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Britannia Unchained: Global Lessons for Growth and Prosperity
Britain is at a cross-roads; from the economy, to the education system, to social mobility, Britain must learn the rules of the 21st century, or face a slide into mediocrity. Brittania Unchained travels around the world, exploring the nations that are triumphing in this new age, seeking lessons Britain must implement to carve out a bright future.
151 pages, Paperback
First published November 13, 2012
17 people are currently reading
227 people want to read
About the author
Kwasi Kwarteng
13 books16 followersKwasi Alfred Addo Kwarteng is a British politician and historian. A member of the Conservative Party, he has served as a member of parliament (MP) since 2010, representing the constituency of Spelthorne in Surrey.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 30 reviews
July 26, 2019
There are two basic approaches to explaining the nature of the current crisis which besets national economies across the world. One of these is to see them all arising as a consequence of stupid decisions taken by inept politicians and their civil servants, with the consequences gradually aggregating until we get to the position of one almighty mess.
The second is prompted by the fact that capitalist economies seem to keep coming back to this same point, with double dip recessions ravaging the production of wealth every decade or so. What is notable from this standpoint is the systemic character of the crisis, seeming to transcend the foibles and inadequacies of this prime minister, or that chairman of the national bank.
The advantage which proponents of the first viewpoint have is that, with the benefit of hindsight, there seems to be no shortage of stupidity and ineptitude when the record is set out and offered up to scrutiny. But just as interestingly, it is also possible at any one point in this type of narrative to stop the clock and note the fact that, though things are bad for Country A, Country B, for the time-being, seems to have got off lightly, or even scot free.
This is essentially the delusion which this book encourages. The core argument is that there is nothing crucially wrong with the free market system itself; it is just the way politicians interfere in its workings to carry through their pet projects in support of the interests of whatever special whatever fragment of the social whole they are favouring. The welfare state looms large in the account of the authors as the biggest special interest project of them all; moving well beyond its original remit to act as a safety net for people who have experienced genuine, out of the ordinary misfortune, to become instead the feather-bed in which citizens corrupted by the ‘entitlement culture’ lounge around in all day.
For Kwarteng and his co-authors – tyros on the solid right wing of the Parliamentary Conservative party – the case against the welfare state is proven by the example of Canada, or Australia, or wherever there are some statistics which can be pieced together which shows what happens when a government goes the other way. The answer is invariably that the power of the free market is unleashed and it goes on to create growth and jobs when those who have been wasting money building schools and hospitals flounder into crisis.
Take India (and do it quickly because the latest evidence of emergence of crisis in that country suggests the example want be quite so shiny for too much longer). The Indians haven’t, according to this book, been so daft as to follow westerners into the study of ‘soft’ liberal arts subjects and are cleaving to science, technology, engineering and maths as the foundation for a university education which will take them into good jobs. With a half million of these STEM subject graduates coming out of Indian colleges every year the Tory authors feel they have a gold standard for education to set up against, in their view, the wretched choices that our young people are supposed to be making.
Welfare culture, with its bastard offspring, health and safety, is supposed to have made us risk adverse and us Brits now seldom venture out of safety zones where we know we will always be okay. Not a scrap of evidence is offered in support of this contention, but never mind, the authors have heard of a chap out in Israel who has invented a new type of bandage and he put all his life savings into making a viable business into making the things. From this anecdote we are get the explanation for the small Middle East nation being so much better at nurturing start-ups into sustainable, long term businesses than we are.
Out of such stuff a web is woven in which we are supposed to be able to read the rules of the 21st century, which are don’t lounge around in bed all day, get up off your arse, get yourself a decent education, and go out and work hard to earn your living. These rules are, of course, suspiciously like the rules which governed success in the 20th century, and, hand on a minute, the 19th, 18th, and probably 17th before that as well. They are nothing more than the bog standard, timeless nostrums of right wing ideology and they continue to resonate today solely because of their bumblebee-like quality on being able to alight on any fact or flower at any day in any season and always extract the same nectar which nourish the souls of free market man.
Yet as the global crisis continues to tumble through its credit crunch, sovereign debt and eurozone phases, the appeal that all we have to do is work as hard as the Indians, trim the public debt back as hard as the Canadians, and take all the risks that the Israelis seem happy to run is not likely find too many backers.
Whilst there are a lot of fun anecdotes about silly policies and deluded politicians to be told to illustrate the story of what has happened over the last few decades the telling of them does not get us very far in understanding how whole systems swing into periodic crisis which get deeper and extend further over society each time they reoccur. It is not sufficient to argue that everything would be fine if only people were more hardworking and sensible when the across the world, including all the countries which these authors regard as blessed, the evidence is piling up of the extent of the still piling up train wreck which began its crash back in 2008, and has littered the countryside with the corpses of the hardworking and diligent of all nationalities.
