Sociology

The New Labour government, led by Tony Blair from 1997, advocated a ‘third way’ between the ‘old left’ and ‘new right’ politics. The sociologist Anthony Giddens provided an academic rationale for this approach, through a recognition of the social changes that made ‘old Labour’ less relevant: globalization, consumerism, individualism, declining trade union membership, and so on. The Third Way was centred on the ideas of citizenship in a civil society, the democratization of the family as an institution that was changing in form, and the idea of giving individuals financial incentives to work (and disincentives to remain unemployed) 603-610