New Right

Theoretical Perspectives: New Right

Key ideas:

• Economic freedom (Market Liberalism)
  
• Rationality (of individuals) / Consumer choice
  
• Cost / Benefit analysis
  
• Free Capitalist Markets (Market Economies)
  
• Individual superior to the Collective (Anti-Collectivism - e.g. Anti- Union)
  
• Underclass theory (Murray)
  
• Welfare dependency / Dependency culture
  
• Limited role of State / Government (Defence, Public Order)
  
• State as "oppressive of individual freedom"
  
• Traditional family roles / gender relationships
  
• Anti-socialist / Pro-Capitalist
  
• Capitalism is highest form of economic organisation / society possible
  
• Nature (biology / genes) more important than Nurture (environment)
  
• Libertarianism

Key Names: Hayek, Friedman, Thatcher, Reagan, Wilson, Van Den Haag. P.Morgan, Phillips.

Key Criticisms: 

• Over-emphasis on Individuals at expense of social structures
  
• Ignores inequalities of class, gender, status, power
  
• Double Moral Standards (economic freedom but strict control of family life)
  
• Political propaganda rather than analysis
  
• New Right Realism (Deviance) - ignores white-collar crime / crimes of powerful
  
• Are human beings "naturally selfish / self-seeking"?
  
• Ignores role of culture in the shaping of social identities
  
• Total "freedom of action for individual" impossible in modern, complex, societies
  
• Dependency Culture = unproven assertion
  
• Underclass theory not proven
  
• Little or no empirical research / evidence to support New Right theories
  
  

Key Critics: All variants of Feminism, Marxism (Traditional and Neo).