Four decades ago the concurrent Thatcher and Reagan governments heralded the arrival of the “New Right” political agenda, which prioritised market forces over the primacy of “the state” in their respective countries.  New Right policies followed in the 1980s, including reducing income and corporate taxes, deregulating labour and financial markets, and the promotion of market mechanisms of consumer choice into public sector services such as health and schools. “Market over state” was the mantra of the New Right but as many commentators noted, making markets requires state action (not least in public order maintenance), resulting in a redeployment of state power rather than its diminishment. Having seized power through the electoral college used to elect the President of the United …

The election of Donald Trump is a political earthquake with few direct precedents. Andrew Jackson’s election as a populist in 1832 is one possibility. As a novice to elected office, President Eisenhower’s election in 1952 has that in common but little else. Ideologically, Trump’s radical reforms permit a loose analogy with Ronald Reagan’s agenda in 1980, but President Reagan was an outward-looking and internationally engaged White House incumbent. Trump is decidedly inward looking and isolationist. His conversion into a normal presidential candidate has been remarkable. Trump’s intelligence and knowledge of the world of social media and TV entertainment gave him a major advantage during the Republican presidential primaries and then the election campaign. Both in the state primary appearances and …

Last week, likely Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton committed her presidential campaign to the push by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and other congressional progressives to make, as a spokesperson noted, the Federal Reserve “more representative of America as a whole.” These reformers insist that the Federal Reserve will be more publicly accountable if its governing boards, which are currently dominated by white men from the financial and corporate sectors, included more women, people of color as well as labor and consumer voices. A more accountable Fed would be good for both the financial markets and the nation as a whole. But changing who sits on the Fed’s regional bank boards will not be enough to avert the next financial crisis. And make no mistake, without …