'Taking Back Control' of Banking: Populist Romanticism and the Global Politics of Ambiguous Post-Crisis Reform in the UK

Abstract

10 years after the global financial crisis began, in a context of rising political populism, this paper asks why, despite growing political turmoil, financial regulation has changed so little. Is it, as populists might maintain, because power has been taken away from ‘the people’ by faceless international technocrats? Careful process-tracing of the global politics shaping UK post-crisis banking reform is used to identify forces promoting continuity and potential sources of change. I conclude that the populist impulse is somewhat correct in its diagnosis but romantic in its desire to ‘take back control’ nationally. Complex opaque global processes did limit UK reform at the margins. However, continuity was produced by interaction between international and domestic factors. The structural dominance of international finance in the UK economy, combined with weak global consensus on change, meant a polarised choice between the status quo and truly radical reform. Despite public anger and some regulator activism, the social conditions (particularly a new economic vision and politically viable strategy for achieving it) for radical change were not present. The task of building those social conditions will be slow, complex and risk-filled. Whilst populism is producing a certain political energy, it’s desire for simple solutions is ill-suited to such a task.