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15 British J. Pol. & Int'l Rel. 1 (2013)

handle is hein.journals/bhjlplcs15 and id is 1 raw text is: doi: 10.1111/j.1467-856X.2012.00510.x BJPIR: 2013 VOL 15, 1-5 The Political Economy of British Social Democracy after New Labour Chris Rogers This section examines the reasons why New Labour's political economy failed to insulate Britain from the recent economic crisis, and what the basis for building sustainable social democracy in the UK might be moving forward. Keywords: financial crisis; Labour party; left political economy; social democracy This special section brings together papers originally presented at a workshop on 'The Global Financial Crisis and the Political Economy of British Social Democracy: The End of New Labour?', held at the University of Warwick in March 2011. As a brief for the workshop, participants were invited to conceptualise the causes and nature of the current crisis and the idea of social democracy itself as broadly as they wished, and the aim of the workshop was to stimulate discussion about two important questions. First, why did the political economy of New Labour fail to insulate the United Kingdom from contagion from the collapse of American sub- prime mortgage markets? In considering the perceived weaknesses and pathologies of New Labour's political economy, a second and more normative question fol- lowed naturally. Namely, what could and should the British left-framed broadly to include the Labour party and other progressive organisations sharing its core values-do in order to create conditions for a progressive and sustainable social democratic renewal in the UK? The limits of social democracy in the UK have been much discussed, and the extent to which both social and structural constraints have served to undermine its progress or shape its trajectory are long-standing points of contention. Such dis- cussion dates back at least as far as R. H. Tawney's The Acquisitive Society, and also includes other significant works on democratic socialism such as Ralph Miliband's Parliamentary Socialism, and Anthony Crosland's The Future of Socialism. In these seminal texts, the issues of changing societal values, the co-option of labour activists by the institutions of the British state, and the extent to which the labour move- ment should operate within the prevailing structures of capitalism, were the key debates. In more contemporary academic literature, the extent to which the pre- vailing structures of power within the global economy have served to limit the progress of successive Labour governments, and the role that globalisation or perceptions of globalisation have played in serving to undermine social democratic ambitions, have been placed centre-stage. Broad questions about the limits of social democracy therefore appear to take on a timeless quality, recurring as they have throughout the history of the British labour movement and the Labour party as Si1p•. Poltical Studies © 2012 The Author. British Journal of Politics and International Relations © 2012 'liq Association Political Studies Association

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