It’s no longer possible to account for everything that has gone wrong in recent years by saying that we’ve had politicians in charge who have been pursuing the wrong policies. Beneath the epiphenomenon of folly and error the very foundations of the system have been rocked by tensions and conflicts which make the differences between Canada and the UK seem trivial. It’s called the crisis of capitalism, and this book offers us nothing that would help us understand what is going on there.
The second is prompted by the fact that capitalist economies seem to keep coming back to this same point, with double dip recessions ravaging the production of wealth every decade or so. What is notable from this standpoint is the systemic character of the crisis, seeming to transcend the foibles and inadequacies of this prime minister, or that chairman of the national bank.
The advantage which proponents of the first viewpoint have is that, with the benefit of hindsight, there seems to be no shortage of stupidity and ineptitude when the record is set out and offered up to scrutiny. But just as interestingly, it is also possible at any one point in this type of narrative to stop the clock and note the fact that, though things are bad for Country A, Country B, for the time-being, seems to have got off lightly, or even scot free.
This is essentially the delusion which this book encourages. The core argument is that there is nothing crucially wrong with the free market system itself; it is just the way politicians interfere in its workings to carry through their pet projects in support of the interests of whatever special whatever fragment of the social whole they are favouring. The welfare state looms large in the account of the authors as the biggest special interest project of them all; moving well beyond its original remit to act as a safety net for people who have experienced genuine, out of the ordinary misfortune, to become instead the feather-bed in which citizens corrupted by the ‘entitlement culture’ lounge around in all day.
For Kwarteng and his co-authors – tyros on the solid right wing of the Parliamentary Conservative party – the case against the welfare state is proven by the example of Canada, or Australia, or wherever there are some statistics which can be pieced together which shows what happens when a government goes the other way. The answer is invariably that the power of the free market is unleashed and it goes on to create growth and jobs when those who have been wasting money building schools and hospitals flounder into crisis.
Take India (and do it quickly because the latest evidence of emergence of crisis in that country suggests the example want be quite so shiny for too much longer). The Indians haven’t, according to this book, been so daft as to follow westerners into the study of ‘soft’ liberal arts subjects and are cleaving to science, technology, engineering and maths as the foundation for a university education which will take them into good jobs. With a half million of these STEM subject graduates coming out of Indian colleges every year the Tory authors feel they have a gold standard for education to set up against, in their view, the wretched choices that our young people are supposed to be making.
Welfare culture, with its bastard offspring, health and safety, is supposed to have made us risk adverse and us Brits now seldom venture out of safety zones where we know we will always be okay. Not a scrap of evidence is offered in support of this contention, but never mind, the authors have heard of a chap out in Israel who has invented a new type of bandage and he put all his life savings into making a viable business into making the things. From this anecdote we are get the explanation for the small Middle East nation being so much better at nurturing start-ups into sustainable, long term businesses than we are.
Out of such stuff a web is woven in which we are supposed to be able to read the rules of the 21st century, which are don’t lounge around in bed all day, get up off your arse, get yourself a decent education, and go out and work hard to earn your living. These rules are, of course, suspiciously like the rules which governed success in the 20th century, and, hand on a minute, the 19th, 18th, and probably 17th before that as well. They are nothing more than the bog standard, timeless nostrums of right wing ideology and they continue to resonate today solely because of their bumblebee-like quality on being able to alight on any fact or flower at any day in any season and always extract the same nectar which nourish the souls of free market man.
Yet as the global crisis continues to tumble through its credit crunch, sovereign debt and eurozone phases, the appeal that all we have to do is work as hard as the Indians, trim the public debt back as hard as the Canadians, and take all the risks that the Israelis seem happy to run is not likely find too many backers.
Whilst there are a lot of fun anecdotes about silly policies and deluded politicians to be told to illustrate the story of what has happened over the last few decades the telling of them does not get us very far in understanding how whole systems swing into periodic crisis which get deeper and extend further over society each time they reoccur. It is not sufficient to argue that everything would be fine if only people were more hardworking and sensible when the across the world, including all the countries which these authors regard as blessed, the evidence is piling up of the extent of the still piling up train wreck which began its crash back in 2008, and has littered the countryside with the corpses of the hardworking and diligent of all nationalities.
It’s no longer possible to account for everything that has gone wrong in recent years by saying that we’ve had politicians in charge who have been pursuing the wrong policies. Beneath the epiphenomenon of folly and error the very foundations of the system have been rocked by tensions and conflicts which make the differences between Canada and the UK seem trivial. It’s called the crisis of capitalism, and this book offers us nothing that would help us understand what is going on there.
April 9, 2022
To quote from an article in the Guardian,
The only reason why anyone would want to waste their time reading this printed toilet paper is to understand the level of contempt these morally bankrupt people have for the regular person. But, mind you, it will give you fits of rage and the desire to vote in extremo merely to balance out this far-right idiocy.
It’s a short book but if you read it you’ll see that a decent editor could have got it down to one sentence. “When we seek to protect the vulnerable we limit the freedom of the rich and the privileged – and that is a disgrace.”
