Les Think tanks néo-libéraux et les élections législatives britanniques de 2019

Abstract

This article analyses the role played by several British think tanks (including the Institute of Economic Affairs, the Centre for Policy Studies, and the Initiative for Free Trade) in the run-up to the December 2019 general election, which was dominated by the issue of Brexit. In recent decades, the original British think tank model, based on the idea of policy advice arising from independent research, has been challenged by the emergence of strongly ideological bodies, who claim the label of think tanks but seem more interested in attracting positive media coverage than in rigorous thinking. This different think tank model is here referred to as hollowed out. We focus on right-wing organisations, primarily concerned with the promotion of free trade, which rely on aggressive advocacy, mastery of media tropes and codes, and the construction of a simplified and sometimes beguiling discourse, built on promises of innovation. We shall examine the attempts by those think tanks to make their voices heard during the 2019 election. We seek to demonstrate that the hollowed-out think tanks might not be as suited to the era of Brexit and populist politics as one might suppose. Indeed, the article will ask whether the ideological think tanks still have a useful role to play, in a discourse which is increasingly polarised between the purveyors of facts and false news.

Keywords

• Brexit
• general election
• media
• conservatism
• think tanks
• economic liberalism