The right turn in economic policy: Business elites and the new conservative economics

What was the role of business elites in the development of the new conserva tive economic policies' Corporate elite and class fraction arguments have b een invoked to explain this "right turn" but have not been systematically e valuated. Combining a decision-making history with an elite background anal ysis of the key policy entrepreneurs behind these policies, we show that: ( I) moderate conservative and ultraconservative business policy organization s (BPOs) developed the main policy proposals and inserted them on the natio nal policy agenda against the opposition of corporate liberal BPOs; and (2) the corporate elite dominated the boards of all three policy camps while s ocial, regional and industrial divisions accounted for policy divisions. Co rporate elite theory needs to be revised to address the social, industrial and regional divisions that create policy divisions and the political press ures from below that condition the dominance of business coalitions.