The Big Society: Ten Years On
| DOI | 10.1177/2041905819891369 |
| Published date | 01 December 2019 |
| Date | 01 December 2019 |
22 POLITICAL INSIGHT • DECEMBER 2019
On 10 November 2009,
David Cameron launched a
determined pitch to depict
a distinctive and coherent
future vision of society that would form
the bedrock of an incoming Conservative
government’s social policy agenda.
Speaking at the Hugo Young Memorial
Lecture in London, the then opposition
leader outlined his aspiration to create
‘the Big Society’. Cameron promised a
more dynamic Conservative social policy
agenda that would refresh the party’s
approach towards the role of the state, while
ostensibly rehabilitating the wider public
image of Conservatism in the process. In
what was widely viewed as a landmark
speech of his leadership, he oered the
prospect of a markedly new and potentially
bolder direction for the Conservative Party.
Yet the Big Society would later stutter
and come to symbolise what many of
Cameron’s critics saw as the fatal aws of
his premiership. Here was a political leader
drawn to new ideas and innovative rhetoric,
but whose engagement ultimately proved
supercial and lacking in terms of practical
delivery and substance. Ten years on, it is
The Big Society:
Ten Years On
David Cameron attempted to make a more caring, socially-conscious
Conservatism his flagship policy. But did the ‘Big Society’ ever really
come to pass? Ben Williams examines the evidence a decade on.
time to assess the overall legacy of the Big
Society agenda, and what, if anything, it
achieved in the subsequent decade.
Origins of the Big Society
The initial ‘Big Society’ speech formed
part of Cameron’s sustained, longer-
term strategy of seeking to change and
‘modernise’ the Conservative Party’s image
following his accession to the leadership
at the end of 2005. A central part of this
approach was to cultivate a more positive
public perception of the Tories. Branded
as the ‘nasty party’ by then Party Chairman
Theresa May back in 2002, Cameron and
his fellow modernisers were fully aware
of the Conservatives’ image problems.
They prioritised the need to instil a more
compassionate and paternalistic tone if the
© Press Association
Political Insight December 2019.indd 22 05/11/2019 10:15
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