New Labour and the theory of globalization

Abstract

This article argues that the theoretical basis of the New Labour project was sociological in its framing, drawing in particular on the ideas of Anthony Giddens. The theory of globalization, individualization and risk advanced by him and others became the rationale for New Labour's rejection of `traditional' socialist and welfare ideologies, holding the collectivist, materialist and class-based politics that these had upheld to be now obsolete. However, it is argued that Marxist analytic perspectives retain their relevance in understanding the dynamics of what is more clearly understood as global capitalism than in the more diffuse language of globalization. The concept of systemic contradiction developed by sociologists such as David Lockwood in the 1980s retains its relevance as an analytical resource in contemporary capitalist society.