Where is the Arthur Seldon for our own era?

24 June 2009

Colin Robinson, biographer of the sage who so influenced Thatcherism, says that Seldon has no counterpart now — the Tory party is no longer receptive to such challenging ideas

‘Think tanks’ have proliferated in the last 30 years. But there is no ferment of ideas comparable to that in the late 1970s. The newer think tanks, often associated with political parties, accept the prevailing economic and political consensus and propose marginal changes, invariably involving more government spending and more government intervention. Sometimes they claim to be searching for a ‘big idea’. They bear no resemblance to the IEA of Seldon and Harris, which wanted to overturn the consensus, not reinforce it. Moreover, Harris and Seldon were not in search of a big idea. They already knew, when they started work at the IEA, what that idea was — a return to market liberalism. Their mission, which they accomplished, was to explain how that goal could be achieved by a reforming government which wished to leave people freer to make their own choices.

Sadly, there is no Seldon now. But, even if Arthur were still here, would his ideas be heeded, as they were in the late 1970s? Regrettably, that period now seems like an isolated, atypical episode when British politicians were seeking ideas and were willing to accept a set of principles as a basis for action.

In 1980, Arthur Seldon predicted correctly that ‘Labour as we know it will never rule again’. Since Labour abandoned socialism, it has had no discernible principles on which to base policy. Without a guiding light, it is reduced to a group trying to attain and then stay in power.

What of the Conservatives, who were once the reformers? After their Thatcherite phase of principled decision-making based on radical ideas, they seem now deliberately to avoid any such ideas for fear of offending some part of the electorate, all too ready to latch on to elements of the conventional wisdom (particularly if they are tinged with green), without having addressed a fundamental issue which concerned Arthur Seldon — how to promote individual choice, thereby reining in coercive action through the state?

Seldon, following Lionel Robbins, saw markets as empowering devices which allow people a constant referendum on the goods and services they want. However, if governments (whose actions are often biased in favour of pressure groups) are forever overriding the referendum, handing out favours which they hope will buy votes, and taxing and borrowing to redistribute wealth and income, how are constant expansion of the state and consequent erosion of individual freedom to be avoided? That is the ‘dilemma of democracy’ identified by Arthur Seldon. It is time for ideas on how the tendency towards overgovernment might be countered, rather than yet more schemes for doing good with other people’s money.

Colin Robinson is Emeritus Professor of Economics, University of Surrey and a former Editorial Director of the Institute of Economic Affairs. His Arthur Seldon: A Life for Liberty is published by Profile Books at £19.99.

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Christopher Chantrill

June 25th, 2009 9:02pm Report this comment

The truth is, we don't need Harris and Seldon any more. We know what needs to be done. But the modern power elite isn't ready to give up its power.

The situation is the same as that leading up to the Reform Bill in 1832.

In those days it was the Duke of Wellington that led the truculent Tory ultras in the Lords to surrender their power peacefully.

The truculence of Gordon Brown and his Labour ultras tell us that the Liberal Elite is years away from a similar surrender.

Tsz San So

June 28th, 2009 10:26am Report this comment

True, big ideas are missing from politics these days and more often than not the same conventional wisdom is repeated by those who are supposed to shape the way the world things. But surely it is no longer the time to talk about free markets when deregulated markets have failed so spectacularly in the last couple of years.

I don't think that what defines politics today is the issue of over versus under government, but rather that of how public resources are to be used and how to government can act to facilitate individuals making choices in life.