Necessity as the Mother of Intervention: The Industrial Policy Debate in England

Abstract

This article seeks to demonstrate two simple points about industrial policy in England. First, industrial policy matters, but if there is to be an effective and fruitful debate about industrial policy, it must not be insular. It must be located within the wider context of the ongoing battle of ideas in the discipline of political economy about the appropriate roles for the state and market in enhancing economic development. Second, the debate about industrial policy must not occur in an historical vacuum, but must learn the lesson of the interventions by the Thatcher, Blair and Brown Governments. These have demonstrated that all British governments have intervened and have picked winners. The Cameron-Clegg coalition government will be no different despite its rhetorical commitment to rolling back radically the frontiers of state spending and intervention