The Office for Budget Responsibility and the Politics of Technocratic Economic Governance

A truly memorable and fantastically well researched contribution to a crucial literature that offers us profound insights into the politicisation, depoliticisation, repoliticisation and attempted re-depoliticisation of economic policy in the UK since the 1990s. Required reading for all students of contemporary British political economy and highly recommended. * Professor Colin Hay, Sciences Po, Paris * Why have economic policymakers been so enamoured with rules and targets since the late twentieth century and yet keep finding ways of getting around them? What are the political implications of the UK government's decades-long love affair with technocratic economic governance? Through his careful analysis of the history of the Office of Budget Responsibility, Clift's book brilliantly answers these and other important questions. He shows us how seemingly neutral technocratic economic forecasts are in fact dependent on a great number of contestable theories, and then demonstrates the profoundly political nature of their different assumptions. This book is a must-read for scholars, students, and engaged citizens who want to understand the pathologies and possibilities inherent in policymakers' efforts to forecast an increasingly uncertain economic future. * Professor Jacqueline Best, University of Ottawa * This is an outstanding book, a major work of scholarship on a neglected subject. Through its detailed study of the OBR it makes an important argument about the nature and limits of technocratic governance. The attempt by the Truss Government to sideline the OBR (with disastrous results) makes the analysis more relevant than ever. * Professor Andrew Gamble, University of Sheffield *