Reader in Political Economy, Manchester Metropolitan University
The outbreak of COVID 19 has enlarged the UK state. This blog explores whether this emergency enlargement of the state may come to serve progressive purposes.
Pre-pandemic class relationships are both shaping and disrupting the politics of covidism.
Corporate Governance in Contention, edited by Ciaran Driver and Grahame Thompson (Oxford University Press, 2018), offers an exemplary overview of some of the most important debates in scholarship on corporate governance in Europe and North America
The tussle over Brexit within the Conservative Party is actually a debate about the UK’s future place in the global capitalist order. Boris Johnson is merely taking remainer George Osborne’s vision to its logical conclusion, while in pinning her hopes on continental capitalism, Theresa May is arguably the real fantasist
Even on the left, post-crisis regional economic policy in Britain has been underpinned by pre-crisis intellectual paradigms. This post argues that a ‘grounded capitalism’ approach can transform the British growth model while alleviating regional inequalities
We can partly situate the grounding of Britain’s pre-crisis growth model in its geographical unevenness – but the left must also situate its response to regional inequalities in a new understanding of capitalism’s spatiality
Our new research published today considers the perspectives of today’s young people on trade unionism – and how unions can respond
Our new research considers the perspectives of today’s young people on the economy, crisis and labour market change – and how they view the prospect of transforming their circumstances through politics
The path to ‘soft Brexit’ has now been firmly established. But the real disjuncture between the UK and the EU may be yet to come
The Chancellor glossed over terrible forecasts, delivered more hype than substance on industrial strategy, and succumbed to another housing market stimulus. But the Osbornomics bag of budget tricks is delivering diminishing returns for the British economy
Firms such as Google and Uber – and their control of our data – may pose a threat to the UK’s competition regime. How policy-makers respond to this will help to define the platform economy
The final report of the Industrial Strategy Commission outlines a bold vision for strategic economic management in the UK, including institutional reforms at the centre. Can we expect the same radicalism from the May government?
The practice of saving has been complexified, but the concept has until recently retained discursive significance as part of an ‘asset-based welfare’ agenda. The 2017 election may, however, have signalled a significant shift in British economic statecraft
The election continued the swing of working-class voters to the Conservative Party – but also the more important trend of working-class disengagement from politics. Can Labour respond without succumbing to populism?
Industrial strategy is the Achilles heel of British economic statecraft, but the radical approaches promised by both the Conservatives and Labour fall short of a transformative agenda
The Corbyn ‘surge’ denied the May government the majority it took for granted – but the implication that austerity in the UK is over is far from clear
While the current method of uprating the state pension is imperfect, Theresa May’s proposal to abolish it is based on a flawed view of intergenerational fairness
Paradoxically, the snap election is a further nail in the coffin of actually-existing British democracy – and reinforces the role of Brexit in the revival of conservative statecraft
Alan France’s ambitious account of young people’s experience of economic crisis across eight developed countries shows what it means to be young has been transformed
As Theresa May knows, Britain is too weak economically to prosper outside the single market under the current economic policy paradigm – this inconvenient truth will soon tear apart the pro-Brexit coalition
Donald Trump’s election reminds us that world order is based on American imperial power, not liberal ideals – the American empire’s unravelling will now be accelerated
Labour will not split, but Corbynism might – Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour Party depends on a large group of activists increasingly uneasy with his approach to politics
Jeremy Corbyn’s destructive utopianism has been reaffirmed by Labour Party members – but there are signs of a widening divergence among Corbyn’s support base, with uncertain implications for Labour’s future
Corbynism represents a ‘fictitious commodity’ in the UK’s political marketplace
While the right acts decisively to restore the established order, the Corbyn experiment eschews both democracy and state power, and thus Labour’s best hope of transforming capitalism.
The aftermath of economic crisis, followed by Brexit, has seen the dismantling of democratic norms in Britain. The right benefits, while the left stands by
Measuring economic success through levels of employment obscures the unsustainable and oppressive nature of the UK’s recovery
To capitalise on the crisis and create a post-neoliberal economic order, progressives need new lenses for understanding everyday economic life
The UK’s withdrawal from the European Union is a product, ironically, of the political elite’s longstanding aversion to democratic self-rule
Stewart Lansley’s advocacy of the sharing economy is the right idea at the right time, but social wealth funds would be a problematic instrument
New analysis of the trade in goods between the UK’s regions and the EU sheds new light on the potential regional implications of Brexit
Austerity is anchored in a new politics of place, but Labour is adrift
The Conservatives understand – and exploit – the electorate’s concerns about ‘place’
Critics of the protection of pensioner benefit entitlements are playing into George Osborne’s hands
New Labour offered change for two decades, without ever really meaning it. Jeremy Corbyn is the near-inevitable consequence
Concentration of infrastructure investment in areas with high levels of business activity suggests the government is unconcerned by ‘crowding out’
The Conservative government’s promotion of financialisation is transforming citizenship in the UK
The gap between rhetoric and reality with regard to transport investment in the North of England encapsulates all the problems of Northern economic development
Osborne’s plans spell ‘devo-danger’ for the left in Northern England
For England’s sake, the time has come for Northern England to find its ‘inner powerhouse’
An ambivalence towards the state meant Labour failed to offer a meaningful alternative to the Conservatives
Regional housing inequalities continue to widen – because the game is rigged
The Conservative agenda on pension investments is inherently shallow and increasingly moralistic in tone
The shallowness of the UK debate on devolution demonstrates the new marginalisation of political economy in public discourse
The SNP has failed to offer a meaningful alternative to the UK’s flawed economic model – a view from Northern England
Hyper-Anglicisation typifies the supply-side agenda for employment – and renders it increasingly irrelevant
The declining significance of progressive and business taxation demonstrates the character of ‘austerity’
The phoney currency debate in Scotland relies on misunderstanding and is helping to marginalise the real alternatives
Investment and consumption performance demonstrates the frailty of the UK economy; the economic recovery is not yet secure
Sterling’s falling value has not been exploited, exposing the coalition’s failure to rebalance the economy
George Osborne promised a ‘march of the makers’ but as yet there is little sign that a resurgence of manufacturing is helping the economy to rebalance
UK investment and consumption performance demonstrates the frailty of the economic recovery
Why the coalition government is wrong to consider the relatively high employment rate one of its main successes
The trade deficit is growing – and the Transatlantic trade deal is unlikely to rectify this
The recent good news about renewed growth in the British economy badly needs to be scrutinised and put in context
The government has a covert strategy to use pensions saving to improve Britain’s economic performance, but it may jeopardise the long-term interests of members
Pension funds will find little comfort in forward guidance