After The End of History

A welcome repeat last night on BBC Four for Huw Edwards's programme on Lloyd George. The emergence of the Soviet Union made it impossible, in his own mind, for him to approve the most urgently needed nationalisation of the mines. Yet, a generation (or as good as) after the fall of the Soviet Union, the markets themselves, not merely in Britain but in America, are demanding, and seem likely to get, the nationalisation of the banks.

Communism sullied the reputation of public ownership. But just as America led the way on Keynesianism, and still does on things like co-operative housing and unions exercising real political power, so she is leading the way on the post-Soviet world's return to (as always historically in Britain) strictly pragmatic nationalisation.