Britain's Economic Decline Research Articles

Ahead of his time: Richard Crossman and house of commons reform in the 1960s

In the context of growing concern during the 1960s about Britain's relative economic decline, and parallel concern about the increasing remoteness of government and administration from the people, there was growing interest among commentators in modernising Britain's political institutions, in order to render them more effective and representative. Much of this interest was shared by Labour's Richard Crossman, who had himself previously written scholarly analyses of the deficiencies of Parliament, and had proposed reforms to reverse its apparent decline and marginalisation. Crossman was granted a unique opportunity to give practical effect to his proposals when he was appointed Leader of the House in 1966, but he enjoyed only limited success, due largely to the fact that few of his senior Labour colleagues shared his enthusiasm for reform, particularly once they had risen to Ministerial rank, and thus enjoyed the power and privileges this bestowed upon them. Many Ministers also failed to discern a link between parliamentary reform and reversal of Britain's economic decline. On the contrary, the economic problems confronting the 1964–1970 Labour Governments were widely viewed as necessitating stronger action from the centre, and this would hardly be achieved by devolving power to, or sharing it with, backbench MPs in the House of Commons.

Managerial Inefficiency and the British Climacteric, 1860-1914

This paper argues that a key reason for Britain's economic decline was the management culture of British industry, in particular the unwillingness of British entrepreneurs to decentralize decision-making within their firms, in comparison to their foreign counterparts. A theory of delegation is developed, and its importance to economic growth established. While it is difficult to directly measure how much authority is delegated within a firm, the paper describes how using this hypothesis, many observed characteristics of British industrial development can then be explained, most importantly the lesser ability of large British firms to generate innovations and maintain growth in all aspects of the firm. In support the paper analyzes the development of a number of industries, particularly the chemical and electrical engineering industries, and examines descriptions of British management practices by contemporaries and recent historians. Thus vigorous entrepreneurship is observed early in the life of many British industries, but as the industries matured and larger firms became appropriate and are developed in the US and Germany, British firms fell behind their counterparts in productivity and their ability to grow.

Postwar British politics in perspective

About the authors. Introduction: Explaining Change in the Postwar Period. (David Marsh). Part One: Key Themes of Postwar British Political Development. 1. Continuity and Discontinuity in British Political Development. (Colin Hay). 2. Britain's Economic Decline: Cultural Versus Structural Explanations. (Jim Johnston). 3. The Post-War Consensus: A Woozle That Wasn't? (Peter Kerr). 4. Crisis and Political Development in Postwar Britain. (Colin Hay). 5. Britain's Relations with the European Union in Historical Perspective. (Jim Buller). 6. Globalization and the Development of the British Political Economy. (Matthew Watson). Part Two: Key Narratives of Postwar British Political Development. 7. Questions of Change and Continuity in Attlee's Britain. (Jim Johnston). 8. Explaining Thatcherism: Towards a Multidimensional Approach. (Peter Kerr and David Marsh). 9. The Post-Thatcher Era. (Stuart McAnulla). Conclusion: Analysing and Explaining Postwar British Political Development. (Colin Hay and David Marsh). Bibliography. Index.

Britain in the world economy since 1880

Bernard Alford reviews the changing role, and diminishing influence, of Britain within the international economy across the century that saw the apogee and loss of Britain's empire, and her transformation from globe-straddling superpower to off-shore and indecisive member of the European Community. He explores the relationship between empire and economy; looks at economic performance against economic policy; and compares Britain - through and beyond the Thatcher years - with her European partners, America and Japan. In assessing whether Britain's economic decline has been absolute or merely relative, he also illuminates the broader history of the world economy itself.

Political explanations for economic decline in Britain and their relationship to policies for education and training

Abstract This paper considers a number of explanations promoted by governments over the last two decades to explain Britain's economic decline. It is argued that the explanations are only partially based in economic realities and are contrived to legitimise broader agendas for policy initiatives. The inadequacy of the education and training system emerges as a recurrent theme and has, as a consequence, been subjected to considerable change. However, other explanations for economic decline have been offered: lack of enterprise, lack of flexibility in the workforce and lack of competitiveness. These explanations are examined for their coherence and continuity and for their implications for education and training.

The Pecularities of the English: Pragmatism and Innovation in Management's Approach to Employee Involvement. Some Evidence from UK Industry

The progress towards 1992 and the European Social Charter promise to draw UK industry further into the European pattern of employee relations. For many years Industrial Relations theory, in particular, has focused on our distinctive voluntarist and pragmatic tradition (Clegg, Flanders, Kahn‐Freund etc), while several Economic and Political writers (Marquand, MacInnes etc) have seen the associated patterns of strong trade union workplace organisation and anarchic, decentralised bargaining as major causes of Britain's economic decline.

