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(Tufton) Street Politics: Changing neoliberalisms in UK think tanks
5th August 2026
REPORT | Rosalba Ellis
Summary:
1. UK politics is marked by an ideological hybridity and elite protection developed within neoliberal think tanks.
The UK’s political landscape has long been shaped by a hybrid mix of neoliberal, nationalist, authoritarian, cultural conservative, and techno-libertarian logics. These ideologies often contradict each other, yet together they can work to stabilise forms of elite privilege. The Labour Party’s adoption of growth-focused, market-led policies under the leadership of Keir Starmer illustrates that this hybrid logic can operate across party lines, not just within the Conservative sphere.
2. Contemporary Tufton Street neoliberalism centres around growth, tech and culture wars.
Influential Tufton Street think tanks frame concepts like growth, sovereignty, innovation, and security as “common sense,” in an attempt to naturalise policies that reinforce elite interests and marginalise alternative solutions. These include:
• Growth imperatives: The state should intervene selectively in the economy by creating a pro-business environment and propping up domestic industries, while retreating from regulation in other sectors. An ideological mix of neoliberalism with more authoritarian tendencies is emerging, alongside a growing economic nationalism, set against traditional neoliberal imperatives to offshore labour. This is paired with a greater acceptance of population control and migration restriction.
• ‘Tech-will-save-us’: A conviction that technology can resolve socio-economic problems is widespread, with automation and digital innovation framed as inevitable and overwhelmingly positive. Meanwhile, job displacement or the social costs of rapid tech expansion are rarely acknowledged or significantly minimised. Instead, efficiency and innovation are often privileged over welfare and climate justice, while environmental impacts are downplayed.
• Culture wars and anti-woke: Cultural conservative agendas are often reinforced, aligning with more punitive forms of domestic politics, increased state control, and a prioritisation of ‘law and order’. There is growing support for the curtailing of certain civil liberties, heightened policing, and harsher sentencing.
3. This taxonomy can offer new analytical tools for progressive actors
This taxonomy equips progressive actors to understand the ideological fundamentals of influential right-wing think tanks. Campaigners, unions and civil society organizations can use these insights to decode, anticipate, and contest the terrain of economic and social debates.
4. Progressive actors need to identify democratic pressure points
The entrenchment of networks across parties deepens inequality, accelerates climate breakdown, and narrows democratic deliberation. Exposing these patterns reveals pressure points where alternative, people-centred economic visions can be proposed, supported, and mobilised. Progressive actors can use these openings to transform rhetorical agendas into real, systemic change.
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