BRITISH PROFESSIONS TODAY: THE STATE OF ... - Property Week

Changing regulatory structures continued >>
Thatcher’s crusade against professional self-regulation and
later cuts in funding for public sector professions, proved that
despite being Conservative in name, her political programmes
were some of the most radical the country had ever seen
(Burrage 2007). Much of the intellectual theory behind
Thatcher’s policies came from Milton Friedman, an advocate
not only of monetarism but also of breaking the legal
monopoly of the medical and other professions. In his view,
one should pursue the logic of the free market wherever it
may lead, regardless of what it might mean for established
institutions (Klein and Day 1996). In Thatcher’s mind too,
professionals should be competing for customers (rather than
clients or patients) in the free market. Thatcher’s position held
that what the professions actually enjoyed was their high
status; their self-regulation and ethical standards were
nonsensical pretences (Burrage 2007).
Despite her success in breaking the trade unions, Thatcher’s
attacks did not result in changing the structure of professional
bodies. She was, however, responsible for breaking the
traditional political deference to the professions. Her general
tactic has not been changed in subsequent decades, despite
changes in government. In fact, most legislation affecting
professional structures of regulation has been passed in the
past decade, under New Labour governments. 4
The rise of the regulatory state
The 1980s was characterized by the retreat of the state (Cook
and Stevenson 1996) as privatisation changed corporate
markets and government-business relations in the UK (Harris
1999). A new style of politics has emerged, characterized by
the steady rise of legislation and regulation in Western
societies (see, for example, Majone 1994). New issues take
precedence on a legislative agenda moulded by regulating the
operations of businesses, rather than government involvement
via direct ownership of parts of the economy (Ibid.). The
economic reforms ushered in by Thatcher, perhaps once
deemed radically Conservative are now taken as the rule. As
Peter Mandelson famously claimed: “we are all Thatcherites
now” (10 June 2002, in an interview with The Times). 5
Shifts in professional regulatory structures have taken place
within the broader context of a general political shift from
interventionist to regulatory modes of governance within the
European Union. The rise of the ‘regulatory state’ in Europe
has followed two key trends: 1) the decline of ‘positive’ (or
Keynesian/Welfare) state tools of stabilisation and
redistribution (with the highly significant exception of the state
response to the global financial crisis 2008), 6 and 2) the
European Commission’s expansionist role through the use of
policy content given the lack of budgetary tools 7 (Majone 1997).
Because of the reduced role of the interventionist state, we
have seen a corresponding increase in the role of the regulatory
state; in short, ‘rule making is replacing taxing and spending’
(Ibid.). An apparent paradox emerges, as ‘deregulation’ – eg
privatisation and devolved powers – is characterised by
‘re-regulation’ – eg price regulation and competition law.
4 Although, government action in the 1980s and 1990s did liberalise certain
professions, particularly the legal services: legislative changes ended
solicitors’ monopoly on the provision of conveyancing services with the
Administration of Justice Act 1985, permitted authorised practitioners to
undertake certain conveyancing functions in relation to land transactions,
and brought an end to barristers’ monopoly over advocacy in higher
courts and solicitors’ monopoly over litigation by allowing both existing
and new professional bodies to apply for such rights, both with The
Courts and Legal Services Act 1990 (Collins 2006).
5 Mandelson’s full remark was: “Globalisation punishes hard any country
that tries to run its economy by ignoring the realities of the market or
prudent public fi nances. In this strictly narrow sense, and in the urgent
need to remove rigidities and incorporate fl exibility in capital, product,
and labour markets, we are all Thatcherites now” (Ibid.). The current
economic downturn and part nationalisation of the banks has caused
some to revise this position: ‘we are all socialists now’.
6 The social democratic consensus about the role of the positive
state began to crumble in the 1970s when the combination of
unemployment and rising rates of infl ation could not be explained within
Keynesian models (Majone 1997).
7 Roughly one-fi fth of regulation now comes from the EU, and one-third
when national discretion is included (Healey 2006).
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