The Evolution of Privatisation as an Electoral Policy, c.1970–90

Abstract

Privatisation was the most enduring legacy of the political economy of Thatcherism, but it has generally been considered from a political science or economics perspective, not a historical one. It cannot be understood purely as the product of economic pressures. Privatisation developed an important electoral dimension during the second Thatcher government, a point obscured by the ahistorical treatment of the policy in political memoirs. There was more to privatisation than denationalisation: wider share ownership was the second plank of the policy, and this provides an important historical perspective on the relationship between Thatcherism and twentieth-century Conservatism.