Japanisation of Schools?

Mike Howarth is a practising headteacher with a keen interest in Japanese education. But readers of this book should not expect a detailed description of Japanese teaching methods or the curriculum in Japanese schools. It is rather an attempt to describe how education can contribute to economic output. Howarth seems to have been motivated to undertake this comparative study of Japanese education through his contact with a number of Japanese factories operating in Wales, and so his purpose is to examine recent educational reforms in England and Wales to determine whether they are aimed in the right direction or not, using Japan as comparator, with the right direction here meaning whether the change will contribute to Britain's economic progress. The author begins by describing the factors which have conspired to effect Britain's economic decline, as the background to present educational change; he then examines the statistical differences in educational standards between the two countries. He attributes the differences more to the so-called 'learning culture' prevalent in Japan, which British education has so far failed to foster. The current reforms are criticised for not dealing with this demand. The current examination system, the National Curriculum and vocational provision are examined in the next four chapters. Lastly, he argues that this 'learning culture' nurtured by a more comprehensive educational system will change the attitudes of the British people and eventually enable British companies to take advantage of the Japanese management methods which he praises so intensely. In a way this is exactly the same kind of interest which has inspired American comparative studies of Japanese education. As Cummings (1989) recently wrote, the perception of the strength of Japanese education has 'piggy backed' on that of the challenge of Japanese economic competitiveness (Comparative Education, 25(3) (sic, pp. 293-302). It is not my intention to argue that this interest is unjustified, but it is sometimes important to be aware of the fact that the comparison of two countries and putative application of one successful method in one country to another do not always work, as a result of other factors which are equally important. This is especially so when one tries to assess one's own country's education system, using another country's system as a model. While admitting that education and training are not the only contributor to Britain's economic failure, the author nevertheless takes the relation between education, training and economic progress for granted. He justifies this by saying that there has been a marked shift in employment from low-skill to high-skill and low knowledge to high knowledge, exemplified by information technology and its applications. British firms

The Entrepreneur and Cultural Values: Recent Work in British Economic History

Today, 150 years after Queen Victoria's ascension to the throne, Victorian cultural values are being widely canvassed both by scholars and by politicians concerned with Britain's economic decline relative to other nations. Among historians seeking to understand Britain's loss of absolute preeminence in the world economy and its persistently low rates of economic growth and productivity compared to major competitors since late Victorian times, the relationship between socio-cultural values (as reflected in literary as well as other types of evidence) and economic performance is much debated. Considerable controversy has centered on the particular issue of whether Britain's economic problems can be traced at least in part to a failure in British entrepreneurship, possibly rooted in a general cultural conservatism. Taking the problem of the entrepreneur as its point of departure, this essay examines some recently published work in British economic history.1 Entrepreneurial values are, of course, much in vogue in neo-conservative quarters in Mrs. Thatcher's Britain. The appearance of a new Penguin edition of Samuel Smiles' Self-Help, with an introduction by Sir Keith (now Lord) Joseph (Mrs. Thatcher's guru and former Secretary of State for Education and Science) is symptomatic of the trend. First published in 1859, Smiles' celebration of energetic individualism has proved to have remarkably enduring appeal. With 20,000 copies sold the first year and over a quarter of a million sold during the next half-century, its sales surpassed those of the great nineteenth-century novels. And now, in the late twentieth century, Lord Joseph recommends it as a tract for our times (16). Doubtless part of the book's appeal lies in the universalistic terms in which it is cast. Smiles views individual self-exertion as the source of all improvement, both at the individual and societal level. The qualities which make for success-hard work, perseverance, self-reliance, courage, common sense-are, he believes, the same for men of all nations, in all walks of life, at all times. Further, they are within the reach of everyone, being best learned through practical experience: formal education, he asserts, gives but the merest beginnings of culture as compared to life education (22). Composed of a myriad of mini-biographical sketches, Self-Help aims to demonstrate the efficacy of the qualities of character which Smiles admires in action.

The Treasury and Britain's Decline

This article concentrates on explanations of Britain's economic decline which highlight the role of the Treasury. There is inconclusive evidence that stop-go financial policies and low investment have contributed to low growth. It is argued that foreign economic policy delayed the modernization of the economy. Although officials influence day-to-day strategy and the creation of instrumentation, the collegiate nature of decision-making means that civil service influence is hard to assess. The Treasury is constrained by pressure groups and by other departments in Whitehall. These constraints are examined with reference to the Medium-Term Financial Strategy. Finally, there are long-term reasons for Britain's decline and these do not originate in any one institution. It is not possible to analyse the role of the Treasury in isolation.