Pushed by the Covid-19 crisis, the UK government has borrowed massively to save jobs, businesses and the economy from collapse, making a mockery of the austerity policies that it had championed for a decade. As a result, the role of the state is now in sharp focus. The contributors to this volume assess what that role should be and how it should be harnessed for the good of the British people in all four of its nations. Together they present policy proposals capable of generating a new social settlement and a long-term, equitable economic recovery post-pandemic. It offers both a vision of a future Britain and a roadmap to getting there.

About the Author

Patrick Allen is chair and founder of the Progressive Economy Forum. He is also founder and senior partner at the law firm, Hodge Jones & Allen.

Suzanne J. Konzelmann is Reader in Management at Birkbeck, University of London. Her most recent book is Austerity (2019).

Jan Toporowski is Professor of Economics and Finance at SOAS, University of London.

Reviews
The British economy is no longer working for most people. This book brings together the best progressive thinkers, not to tell us what is wrong, but to explore the foundations of a new economy that works better for as many of us as possible. It's essential reading for everyone that wants equity, democracy and dynamism baked into a very different twenty-first century economy. -- Neal Lawson, Executive Director, Compass

After decades of assault by state-shrinking ideologues, a collision of crises has revealed how only the power of good government can save us. Covid, climate catastrophe and Brexit crashed in on a public realm stripped bare by a decade of extreme austerity. Here all the best writers and thinkers on the good society show recovery is possible, with a radical rethink of all the old errors. Read this and feel hope that things can change.

-- Polly Toynbee, Guardian columnist

For forty years the global race to the bottom has been a political choice. I commend the authors of this important book for setting out an alternative politics of fuller, better and greener employment.

-- Frances O'Grady, General Secretary, TUC

A roadmap for reforming the British welfare state in the aftermath of the Covid-19 crisis ... useful and thought-provoking ... I found its arguments on the need for governments to address inequality and look beyond GDP growth alone to be very persuasive ... an important and timely book with lessons for those both inside and outside the United Kingdom.

-- LSE Review of Books



Book Information
ISBN 9781788213295
Author Patrick Allen
Format Paperback
Page Count 264
Imprint Agenda Publishing
Publisher Agenda Publishing