Political parties Flashcards
What were the main policies of the post-war consensus?
1-A mixed economy (made up of both publicly and privately owned industries and enterprises.)
. These industries included coal, steel, ship building, the railways, gas, and electricity
2-Economic management (an economy that is regulated by the government.)
. Labour introduced boards or public corporations to run these industries, to avoid the claim that the nationalised industries were a tool for government.
. These boards were given the necessary freedom to operate outside of government interference and were only answerable to parliament.
3-Comprehensive social welfare
. Under Attlee the welfare state was expanded on the basis of the Beveridge Report (1942).
. This expanded the welfare state, based on a comprehensive system of social security and a NHS, sought to protect citizens ‘from the cradle to the grave’.
-It brought about a major redistribution of wealth, as it was funded by a system of progressive taxation.
What was one nation conservativism
-Society should be left to evolve organically rather than with the intervention of government.
-Paternalism: The privileged and wealthy have obligations, passing on theirs benefits to aid the less fortunate.
What was the de-industrialisation and the rise of unions in the UK?
• Starting during the 1960s as the process of de-industrialisation occurred and the UK economy began moving away from heavy industry, full employment became much harder to achieve.
• Higher levels of inflation also made it harder for Labour in power to support all of the demands of the unions.
• Increasingly union leaders became political figures in their own right and challenged the Labour leadership.
• Labour Party policy had to be approved by the party as a whole and union leaders had a block vote, meaning the leader would cast the votes for all their members – meaning they dominated discussions and decisions in party policy.
• This is one of the reasons the party moved to the left in the Thatcher period during the 1980s and maintained its commitment to nationalisation and full employment at a time when the economy was changing, and these ideas were becoming less popular.
What was the economic decline seen in the postwar consensus?
• By the 1970s there was a growing political awareness of the fact that international league tables showed that Britain was at the wrong end for figures regarding strikes, productivity, inflation, economic growth and rising living standards.
• Britain became known as the ‘sick man of Europe’.
• The targets for blame included: failure to invest in new
plant and machinery; restrictive working practices and outdated attitudes on the shop floor (‘us and them’); amateurish management; loss of markets; and rise of competition.
• Britain was plagued by high inflation, low growth and what many came increasingly to regard as irresponsible trade union power.
• Measures to boost economic activity and reduce unemployment sucked in extra imports, thereby worsening the trade balance, and seemed to lead to unacceptable rises in inflation.
• The financial markets’ loss of confidence meant a sharp slide in the value of sterling, which in turn led to the International Monetary Fund’s ‘rescue’ in 1976.
• In the ‘Winter of Discontent’ in 1979 a rash of strikes in crucial public services against the Labour government’s income policies seemed to show that the country was ungovernable and that no government had an answer to inflation.
What was ‘new right conservativism’?
The term ‘New Right’ was used to describe a set of political values and ideas, largely emerging in the USA between the 1970s and 1980s, which were adopted by conservatives throughout the developed world. It was a reaction both against socialist ideas and traditional conservative values – seen as too weak to deal with contemporary problems.
The two elements within Thatcherism are:
-Neoliberalism (‘economic Thatcherism’), its central pillars are the free market and the self-reliant individual.
-Neoconservatism (‘social Thatcherism’), a form of authoritarian conservatism that calls for the restoration of order, authority, and discipline in society.
What was Privatisation during the Thatcher government?
• The ‘mixed’ economy was transformed by the privatisation of most of the industries that had been nationalised in the 20th century.
• These included telecommunications, gas, electricity, water, steel, buses and railways.
The state, therefore, lost direct control of major UK industries.
What was deregulation under the Thatcher government.
Deregulation:
-The Thatcher government removed a wide range of restrictions and controls on the economy.
-Controls on exchange rates were ended, allowing the poundw to ‘float’.
-Financial markets were deregulated.
-Subsidies and supports for ‘failing’ industries were scaled down or scrapped.
What was the tough law and order seen under Thatcher’s government?
Tough Law and Order:
-Greater emphasis was placed on maintaining public order through a fear of punishment, reflected in the belief that ‘prison works.’
-Custodial sentences were more widely used, prison terms were lengthened, and, in some cases, ‘tougher’ prison regimes were imposed.
What were the traditional values seen in the Thatcher government?
-One of the enemies of social Thatcherism was the spread of liberal or permissive values, associated in particular with the 1960s.
Instead, traditional, ‘Christian’ or ‘family’ values were defended.
What was the national patriotism seen under Thatcher?
Thatcherites placed a particular stress on strengthening national identity, seen as one of the cornerstones of political strength and social stability.
Over time, this came increasingly to be expressed in the form of Euroscepticism.
What was Thatcher’s issue with the Falklands?
• The recapture of the Falkland Islands from Argentina in 1982 was important for the success of the Thatcher project.
• It coincided with an improvement in the public standing of the government and of Thatcher herself.
• The victory seemed to vindicate her claims in domestic politics that she could provide strong leadership and stand up for the nation.
The war rhetoric could now be turned against the enemies within - particularly the trade unions
What was ‘blairism’
- The first change towards new labour was the rewriting of clause IV, a demonstration of old labour’s socialist origins.
- ‘Blairism’ combined thatcherite market-oriented economic strategy with continued support for public services.
What was market economics under blair?
• Labour came to accept that the economy should be regulated by the market and not by the state.
• Blairism built on Thatcherism – privatisation, reduced union power, lower taxes, deregulation.
• Semi-independence was granted to the Bank of England in setting interest rates (1997).
• Nevertheless, after 2001 Labour embarked on an expansion of public services, with unprecedented spending on health and education.
What was constitutional reform under Blair?
• A bold series of constitutional reforms included devolution, The Human Rights Act and reform of the House of Lords.
• However, Labour’s conversion to constitutional liberalism was partial, for example alternatives to the Westminster voting system were dropped, reform declined after 2001.
• After 2007 Brown took steps to reduce the prerogative powers of the PM and expand the role of Parliament.
However, more radical reforms such as an elected second chamber, ‘written constitution’ and entrenched bill of rights, never progressed beyond the discussion phase.
What was third way welfare under Blair?
• Blair’s approach to welfare was a middle way between the post-war welfare consensus and Thatcherism.
• There was wider use of ‘targeted’ benefits, an emphasis on the idea of ‘welfare to work’ and attempts to reform the public services.
• Welfare reform was based on the idea that the public services should be more market-orientated and consumer responsive.
• It was however an area where differences between Brown and Blair were most acute, as Chancellor Brown slowed the pace of public sector reform, after 2007 plans for further reform were effectively abandoned.
