New Right

• Human nature

  • Atomistic individualism and self ownership - they think people have absolute rights and the ability to rationally pursue their own self-interests
  • Ethical egoism - beliving it is morally right to act in our own self interest we must rationally determine what we need to do to thrive
  • No single utopian vision will suit all people as humans are all unique individuals - Thatcher believed there was no such thing as society as we are all seperate entities
• Society

  • Minimal government intervention and oppose social policies and welfare
  • Espouse traditional values and lifestyles
  • Atomistic rights are absolute, this includes property rights
  • They believe positive rights are unnatural and cannot be claimed
  • Strive for the separateness of persons and self-ownership, as liberty distrupts patters and creates the danger of the common good, believing the ends do not justify the means
• The state

  • They wish to roll back the frontiers of the state and allow market forces to function and revitalise society
  • They wish for a strong state to enforce the law, create order and promote traditional values and to leave moral issues to individuals; te state exists to protect people from coercion - paternalism and redistribution violate absolute side contraints
• The Economy

  • Agree with Neoliberalists, as they both want to tackle inflation and slow growth with tax and spending cuts, free markets, monetarism, deregulation and privatisation
  • Capitalism is efficent and moral - the entitlement theory of justice focuses on entitlement, not moral desert (producers over takers)
  • Condemn redistribution and 'common good' as it undermines self-ownership, they think taxation is state-sanctioned theft
  • Free market economy and little to no government intervention, this encourages innovation and competition within the economy