic power of the competitors (i.e. high cost further training, internships, connections).
Despite New Labour’s expansion of higher education (and the consequent devaluation of degrees), the level of social mobility in Britain has declined as social inequality has increased to the highest level since 1945
The rupture lies in the transition from a world where exam marks count to one governed entirely by capitalist power. There are only a certain number of professional jobs available and these are allocated on the basis of the economic power of the competitors (i.e. high cost further training, internships, connections).
Despite New Labour’s expansion of higher education (and the consequent devaluation of degrees), the level of social mobility in Britain has declined as social inequality has increased to the highest level since 1945
18 March 2009
Don't consider economics without politics
Unfortunately many articles don't really say anything other than the capitalist economy is cyclical with expansion and contraction.
What I find missing from these articles is not so much empirical data, but a false separation of the economic from the political. The thirty years of market fundamentalism marched alongside a profound shift in politics in both Britain and US. There is a hidden assumption that the upturn when it comes will take place in a political configuration akin to that of the 1990s or early 2000s.
The economic ideology that underpinned 1979-2009 has now fallen apart; unemployment, debt and poverty are multiplying. There is today a feeling of a phoney war as socio-political pressure builds up. It is highly unlikely that in the next half decade there won’t be major political changes which will themselves impact on economic structures.
What I find missing from these articles is not so much empirical data, but a false separation of the economic from the political. The thirty years of market fundamentalism marched alongside a profound shift in politics in both Britain and US. There is a hidden assumption that the upturn when it comes will take place in a political configuration akin to that of the 1990s or early 2000s.
The economic ideology that underpinned 1979-2009 has now fallen apart; unemployment, debt and poverty are multiplying. There is today a feeling of a phoney war as socio-political pressure builds up. It is highly unlikely that in the next half decade there won’t be major political changes which will themselves impact on economic structures.
16 March 2009
Thirty years of market fundamentalism was the wrong path
Undoubtedly the political impasse of the 1970s characterised by intensified class and other conflict did not represent the ideal society. Neither left nor right claimed that it did. What was unfortunate, I believe, was that Thatcherism emerged as the so-called solution to this crisis.
In essence, Thatcherism was about centralised authoritarianism which was used to weaken democracy and smash working class power. Inequality and poverty soared in the new framework of unbridled capitalism; and it was this model that has been continued and deepened by New Labour.
The thirty years of market fundamentalism after 1979 were not ones of joy, security and abundance for many. Britain became a society increasingly scarred by an insecure flexible workforce burdened with debt. While the poor rotted on crime-ridden junk estates, at the top the rich lived a life of luxury giving Britain a socio-economic profile like the countries of Latin America.
Today even the service and finance sectors (the sole economic achievement) have imploded with Britain having little left to show for all the pain of Thatcherism. I believe that had Thatcher never existed and had Tony Benn won a couple of elections in the last thirty years, Britain would be a better place today.
In essence, Thatcherism was about centralised authoritarianism which was used to weaken democracy and smash working class power. Inequality and poverty soared in the new framework of unbridled capitalism; and it was this model that has been continued and deepened by New Labour.
The thirty years of market fundamentalism after 1979 were not ones of joy, security and abundance for many. Britain became a society increasingly scarred by an insecure flexible workforce burdened with debt. While the poor rotted on crime-ridden junk estates, at the top the rich lived a life of luxury giving Britain a socio-economic profile like the countries of Latin America.
Today even the service and finance sectors (the sole economic achievement) have imploded with Britain having little left to show for all the pain of Thatcherism. I believe that had Thatcher never existed and had Tony Benn won a couple of elections in the last thirty years, Britain would be a better place today.
13 March 2009
Thatcher is to blame for the current crisis
Undoubtedly the political impasse of the 1970s characterised by intensified class and other conflict did not represent the ideal society. Neither left nor right claimed that it did. What was unfortunate was that Thatcherism emerged as the so-called solution to this crisis.
In essence, Thatcherism was about centralised authoritarianism which was used to weaken democracy and smash working class power. Inequality and poverty soared in the new framework of unbridled capitalism; and it was this model that has been continued and deepened by New Labour.
Thatcher gave birth to a socio-economic regime which both pulled apart the social fabric and which has now failed in its own economic terms. Blaming Thatcherism is fully justified. Had the miners won in 1984-5 she would have been stopped in her tracks; the rest is the what-ifs of history.
In essence, Thatcherism was about centralised authoritarianism which was used to weaken democracy and smash working class power. Inequality and poverty soared in the new framework of unbridled capitalism; and it was this model that has been continued and deepened by New Labour.
Thatcher gave birth to a socio-economic regime which both pulled apart the social fabric and which has now failed in its own economic terms. Blaming Thatcherism is fully justified. Had the miners won in 1984-5 she would have been stopped in her tracks; the rest is the what-ifs of history.
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