There's a piece worth reading in the Guardian today by Phillip Blond, an academic and author of a forthcoming book called Red Tory:
"The Blairite left and Thatcherite right have colluded in the production of an oligarchical market state that monopolises power and wealth. Indeed, both the public and the private sector are now governed by a centralised bureaucratic or moneyed elite that effectively disempowers everybody else. With more than 20% of private-sector employees working for venture capitalists and with virtually all life in the public sector dictated by the relationship between disengaged managers and centrally determined performance targets, the ordinary worker has been stripped of any transformative influence or social power."
He sees a lot of potential in the Conservative Party's focus on civil society - deeming it much more significant than merely being the vacuous "sheep's clothing" that other writers for the Guardian see it as - and hopes it won't lack for ambition now that the Party has a comfortable poll lead.
