Grace Blakeley | |
|---|---|
 Blakeley in 2019 | |
| Born | 26 June 1993 Basingstoke, Hampshire, England |
| Education | |
| Alma mater | |
| Occupations |
|
| Employers |
|
| Writing career | |
| Subjects | |
| Website | graceblakeley |
Grace Blakeley (born 26 June 1993) [1] is an English economics and politics commentator, [2] [3] columnist, journalist and author. She is a staff writer for Tribune and panelist on TalkTV. She was previously the economics commentator of the New Statesman and has contributed to Novara Media.
Blakeley was born in Basingstoke in Hampshire, England. [4] She is half Welsh on her father's side. [5] She was privately educated at Lord Wandsworth College, [6] and later attended the Sixth Form College, Farnborough. [7] She studied philosophy, politics and economics at St Peter's College, Oxford, graduating with a first class honours degree. [7] [8] Blakeley then obtained a master's degree in African studies at St Antony's College, Oxford. [9] After graduating, she worked as a management consultant for KPMG in their Public Sector and Healthcare Practice division. [8] Blakeley then worked as a research fellow for a year at a left-wing think tank, the Institute for Public Policy Research, in Manchester, specialising in regional economic policy. [8]
Blakeley joined the magazine New Statesman in January 2019 as its economics commentator, writing a fortnightly column and contributing to the website and podcasts. [10] Her articles for the magazine included support for Lexit and a Green New Deal. [11] [12] Her first book, Stolen: How to Save the World from Financialisation, was published by Repeater Books on 10 September 2019. [13] Michael Galant writing for the openDemocracy website, praised the book as a "convincing critique of modern capitalism for socialists and sceptics alike". [14] CapX's Diego Zuluaga commented in his review that it was a "sweeping polemic against the market economy", and felt the author had been selective in how she presented evidence for her arguments. [15]
Blakeley became a staff writer for the democratic socialist magazine Tribune in January 2020. [16] She sits on the Labour Party's National Policy Forum, which is responsible for policy development. [17]
Blakeley's second book, The Corona Crash: How the Pandemic Will Change Capitalism, was published in October 2020. [18] Her next book, Vulture Capitalism: Corporate Crimes, Backdoor Bailouts, and the Death of Freedom, was published in 2024. [19]
Blakeley identifies as a democratic socialist [20] and supports the use of capital controls. [21] She supported Jeremy Corbyn and voted for him in the 2015 and 2016 Labour leadership elections, though she criticised him in 2016 for failing to "challenge the hegemony of neoliberalism" in the way she had imagined he would. [21] [22]
Blakeley promotes a Green New Deal. [21] [23] Though she has emphasised it as running "counter to a capitalist system", she has argued that "even those who do not identify as socialists" may soon realise that a green industrial revolution is the "only option". She calls for a "fair transition towards a low-carbon economy". [24]
Blakeley is a Eurosceptic, and has branded the European Union as "neoliberal", "neo-colonial" and "run in the interests of financial and corporate elites". [21] [25] In 2019, she wrote an article titled: "Why the left should champion Brexit", where she argued the EU was a barrier to building a socialist economy. [26]
The Third Way, is a centrist political position that attempts to reconcile centre-right and centre-left politics by synthesising a combination of economically liberal and social democratic economic policies along with centre-left social policies.
Red-baiting, also known as reductio ad Stalinum and red-tagging, is an intention to discredit the validity of a political opponent and the opponent's logical argument by accusing, denouncing, attacking, or persecuting the target individual or group as anarchist, communist, Marxist, socialist, Stalinist, or fellow travelers towards these ideologies. In the phrase, red refers to the color that traditionally symbolized left-wing politics worldwide since the 19th century, while baiting refers to persecution, torment, or harassment, as in baiting.
Tribune is a democratic socialist political magazine founded in 1937 and published in London, initially as a newspaper, then converting to a magazine in 2001. While it is independent, it has usually supported the Labour Party from the left. Previous editors at the magazine have included Aneurin Bevan, the Minister of Health who spearheaded the establishment of the National Health Service, former Labour leader Michael Foot, and writer George Orwell, who served as Literary Editor.
Lindsey Ann German is a British left-wing political activist. A founding member and convenor of the British anti-war organisation Stop the War Coalition, she was formerly a member of the Socialist Workers Party, sitting on its central committee and editor of its magazine, Socialist Review.
Hilary Wainwright is a British sociologist, political activist and socialist feminist, best known for being a co-editor of Red Pepper magazine.