It’s a wretched read – a series of assertions and hunches freed from the chains of argument or evidence, with the intellectual rigour of a YouTube conspiracy rant. The prose occasionally soars to the level of clickbait, as in its most famous sentence: “The British are among the worst idlers in the world.” Most of its authors are now cabinet ministers in a government that no one would call exactly Stakhanovite.
The only reason why anyone would want to waste their time reading this printed toilet paper is to understand the level of contempt these morally bankrupt people have for the regular person. But, mind you, it will give you fits of rage and the desire to vote in extremo merely to balance out this far-right idiocy.
lookedinto-decidedagainst
August 9, 2021
In September 2012 Kwasi Kwarteng, Priti Patel, Dominic Raab, Chris Skidmore and Elizabeth Truss co wrote a book called Britannia Unchained which reveals everything they thought about British workers in three pithy sentences.
July 13, 2018
A mean spirited book by mean spirited authors, extolling the pursuit of greed at the expense of the general public.
July 18, 2021
It's generally good to read stuff which is from an opposing political camp.
This book was written (co-authored) in 2011/2012 and 10 years on, the same authors (editors?) have been in power for a few years, their Brexit dream has become reality, the country has been effectively governed by their Conservative party for a decade.
Their book's main points include:
- Children should be prioritised a STEM education, otherwise the educational system is a failure. India, Singapore and other countries are highly praised for this.
- Labour party rule is slated regularly and freely. The reasons and evidence is somewhat cherry-picked from magazines and newspapers (Daily Mail? Really?) with very limited authoritative source, and even then the stats are skewed.
- The British are lazy and too used to the welfare state and should be made to
- Markets should be left to their own devices, without any hindrance from the state, as corporations will always Do The Right Thing. Essentially the Efficient Market Hypothesis (EMH), despite it being proven over time to be flawed, a fallacy, is brought up in the book to be what will turn this dang country around.
Oh there's plenty of pointers in here, by people who've been wedded to the Tory way without any real experience of industry. And now we are where we are, in 2021 with the lot of these authors in rule. They clearly feel they know what this country needs, they've published a book to publicise their views. Given they're now in government I'm awaiting their great work in action which I presume will be shortly, given Brexit has been a bit of a costly shambles so far..
This book was written (co-authored) in 2011/2012 and 10 years on, the same authors (editors?) have been in power for a few years, their Brexit dream has become reality, the country has been effectively governed by their Conservative party for a decade.
Their book's main points include:
- Children should be prioritised a STEM education, otherwise the educational system is a failure. India, Singapore and other countries are highly praised for this.
- Labour party rule is slated regularly and freely. The reasons and evidence is somewhat cherry-picked from magazines and newspapers (Daily Mail? Really?) with very limited authoritative source, and even then the stats are skewed.
- The British are lazy and too used to the welfare state and should be made to
- Markets should be left to their own devices, without any hindrance from the state, as corporations will always Do The Right Thing. Essentially the Efficient Market Hypothesis (EMH), despite it being proven over time to be flawed, a fallacy, is brought up in the book to be what will turn this dang country around.
Oh there's plenty of pointers in here, by people who've been wedded to the Tory way without any real experience of industry. And now we are where we are, in 2021 with the lot of these authors in rule. They clearly feel they know what this country needs, they've published a book to publicise their views. Given they're now in government I'm awaiting their great work in action which I presume will be shortly, given Brexit has been a bit of a costly shambles so far..
February 5, 2020
No proper research.When authors refer to numbers on benefits they do not define which benefits. Do they include disability benefit, child benefit ? They state, British workers are lazy when productivity also relies on good management and investment. It’ is a book written by people with an ideology that have not done solid research into what they are writing about and sadly this is a reflection of current government thinking all soundbite and no substance.
March 7, 2021
A scary and disturbing read. However, I felt I should read something by the right-wing demagogues I so often decry. I do feel it's important to read texts one doesn't agree with critically even if the experience can sometimes be uncomfortable.
What surprised me most about this book, co-authored by some key Tory figures, was how badly it was written. The lack of academic rigor and inconsistencies were shocking at times. Just by way of an example, and drawing from now hazy memories, in one chapter the author attacks the current lamentable state of university education in the UK and just a few pages later goes on about what a success this sector is and how many foreign students it attracts!
What surprised me most about this book, co-authored by some key Tory figures, was how badly it was written. The lack of academic rigor and inconsistencies were shocking at times. Just by way of an example, and drawing from now hazy memories, in one chapter the author attacks the current lamentable state of university education in the UK and just a few pages later goes on about what a success this sector is and how many foreign students it attracts!
April 6, 2023
Awful book. Badly written, flawed and over-heavy on Cherry-picked stats.
I borrowed this from my local library (would not pay for it at all) to try and see where this bunch of Tories who have presided within the worst government cabinets in a hundred years or so are coming from.
