The Politics of Public Expenditure

Maurice Mullard

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2005
• Topic: Economics
• eBook ISBN:
  9781134852420
• Subtopic: Economic Theory
• Index: Economics

The question of public expenditure has proved to be one of the perennial problems for British Governments. Given forecasts of low growth and record levels of unemployment, the present Government could be faced with dilemmas of greater magnititude than ever. This new edition of Maurice Mullard's book has been carefully revised to provide students with an accessible text. It is principally concerned with explaining the political contexts in which public expenditure decisions have had to be made over the last twenty years. It examines the way in which Governments make choices according to public pressure and the fact that bargains and compromises have to be made in order to maintain political credibility. Maurice Mullard provides examples of the way in which Government policy and individual expenditure programmes have been shaped according to the political climate. The text combines theoretical framworks with policy analysis. This edition contains new chapters on Conservative and Labour politics and a section on John Major's government.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of figures
• List of tables
• Introduction
• Chapter 1: Definitions of politics and public expenditure
• Chapter 2: Explaining public expenditure
• Chapter 3: Conservative Party politics and public expenditure
• Chapter 4: The Labour Party and the politics of public expenditure
• Chapter 5: The Heath Government 1970–4
• Chapter 6: The Labour Governments 1974–9
• Chapter 7: The Thatcher Government 1979–83
• Chapter 8: The restructuring of public expenditure 1984–90
• Chapter 9: Politics and public expenditure in the 1990s: the years of the new pragmatism
• Chapter 10: Conclusions: the challenges of the 1990s
• References
• Index