The Thatcher/Reagan years are commonly thought of as the heyday of free market ideology. The reality is starkly different however – despite the lip-service paid to F.A. Hayek by Thatcher and the Tories they suffered from the same Fatal Conceit that state socialist planners and previous economic managerialists did – they believed that they could plan economic activity.

I am reminded of this by a post on the FEEs blog Anything Peaceful which describes the ‘market based approach’ being pursued to redevelop a small town’s downtown area. Far from being market based, its planning centred with ‘experts’ deciding what should be done.

Back in the 1980s, Thatcher and company were likewise paying lip service to the free market and market based solutions, but in reality their program of privatisation was simply a more efficient mechanism of control. Allowing a few sops to the market to impose some discipline, but still seeking to manage the economy – the Fatal Conceit.

Chris Tame of the Libertarian Alliance saw this, the so-called privatisations being nothing of the sort, simply passing the profits and day to day running to another section of the ruling class (one more amenable to Tory aims than the Unions and state employed managers).
It was this truth which allowed New Labour, under the direction of Blair and Mandelson to adopt the Thatcherite methodologies – the state maintains control, but in a more efficient manner than the supposedly socialist methods which dominated until 1979.

Murray Rothbard also criticised this pseudo-privatisation, seeing it for what it really is – the notorious anarcho-’capitalist’ suggested that the state run businesses should be taken over by the workers in an act of true privatisation.

Too many of today’s supposedly free market ideologues are actually another breed of the planner and controller.

Update:
Just to make it clear, the FEE blog post was making a similar point to me.