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9 - Neoliberalism

The Brezhnev years

from Part III - The Rise and Fall of the Neoliberal ‘Movement Regime’

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 September 2023

Abby Innes
Affiliation:
London School of Economics and Political Science
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Summary

British neoliberalism was taken up by democratic parties in an open society, so this chapter explores what, if any, lessons about its political consequences can be drawn from the political evolution of the Soviet Union. Political parties in Western Europe by the 1970s were struggling to keep pace with the changing social needs and preferences of their electorates when neoliberalism emerged. This social dis-embedding of parties would only worsen in the UK, however, when neoclassical economic diagnoses became the bipartisan methodology, and electoral choices around economic strategies were duly narrowed. The chapter traces how, as the tide of neoliberal developmental failures has risen, the Conservative Party embraced the same political strategies as late Soviet regimes. The ‘combat task’ rhetoric of economic change was replaced with the charismatic politics of nationalism, and governments increasingly resorted to demonstrable lies and invented realities to deflect from the real effects of policy and after 2016, its most utopian expression: Brexit. The chapter also reviews the rise of political corruption under neoliberalism, another Soviet affinity, as ideology morphs into alibi.

Type
Chapter
Information
Late Soviet Britain
Why Materialist Utopias Fail
, pp. 327 - 370
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2023

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  • Neoliberalism
  • Abby Innes, London School of Economics and Political Science
  • Book: Late Soviet Britain
  • Online publication: 14 September 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009373647.013
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  • Neoliberalism
  • Abby Innes, London School of Economics and Political Science
  • Book: Late Soviet Britain
  • Online publication: 14 September 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009373647.013
Available formats
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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.

  • Neoliberalism
  • Abby Innes, London School of Economics and Political Science
  • Book: Late Soviet Britain
  • Online publication: 14 September 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009373647.013
Available formats
×