The British left can refer to multiple concepts. It is sometimes used as shorthand for groups aligned with the Labour Party. It can also refer to other individuals, groups and political parties that have sought egalitarian changes in the economic, political, and cultural institutions of the United Kingdom. There are various subgroups, split between reformist and revolutionary viewpoints. Liberals, progressives and social democrats believe that equality can be accommodated into existing capitalist structures, but they differ in their criticism of capitalism and on the extent of reform and the welfare state. Anarchists, communists, and socialists, among others on the far left, on the other hand argue for abolition of the capitalist system.
Social democracy is a political, social, and economic philosophy within socialism that supports political and economic democracy and supports a gradualist, reformist and democratic approach towards achieving socialism. In practice, social democracy takes a form of socially managed welfare capitalism, achieved with partial public ownership, economic interventionism, and policies promoting social equality.
Sir Keir Rodney Starmer is a British politician and barrister who has served as Leader of the Opposition and Leader of the Labour Party since 2020. He has been Member of Parliament (MP) for Holborn and St Pancras since 2015. He was previously Director of Public Prosecutions from 2008 to 2013.
Owen Hatherley is a British writer and journalist based in London who writes primarily on architecture, politics and culture.
Jacobin is an American socialist magazine based in New York. As of 2023, the magazine reported a paid print circulation of 75,000 and over 3 million monthly visitors.
Democratic socialism is a left-wing set of political philosophies that supports political democracy and some form of a socially owned economy, with a particular emphasis on economic democracy, workplace democracy, and workers' self-management within a market socialist, decentralised planned, or democratic centrally planned socialist economy. Democratic socialists argue that capitalism is inherently incompatible with the values of freedom, equality, and solidarity and that these ideals can only be achieved through the realisation of a socialist society. Although most democratic socialists seek a gradual transition to socialism, democratic socialism can support revolutionary or reformist politics to establish socialism. Democratic socialism was popularised by socialists who opposed the backsliding towards a one-party state in the Soviet Union and other nations during the 20th century.
State socialism is a political and economic ideology within the socialist movement that advocates state ownership of the means of production. This is intended either as a temporary measure, or as a characteristic of socialism in the transition from the capitalist to the socialist mode of production or to a communist society. State socialism was first theorised by Ferdinand Lassalle. It advocates a planned economy controlled by the state in which all industries and natural resources are state-owned.
Richard Seymour is a Northern Irish author, commentator and owner of the blog Lenin's Tomb. His books included The Meaning of David Cameron (2010), Unhitched (2013), Against Austerity (2014) and Corbyn: The Strange Rebirth of Radical Politics (2016). Seymour was born in Ballymena, Northern Ireland to a Protestant family, and currently lives in London. A former member of the Socialist Workers Party, he left the organisation in March 2013. He completed his PhD in sociology at the London School of Economics under the supervision of Paul Gilroy. His thesis, dated 2016, was titled Cold War anticommunism and the defence of white supremacy in the southern United States. In the past he has written for publications such as The Guardian and Jacobin.
Left Unity is a left-wing political party in the United Kingdom founded in 2013 when film director and social campaigner Ken Loach appealed for a new party to replace the Labour Party. More than 10,000 people supported Loach's appeal.
Costas Lapavitsas is a professor of economics at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London and was elected as a member of the Hellenic Parliament for the left-wing Syriza party in the January 2015 general election. He subsequently defected to the Popular Unity in August 2015.
Momentum is a British left-wing political organisation which has been described as a grassroots movement supportive of the Labour Party; since January 2017, all Momentum members must be members of the party. It was founded in 2015 by Jon Lansman, Adam Klug, Emma Rees and James Schneider after Jeremy Corbyn's successful campaign to become Labour Party leader and it was reported to have between 20,000 and 30,000 members in 2021.
Richard Leonard is a British politician who served as Leader of the Scottish Labour Party from 2017 to 2021. He has been a Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP), as one of the additional members for the Central Scotland region, since 2016. He ideologically identifies as a socialist, democrat and internationalist.
Millennial socialism is a resurgence of interest in democratic socialism and social democracy among Americans and Britons born between 1981 and 1996, generationally known as millennials.
The 2020 Labour Party leadership election was triggered after Jeremy Corbyn announced his intention to resign as the leader of the Labour Party following the party's defeat at the 2019 general election. It was won by Keir Starmer, who received 56.2 per cent of the vote on the first round. It was held alongside the 2020 Labour Party deputy leadership election, in which Angela Rayner was elected to succeed Tom Watson as deputy leader.
Aaron Bastani is a British writer. He co-founded the left-wing media organisation Novara Media in 2011, and has hosted and co-hosted many of its podcasts and videos. After a 2014 video for the publication, he popularised the term "fully automated luxury communism", which describes a post-capitalist society in which automation greatly reduces the amount of labour humans need to do. He wrote a book in 2019, Fully Automated Luxury Communism, about the subject. Bastani has also written for The Guardian, London Review of Books, openDemocracy and Vice, and is known for his Twitter activity.
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