Well, it was clear to see where Kwarteng and Truss got their nation-crippling budget ideas from - some entrepreneur who said he sometimes struggled to understand why he should work hard when paying 50% tax rate. This clearly represents the majority of the workforce who don’t earn above the base rate, then doesn’t it?
The authors start every chapter starting the British public as work shy and a nation of idlers and other such ‘platitudes.’
The chapters don’t follow on either. It’s a collection of spurious ideas with some stats found to provide seeming endorsement without any opposing views interrogated. The worst ‘connection’ has to be slating British student for moving away from Science and Maths towards social sciences and arts and culture, and praising Asian students for focusing hard on science and maths; in the next chapter, an example is given of a Chinese girl from taxi driver and fast food worker parents, working so hard that she is lauded by the authors for going off to uni to study music?? I mean, you’ve literally just slated the arts as pointless degrees!
Finally, we should all be commuting 2 hours each way and working a 10-12 hour day on £7 per hour picking fruit because that shows a strong work ethic. Or drive a taxi (no offence to taxi drivers) as they don’t get sick pay, holiday pay or anything.
The book is hard to read with endless percentages and reference to GDP and percentage of GDP and comparisons between counties that make it hard to follow. It’s like the authors think you can literally cherry pick successful policies from other countries and make them work autonomously from any other policy. That’s not how a country functions, I’m afraid.
So out of touch.
No, I’m really not a fan.
I borrowed this from my local library (would not pay for it at all) to try and see where this bunch of Tories who have presided within the worst government cabinets in a hundred years or so are coming from.
Well, it was clear to see where Kwarteng and Truss got their nation-crippling budget ideas from - some entrepreneur who said he sometimes struggled to understand why he should work hard when paying 50% tax rate. This clearly represents the majority of the workforce who don’t earn above the base rate, then doesn’t it?
The authors start every chapter starting the British public as work shy and a nation of idlers and other such ‘platitudes.’
The chapters don’t follow on either. It’s a collection of spurious ideas with some stats found to provide seeming endorsement without any opposing views interrogated. The worst ‘connection’ has to be slating British student for moving away from Science and Maths towards social sciences and arts and culture, and praising Asian students for focusing hard on science and maths; in the next chapter, an example is given of a Chinese girl from taxi driver and fast food worker parents, working so hard that she is lauded by the authors for going off to uni to study music?? I mean, you’ve literally just slated the arts as pointless degrees!
Finally, we should all be commuting 2 hours each way and working a 10-12 hour day on £7 per hour picking fruit because that shows a strong work ethic. Or drive a taxi (no offence to taxi drivers) as they don’t get sick pay, holiday pay or anything.
The book is hard to read with endless percentages and reference to GDP and percentage of GDP and comparisons between counties that make it hard to follow. It’s like the authors think you can literally cherry pick successful policies from other countries and make them work autonomously from any other policy. That’s not how a country functions, I’m afraid.
So out of touch.
No, I’m really not a fan.
September 29, 2022
One of the most close minded, unrealistic, and least enlightening visions for the future of Britain. Whether the authors are wholly undereducated in economics or just plain cruel is unclear - though as we see their vision playing out before our eyes, the answer may be BOTH.
Steer clear if you're sound of mind, and hope to stay that way.
Steer clear if you're sound of mind, and hope to stay that way.
October 3, 2021
This is amazingly bad - but very short. The interesting thing is what an incredibly low opinion this crop of Tories has of the people it now governs. The incoherence did surprise me.
March 14, 2022
Utter tripe
October 30, 2022
This book is all about how lazy the British are, we need to be working 20 hour days. All of us, including the children. Quality of life is not a thing we should be aiming for, growth is. And we should all be taking degrees in maths, even if we aren't good at it. Being good at anything else, those pesky social sciences and humanities subjects for example, is just being lazy as they're not proper subjects.
Ayn Rand style nonsense. Glad I've finished it.
Ayn Rand style nonsense. Glad I've finished it.
October 3, 2022
Poorly researched and sometimes self contradictory, this correctly identifies some problems with the UK and economy but is barely capable of offering any insight into root causes and even less of any solutions. If you are looking for global lessons on growth and prosperity, you won't find them here. What you will find are the authors' economic libertarian ideology and prejudices backed up with a few anecdotes and sourced predominantly from the popular press dressed up as something more objective. Useless for gaining any understanding on its supposed subject matter, but essential reading to get an understanding into the minds and agenda of the authors and by extension the current government.
September 24, 2022
I can, admittedly, exist in a bit of an echo chamber of politics. I read books that exist within the sphere of my own political leanings, and tend to discard things like this because I know they'll make me angry. I decided however, given Truss' recent ascent to Prime Minister, I should give it a go - this is the roadmap on which her government is basing its plans, I should try understand it.
