Radicalism, Radicalization and Recession: Britain in the 1980s

Abstract

Government policy in response to the recession in Britain during the 1980s can be interpreted as an attempt to alter the balance of class forces in favour of capital or as an attempt to alter the balance of public and private sector production and consumption in favour of the latter. The limitations of previous research on radicalism and radicalization are reviewed and on the basis of a purposefully designed panel survey, class and sector theories are examined in terms of both attitudinal and behavioural data. The importance of distinguishing between the structure of radicalism and the process of radicalization was highlighted by the finding that the variables which explain the former are not the same as those that explain the latter. The basic class and sector models were confirmed: employees and public sector producers/consumers were found to be more radical than employers and private sector producers/consumers respectively. Most support for dominant values was evident among the capitalist class and public sector controllers emerged as the new vanguard of radicalism. Finally the persistence of a radical value system in contemporary Britain remains clearly associated with