Michael Gove has been a leading figure in British Conservatism for more than three decades. As a journalist, government minister and now editor of the Spectator, he has helped shape the right even as it has moved further rightwards.
Gove's Record on Brexit and Austerity
In the latest episode of Radical Thinking, Gove joins Aditya Chakrabortty to discuss the future of the right, his record on Brexit and austerity, and the Spectator's position on Islam.
Suggested Reading and Further Analysis
Aditya's suggested reading includes Gove's essay in a 1998 collection called The Moderniser's Dilemma: Radical Politics in the Age of Blair, and The Demented Dalek by historian Richard J Evans in the London Review of Books.
For more on the British right, there is a column by Chakrabortty for the Guardian. Phil Burton-Cartledge's book The Party's Over: The Rise and Fall of the Conservatives from Thatcher to Sunak analyses why the most successful political party is now failing.
Geoffrey Wheatcroft's Bloody Panico!: or, Whatever Happened to The Tory Party offers an entertaining short narrative. A paper on the economics of the Cameron years is acute on how the Tories failed to move the UK away from being a country of renters towards a country of makers.
Another paper, based on data from the Bank of England, suggests Brexit may have cost the UK 8% of GDP. On the Spectator, Nesrine Malik's recent column in The Guardian asks why Britain's oldest political magazine has become such a rabid cheerleader for Islamophobia.
