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Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Parties matter but institutions live on
T2 - Labour’s legacy on Conservative immigration policy and the neoliberal consensus
AU - Consterdine, Erica
PY - 2020/1/31
Y1 - 2020/1/31
N2 - The drivers of immigration policy have long been contested. While partisan theory contends that policy is a product of parties’ interests, historical institutionalism places explanatory value on the norms of policymaking and path dependency. Examining Conservative-led immigration policy, I argue that while parties matter for defining policy objectives, institutions explain policy outputs. Despite a shift from Labour’s expansive managed migration regime to the Coalition’s restrictive policy, there was remarkable confluence in policy and policymaking. Challenging the parties matter school of thought, I argue that institutional legacies inherited from New Labour explain policy stability and that these are reflective of an emerging political consensus on neoliberal migration management, including outsourcing and commodifying migration controls, maintaining an indirect corporatist agreement with employers, underpinned by a policy paradigm predicated on economic worthiness. This article demonstrates how inherited institutions persist and how ideational legacies evolved to a political consensus of neoliberal migration management.
AB - The drivers of immigration policy have long been contested. While partisan theory contends that policy is a product of parties’ interests, historical institutionalism places explanatory value on the norms of policymaking and path dependency. Examining Conservative-led immigration policy, I argue that while parties matter for defining policy objectives, institutions explain policy outputs. Despite a shift from Labour’s expansive managed migration regime to the Coalition’s restrictive policy, there was remarkable confluence in policy and policymaking. Challenging the parties matter school of thought, I argue that institutional legacies inherited from New Labour explain policy stability and that these are reflective of an emerging political consensus on neoliberal migration management, including outsourcing and commodifying migration controls, maintaining an indirect corporatist agreement with employers, underpinned by a policy paradigm predicated on economic worthiness. This article demonstrates how inherited institutions persist and how ideational legacies evolved to a political consensus of neoliberal migration management.
KW - Conservative Party
KW - historical institutionalism
KW - immigration
KW - neoliberal migration management
KW - New Labour
KW - outsourcing
KW - partisan theory organised interests
U2 - 10.1177/1369148119890253
DO - 10.1177/1369148119890253
M3 - Journal article
JO - The British Journal of Politics and International Relations
JF - The British Journal of Politics and International Relations
SN - 1369-1481
ER -