Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-cjp7w Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-06-21T01:03:26.567Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Conclusion

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 October 2019

Get access

Summary

What matters is what works.

(Tony Blair, 1998)

I didn't come into politics to make cuts. Neither did Nick Clegg. … We're tackling the deficit because we have to – not out of some ideological zeal. This is a government led by people with a practical desire to sort out this country's problems, not by ideology.

(David Cameron, 2010)

This book has sought to argue that Britain operated a social democratic system between 1945 and 1979. This system came under strain in the mid-1970s, as the post-war economic Golden Age drew to a close. It was steadily dismantled after 1979, and has not been reinstated since. The highwater mark of British social democracy coincided with the UK's most enthusiastic engagement with Europe, from the late 1950s to the early 1980s. British social democratic leaders were the keenest to take Britain ‘into Europe’. Thereafter, but especially from 1988 onwards, the Right has wholly abandoned social democracy and turned strongly against the EEC/EU. The mainstream Left's grasp on social democracy has been tenuous, and its engagement with Europe superficial. These circumstances created the perfect conditions for the UK to vote to leave the EU, as it did in 2016. What then has the evidence shown about this argument?

It is, I would suggest, clear that Britain operated as a social democratic system in the post-war period, and did so with reasonable stability. The mixed economy, strong trade unions, and activist social policies in areas such as education and housing, were constant features of this landscape. The consequence was that, by the mid-1970s, the UK was more equal than it had ever been. Of course, this was no paradise, and there were plenty of critics of Left and Right. The Left were impatient with social democracy's accommodation with capitalism. The Right thought there was too little capitalism and too much quasi-socialism.

Of course, as we have seen, the system came under strain during the 1970s, as the simultaneous increase in inflation, unemployment and industrial militancy evidenced the end of the Golden Age. For the critics of social democracy, this was a crisis not to be wasted. To the Left, the economic downturn showed that social democrats had been foolish to seek to save capitalism from itself.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Boydell & Brewer
Print publication year: 2019

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

  • Conclusion
  • Adrian Williamson
  • Book: Europe and the Decline of Social Democracy in Britain: From Attlee to Brexit
  • Online publication: 24 October 2019
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781787445734.010
Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

  • Conclusion
  • Adrian Williamson
  • Book: Europe and the Decline of Social Democracy in Britain: From Attlee to Brexit
  • Online publication: 24 October 2019
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781787445734.010
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Conclusion
  • Adrian Williamson
  • Book: Europe and the Decline of Social Democracy in Britain: From Attlee to Brexit
  • Online publication: 24 October 2019
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781787445734.010
Available formats
×