'Sacking the new Jerusalem? The New Right, social democracy and professional identities'

The New Right have had an important if somewhat imprecise impact upon Anglo -American capitalism over the past twenty years. Much has been written abou t them by a variety of disciplines over a wide subject terrain. This paper will further contribute to this analysis by discussing an area which has be en somewhat neglected to date - namely, the way in which the New Rightis at tempt to reconstruct society has affected professional work, the identities of professionals and, by implication, the service class. It will do so thr ough an analysis of the New Right and towards the end it will use the Unive rsity sector as an example of change for a variety of professional areas. C hanges in the University and other sectors have led to new discourses and p ractices which have had real material effects and altered the nature of pro fessional work. In turn, these effects have reshaped the welfare state and undermined key aspects of the pre-New Right foundations on which it was bui lt. This alteration is ongoing and hence the future of the welfare state an d the wider social structure is being fought out in these processes. To sim plify this attempted reconstruction has pitted public sector professionals against private sector ones as the former have material interests bound up with a large allocative state whilst the latteris interests are tied up wit h a neo-liberal state. However, such a division creates a problem for the N ew Rightis long term success as it potentially encourages one section of th e service class to support the left in an attempt to conserve their bit of the welfare state. What follows is based upon the experience of the UK.