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The Political Economy of Britain in Crisis pp 1–51Cite as

Palgrave Macmillan

Introduction

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Abstract

This chapter introduces notions of crises. It highlights how crises are perceived as holding both constructivist and materialist elements. It argues that accepted narratives of events combine to constitute/construct a crisis, before exploring how crises are related to concepts such as blame, framing and agenda setting. Furthermore, crises are not necessarily viewed as negative events, but can be utilised by certain actors to promote certain agendas. Hence, it may be beneficial for some actors to highlight/generate notions of crises. This chapter establishes the research questions and hypothesis for the remainder of the study, in particular it hypothesises that the trade unions will be over blamed for the crisis of 1976–1979 and the banking sector will be under blamed for the crisis of 2007.

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  1. Department of Politics, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, Merseyside, UK

    Christopher Kirkland

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Kirkland, C. (2017). Introduction. In: The Political Economy of Britain in Crisis. Building a Sustainable Political Economy: SPERI Research & Policy. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-59238-1_1

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