I was right. It made me fucking angry. Not only ideologically is it ridiculously cruel, dismissive, and generally just patronising to the working class. But as a researcher myself, someone who has engaged with ideological work and publication, it's just horribly bad. The standard of research in this book is abhorrent. I mean, it's not just the conclusions with which I disagree, the actual standard of critical thinking is the problem. The presented argument that labour protections and business regulation in the UK has led to its ailing economy is destroyed with 4 seconds of looking at their nearest EU neighbours. It's just nonsensical ravings. Somehow writing a 150~ page book that can be summarised as "British workers are lazy and useless, and our economy would be better without anywhere near as many labour rights or protections" didn't sink the writers careers will forever amaze me.
There are 5 listed authors of this 152 page book. And somehow not 1 of them managed to write anything actually factual.
I was right. It made me fucking angry. Not only ideologically is it ridiculously cruel, dismissive, and generally just patronising to the working class. But as a researcher myself, someone who has engaged with ideological work and publication, it's just horribly bad. The standard of research in this book is abhorrent. I mean, it's not just the conclusions with which I disagree, the actual standard of critical thinking is the problem. The presented argument that labour protections and business regulation in the UK has led to its ailing economy is destroyed with 4 seconds of looking at their nearest EU neighbours. It's just nonsensical ravings. Somehow writing a 150~ page book that can be summarised as "British workers are lazy and useless, and our economy would be better without anywhere near as many labour rights or protections" didn't sink the writers careers will forever amaze me.
There are 5 listed authors of this 152 page book. And somehow not 1 of them managed to write anything actually factual.
September 30, 2022
I give the book 1 star.
It raises some important issues regarding the fact that Britain's youth has become a nation of people wanting fame and celebrity, and are always taking the easy route to success, that the British generally don't have the strongest work ethic, be that in education or employment.
What the book fails to do is to state the REAL reasons that the Brits are the way they are, which is the govt propaganda machine, the media, the TV, constantly plying every man woman and child with utter nonsense, that the general Brit is xenophobic, and just despises anything that isn't white or that speaks English as a second tongue.
That the country is held back by racism, jealousy, and govt lies.
They even go on about GDP and debt, and how this has increased or decreased, but they don't state that the massive surges in debt are due to non regulation of the banking industry and allowing them to run amok and pay fantastic unbelievable bonuses, inevitably at the expense of the ordinary tax pay ... just so they could show a fantastic bottom line.
They do mention the need for proper education with regard to the developing world and the need for Maths, Science and economic understanding...but they fail to mention that our own govt front benches are run by people who haven't got a clue about Maths, Science and economics, who probably went to a public school, then oxbridge and then studied the CLASSICS...which is totally useless. Not only that, but the education for the rich and their public schooling, is far far superior in many senses than the secondary modern schools that 95 % of the public go to, which are not funded very well, and there is no real reform to improve them.
They say that many Brits get an easy ride from the welfare state, but fail to mention the increasing gap between rich and poor, and how they (the tories) are blatantly looking out exclusively for the rich, and that this disheartens the poor. They also fail to mention the old chums network and all illicit money laundering that is done by the aristocracy of this country offshore, which also disheartens the poor.
Ok a Polish person may come over here and work hard in the fields picking fruit for 400 pounds a week, but they fail to mention that the Polish coming over here were used to working hard for 75 pounds a week, so 400 seems like they have just won the lottery, so they make sure they are well behaved and industrious, so as not to ruin this LOTTERY WIN.
They say that people dont want to do work hard for success, yet fail to mention that people do not mind working hard, but when they see every day that companies and politicians are just capitalists trying to increase the bottom line for themselves, that they feel abused, that there is no incentive to work harder at your company, when they will personally reap massive rewards from your hard work, but dump you in a nano second, if times got tight and interfered with the bottom line.
They also go on about how unions and regulation are stifling growth, yet fail to mention that if it were not for unions and regulation, our 7 year old children would be working 14 hour days in factories, and we would be drinking water filled with mercury and TB.
They complain about people studying easy degrees, rather than the stuff which will make them indispensable, but fail to mention that the education minister has enabled the universities to make any course they like, as long as it brings in the money and traps the student into many years of loan payments with interest.. they fail to mention it is in their power to change this. Nor do they mention that half of the cabinet studied classics, but by being a member of the old chums network, they are now ministers of health, or education, or finance....why should WE GRAFT OUR BUTTS OFF TO GET A DEGREE IN PURE MATHEMATICS?
The writers are totally brainwashed, it seems all life to them is just really about the economy and working, there is very little, if any humanity in the book, there is no mention of living a life of happiness, or finding your true vocation. Its all about "Graft, and graft harder, and if you haven't sorted it out quickly, then WE WILL FIND YOU SOME MEANS OF GRAFTING HARD, whether you like it or not", there is no consideration, for the fact that many have inherited thousands of acres of british land, and have never done a days work in their lives, yet we have to work our asses off to pay them for a tiny space... this is all about the poor, with very little focus on the rich.
if they mentioned Land reform, and taking back tens of thousands of square miles from the toffs and distributing it to those of us born and raised in the uk..then i may think differently...but no, we must work and work harder and maybe if we are lucky like some girl on dragons den was...we could ask our masters to sell us half an acre of his big land, and we could live happily ever after.
