ABSTRACT
The great economic crisis that struck in 2008 has called into question important elements of the model of economic growth of the preceding decades. Notable among these is the idea of economic policy. While the economic policy process is always subject to a complex set of conditions, in the years prior to the crisis one condition imposed itself over the others: the formidable external restriction imposed by ever more voluminous and internationalised capital markets. After 2008, the decisions made by democratic governments opened the way towards defining more autonomous policies. Soon, however, contradictions and back-pedalling occurred, which thwarted those initial steps from progressing towards a new model of policy-making. All of this is examined in the first two sections of this chapter. In the third section, we go further, attempting to analyse what the consequences of the crisis might be on the nature of policy in the long term.
