Friedman (Friedman and Friedman, 1980), and was advocated by
Ronald Reagan in his Republican presidential campaigns. Its most
sustained practical influence was on the Conservative administration
from 1979 to 1997, led for most of that period by Margaret Thatcher.
The Thatcherites have – in distinction to usual British conservative
pragmatism – insisted on applying one theoretical analysis to a wide
variety of policy areas. The extent of their opposition to the growth of
the ‘nanny state’, and insistence on the introduction of market
mechanisms and privatisation, not only to social welfare areas but
even to prisons, the Post Office and the armed forces, is remarkable.
‘Thatcherism’ can be seen as a variety of liberalism in its insistence
on the importance of the free market, its individualism and support
for electoral democracy on a national level. However, it retains
support for the Crown, ‘traditional family values’ and a suspicion of
internationalism (i.e. a lukewarm attitude to European Union
political integration) from the conservative tradition.
More recently, in the United States, a prominent ‘neo-con-
servative’ group supporting the George W. Bush administration, and
associated with the American Enterprise Institute and the Project for
the New American Century, have adopted similar economic and
nationalist policies. In the US context, conservatism takes paradoxical
form in a belief in the compulsory export of liberal institutions to the
South – including Iraq and Afghanistan. The United Nations is the
focus for a suspicion of international institutions.
Conservatism by its very nature continually evolves in response
to economic and social changes. Whilst neo-conservatism is still a
popular strand of conservatism, it is currently being challenged by
what may be referred to as ‘crusty conservatism’. Probably the best
known exponent of this in the UK is David Cameron, the Con-
servative Party leader, who stresses environmental and social issues.
Christian democracy
In recent years in the United States, whilst what the British might
call ‘Thatcherite’ political attitudes have been strong, arguably the
strongest organised force on the political right has been Christian
fundamentalism with its emphasis on the so-called ‘moral majority’
issues of abortion, pornography and the like.
IDEOLOGIES 95