There is plenty of metion of how lazy we are as a nation, but no mention of how lazy they are or how for some unknown reason, when war breaks out in afghanistan, syria, iraq, why they are not very enthusiastic as they are about us working, as enthusiastic about they themselves going to war and fighting for THEIR COUNTRY ON THE FRONT LINE...WITH GUN AND BULLETS. OR EVEN A TANK....this doesnt come up... i suppose its a given, that , that aspect is our job...and when we come back...WORK HARDER.
whoever wrote this book needs to get real.
In fact the entire book is about getting the poor working as hard as possible, so they can pay rent to the rich.
So in all , it was like a party political broadcast for the tories... as i said, some great points were raised, but the real truth behind the situation remains hidden from the conversation in the book.
It raises some important issues regarding the fact that Britain's youth has become a nation of people wanting fame and celebrity, and are always taking the easy route to success, that the British generally don't have the strongest work ethic, be that in education or employment.
What the book fails to do is to state the REAL reasons that the Brits are the way they are, which is the govt propaganda machine, the media, the TV, constantly plying every man woman and child with utter nonsense, that the general Brit is xenophobic, and just despises anything that isn't white or that speaks English as a second tongue.
That the country is held back by racism, jealousy, and govt lies.
They even go on about GDP and debt, and how this has increased or decreased, but they don't state that the massive surges in debt are due to non regulation of the banking industry and allowing them to run amok and pay fantastic unbelievable bonuses, inevitably at the expense of the ordinary tax pay ... just so they could show a fantastic bottom line.
They do mention the need for proper education with regard to the developing world and the need for Maths, Science and economic understanding...but they fail to mention that our own govt front benches are run by people who haven't got a clue about Maths, Science and economics, who probably went to a public school, then oxbridge and then studied the CLASSICS...which is totally useless. Not only that, but the education for the rich and their public schooling, is far far superior in many senses than the secondary modern schools that 95 % of the public go to, which are not funded very well, and there is no real reform to improve them.
They say that many Brits get an easy ride from the welfare state, but fail to mention the increasing gap between rich and poor, and how they (the tories) are blatantly looking out exclusively for the rich, and that this disheartens the poor. They also fail to mention the old chums network and all illicit money laundering that is done by the aristocracy of this country offshore, which also disheartens the poor.
Ok a Polish person may come over here and work hard in the fields picking fruit for 400 pounds a week, but they fail to mention that the Polish coming over here were used to working hard for 75 pounds a week, so 400 seems like they have just won the lottery, so they make sure they are well behaved and industrious, so as not to ruin this LOTTERY WIN.
They say that people dont want to do work hard for success, yet fail to mention that people do not mind working hard, but when they see every day that companies and politicians are just capitalists trying to increase the bottom line for themselves, that they feel abused, that there is no incentive to work harder at your company, when they will personally reap massive rewards from your hard work, but dump you in a nano second, if times got tight and interfered with the bottom line.
They also go on about how unions and regulation are stifling growth, yet fail to mention that if it were not for unions and regulation, our 7 year old children would be working 14 hour days in factories, and we would be drinking water filled with mercury and TB.
They complain about people studying easy degrees, rather than the stuff which will make them indispensable, but fail to mention that the education minister has enabled the universities to make any course they like, as long as it brings in the money and traps the student into many years of loan payments with interest.. they fail to mention it is in their power to change this. Nor do they mention that half of the cabinet studied classics, but by being a member of the old chums network, they are now ministers of health, or education, or finance....why should WE GRAFT OUR BUTTS OFF TO GET A DEGREE IN PURE MATHEMATICS?
The writers are totally brainwashed, it seems all life to them is just really about the economy and working, there is very little, if any humanity in the book, there is no mention of living a life of happiness, or finding your true vocation. Its all about "Graft, and graft harder, and if you haven't sorted it out quickly, then WE WILL FIND YOU SOME MEANS OF GRAFTING HARD, whether you like it or not", there is no consideration, for the fact that many have inherited thousands of acres of british land, and have never done a days work in their lives, yet we have to work our asses off to pay them for a tiny space... this is all about the poor, with very little focus on the rich.
if they mentioned Land reform, and taking back tens of thousands of square miles from the toffs and distributing it to those of us born and raised in the uk..then i may think differently...but no, we must work and work harder and maybe if we are lucky like some girl on dragons den was...we could ask our masters to sell us half an acre of his big land, and we could live happily ever after.
There is plenty of metion of how lazy we are as a nation, but no mention of how lazy they are or how for some unknown reason, when war breaks out in afghanistan, syria, iraq, why they are not very enthusiastic as they are about us working, as enthusiastic about they themselves going to war and fighting for THEIR COUNTRY ON THE FRONT LINE...WITH GUN AND BULLETS. OR EVEN A TANK....this doesnt come up... i suppose its a given, that , that aspect is our job...and when we come back...WORK HARDER.
whoever wrote this book needs to get real.
