Economic Policy and the Policy Review

Abstract

The central purpose of the Review was, of course, to provide a base of new policy for the Party. This chapter will consider the Review’s policy output, focusing on the economic policies and policy groups. This focus will enable a concentration in greater detail on the attitudes, changes and policies provided in this important policy area. Economic policy is interpreted in a wide sense allowing an examination of the interaction between different groups. This is a policy area of particular importance; it can be seen as a basis for other areas of policy (Whiteley, 16), and has been seen as an area of particular contention in the 1992 General Election (Sanders). As a policy area of consistent importance, examination of economic policy provides an opportunity to assess how genuinely innovative and radical the Policy Review actually was.