How neoliberalism broke economics
Tuesday 15 July 2025
Is Keir Starmer a Brezhnev or a Khrushchev?
Our Associate Professor in Political Economy Dr Abby Innes was interviewed by the Institute of Art and Ideas, arguing that Britain’s governing model has more in common with the Soviet Union than many would care to admit.
Drawing on her book, Late Soviet Britain, Innes explores how the UK’s embrace of managerialism and economic determinism has produced a system that promises technical neutrality but delivers ideological rigidity.
Do we mistakenly treat economics as an exact science? Can a political system function when economic decisions are removed from democratic debate? And has Britain’s faith in market mechanisms created a new form of central planning?