In fact the entire book is about getting the poor working as hard as possible, so they can pay rent to the rich.
So in all , it was like a party political broadcast for the tories... as i said, some great points were raised, but the real truth behind the situation remains hidden from the conversation in the book.
October 16, 2022
I'm stunned these grifters managed to graduate from the top universities they've all come from if this utter drivel represents the best of their thinking. While I'm on the opposite side of the political divide, I am interested in hearing well‐thought through and considered arguments regardless of whether they are left or right on the political spectrum but reading this felt like being cornered by some coked up toff that had recently suffered a concussion. This book was full of poorly reasoned and ill thought through garbage. It's no surprise that Truss and Kwarteng crashed the economy when given the chance to put their ideas into action as this book shows there is no depth or intelligence underlying their policies.
May 8, 2020
Not an impressive work from people whose qualifications imply we should expect better.
The books major flaw is that so many sweeping statements are made & aren't backed up by references; many of the references the group do use are newspaper stories, not other books/research/studies.
The books major flaw is that so many sweeping statements are made & aren't backed up by references; many of the references the group do use are newspaper stories, not other books/research/studies.
August 26, 2020
Poorly written and edited - punctuation missing, double negatives, and incoherent paragraph breaks. Perhaps the marker of writers more used to composing speeches.
For a book that claims to offer up lessons, it gives very little in terms of explicit implementable change or policy.
For a book that claims to offer up lessons, it gives very little in terms of explicit implementable change or policy.
March 14, 2016
Typo after typo.
May 1, 2019
DH read this so that you didn’t have to.
October 5, 2022
Despite the fact it is now somewhat dated I read it to try to get an idea of the thinking behind the Liz Truss and Kwasi Kwarteng's ideas and recent mini budget.
I did not really get the answer, but I hope they have learned and have better laid out arguments in the intervening decade. It would also have been nice to have has something to say who worked on which chapters. I hate assumptions!
For such a slim volume it is expensive and whilst there are many erudite and recognised authors listed in the Bibliography, the Notes rarely refer to these, mainly quoting newspaper articles and other sources.
The general ideas sound like they have merit with respect to "Global Lessons for Growth and Prosperity" and Kwasi Kwarteng certainly has the academic qualifications and to talk with authority on the subject. I thought it was a rather superficial book. There was little to indicate there was much done to look at the differences and similarities between the supposed successful nations and ours, or the inevitable "cost" or "downside" of making the changes in these countries. Essentially the things that are uncovered during a good debate or an enquiry.
It gave me the impression it was written so that someone could spend only a couple of hours and sound good with few 10 second sound Bytes.
Given the current state of Brazil if this growth has worked it has been for a few very wealthy people at the expense of the planet as a whole. Perhaps an unfortunate example to have used.
It was an easy and pleasant read and at least they do not believe in a silver bullet. I agree we need to think longer term and as a nation stop living beyond our means.
What was not said but the message that came across to me was one used by Kennedy, “Ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country,” Until we start thinking like that and not just relying on the government to sort everything out, little will change. Any policy to meet the lessons in this book is going to have to face the drag of changing this culture.
I did not really get the answer, but I hope they have learned and have better laid out arguments in the intervening decade. It would also have been nice to have has something to say who worked on which chapters. I hate assumptions!
For such a slim volume it is expensive and whilst there are many erudite and recognised authors listed in the Bibliography, the Notes rarely refer to these, mainly quoting newspaper articles and other sources.
The general ideas sound like they have merit with respect to "Global Lessons for Growth and Prosperity" and Kwasi Kwarteng certainly has the academic qualifications and to talk with authority on the subject. I thought it was a rather superficial book. There was little to indicate there was much done to look at the differences and similarities between the supposed successful nations and ours, or the inevitable "cost" or "downside" of making the changes in these countries. Essentially the things that are uncovered during a good debate or an enquiry.
It gave me the impression it was written so that someone could spend only a couple of hours and sound good with few 10 second sound Bytes.
Given the current state of Brazil if this growth has worked it has been for a few very wealthy people at the expense of the planet as a whole. Perhaps an unfortunate example to have used.
It was an easy and pleasant read and at least they do not believe in a silver bullet. I agree we need to think longer term and as a nation stop living beyond our means.
What was not said but the message that came across to me was one used by Kennedy, “Ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country,” Until we start thinking like that and not just relying on the government to sort everything out, little will change. Any policy to meet the lessons in this book is going to have to face the drag of changing this culture.
December 9, 2022
Libertarian ‘classical liberal’ outdated and disproven trickle-down economics codswallop.
Quite bizarrely subsequently trialled in the real world at the national scale (you couldn’t make it up) and then instantaneously and universally rejected by the very markets the ‘authors’ (read Libertarian zealots) entreat us to free. You couldn’t make it up.
The authors should each stand in the corner wearing paper hats with a large D emblazoned on them.
Laughable nonsense that cost the U.K. between £20 and £40 billion. If you were a dyed-in-the-wool intellect extracted rabid old-school Tory mated with a gammon-hued, flag-waving, military history loving EDL supporter you should absolutely dutifully do your bit to re-stimulate the economy and undo some of the authors’ damage by buying the book to save old Blighty.
If however you have a nanogram of sense you will of course laugh and jeer at the brazenness of authoring such drivel for the most appalling readership minority to have ever crawled out of the primordial slime. Why oh why Goodreads is there not a zero rating.
Quite bizarrely subsequently trialled in the real world at the national scale (you couldn’t make it up) and then instantaneously and universally rejected by the very markets the ‘authors’ (read Libertarian zealots) entreat us to free. You couldn’t make it up.
The authors should each stand in the corner wearing paper hats with a large D emblazoned on them.
Laughable nonsense that cost the U.K. between £20 and £40 billion. If you were a dyed-in-the-wool intellect extracted rabid old-school Tory mated with a gammon-hued, flag-waving, military history loving EDL supporter you should absolutely dutifully do your bit to re-stimulate the economy and undo some of the authors’ damage by buying the book to save old Blighty.
If however you have a nanogram of sense you will of course laugh and jeer at the brazenness of authoring such drivel for the most appalling readership minority to have ever crawled out of the primordial slime. Why oh why Goodreads is there not a zero rating.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 1, 2017
Interesting insight into the minds of the current generation of Conservative ministers. This book written by a group of up and coming MPs, sets out their views on how Britain could learn from a range of countries against different measures. However it is hard to see how all the 'lessons' would or could translate to Britain and there is nothing on how the increasing shift from income to capital could be addressed and help social mobility. Worth a read even for those on the opposite side of the political spectrum.
January 7, 2020
Good outline of a way forward
The book is rich in examples that seek to point to the ways the system can be changed to grow the economy and unleash the potential of a country. The outline of the oath forward is there, but the call to action seems to be left more for the reader to ponder.
The book is rich in examples that seek to point to the ways the system can be changed to grow the economy and unleash the potential of a country. The outline of the oath forward is there, but the call to action seems to be left more for the reader to ponder.
June 29, 2024
A mix of daily mail style anecdote and irrelevant economic and culture comparisons but no lessons
A very strange book which seems to combine anecdotes the daily mail would find far fetched with near irrelevant comparisons of largely poorer countries and the UK in terms of culture and economy. Leading to no actual answer for anything about what the lessons for the UK would be.
A very strange book which seems to combine anecdotes the daily mail would find far fetched with near irrelevant comparisons of largely poorer countries and the UK in terms of culture and economy. Leading to no actual answer for anything about what the lessons for the UK would be.
January 1, 2020
A book by present Members of Parliament about the key secotrs of the British culture and economy that need to be strenghtened in order to once again be a world power, or at least improve our own lot.
A book with ideas that make much sense and with a credible blueprint for the future.
A book with ideas that make much sense and with a credible blueprint for the future.
October 4, 2022
A Manifesto of political thought sourced from newspaper clippings of the Guardian. I appreciate the enthusiasm though.
March 15, 2023
We had a toilet roll shortage during lockdown so this book came in handy at long last.
August 11, 2024
Polemic Nonesense
February 24, 2023
Okay, I didn't manage the whole thing. But I've got the ebook so I can do detailed, super-academic scholarly textual analysis for you. For instance, the word 'idlers' is used three times in this book, once in this famous quote:
The word 'investment' is used 50 times. 'Hard work' 25 times. 'Benefits' 43 times. 'Feckless' twice. 'Mother' 12 times. 'Entrepreneur' 27 times. Although I don't know what use this is to anyone. 'Poverty' ten times. 'Trade' 27 times. 'Joy' zero times.
The book is indeed a joyless thing. But useful. Future researchers will treasure this book as a detailed and unapologetic guide to the bleak corner of pin-striped, antisocial ultra-capitalism that brought us the weird national trauma of the Liz Truss Era (6 September 2022 – 25 October 2022). Predictably, the word 'neoliberal' also occurs zero times. Enjoy.
"Once they enter the workplace, the British are among the worst idlers in the world. We work among the lowest hours, we retire early and our productivity is poor. Whereas Indian children aspire to be doctors or businessmen, the British are more interested in football and pop music."
The word 'investment' is used 50 times. 'Hard work' 25 times. 'Benefits' 43 times. 'Feckless' twice. 'Mother' 12 times. 'Entrepreneur' 27 times. Although I don't know what use this is to anyone. 'Poverty' ten times. 'Trade' 27 times. 'Joy' zero times.
The book is indeed a joyless thing. But useful. Future researchers will treasure this book as a detailed and unapologetic guide to the bleak corner of pin-striped, antisocial ultra-capitalism that brought us the weird national trauma of the Liz Truss Era (6 September 2022 – 25 October 2022). Predictably, the word 'neoliberal' also occurs zero times. Enjoy.
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