The Politics of Consumer Credit in the UK, 1938-1992

As early as the 1930s, Britain had a highly innovative and profitable mortgage sector that promoted a major extension in home ownership. These controversial and risky offerings had an equivalent in numerous hire purchase agreements, with which new homes were furnished. Such developments were forerunners of the 'easy credit' regime more commonly associated with the 1980s. Taking a long-term perspective on this issue indicates that Britain's departure from European models of consumer credit markets was not simply a by-product of neoliberalism's influence on the Thatcher administration, and this book offers a much fuller explanation to the phenomenon. It explores debates within and between the major political parties; reveals the infighting amongst civil service departments over management of consumer demand; charts the varying degrees of influence wielded by the Bank of England and finance capital, as opposed to that of consumer durable manufacturers; reviews the perspectives of consumers and their representatives; and explains the role of contingency and path dependency in these historical events. The central focus of this book is on consumer credit, but this subject provides a case study through which to explore numerous other important areas of British history. These include debates on the issues of post-war consensus, the impact of rising home ownership and its impact on consumer credit and personal finance markets, the management of consumer society, political responses to affluence, the development of consumer protection policy, and the influence of neoliberalism.

Stuart C. Aveyard is Senior Lecturer in British and Irish History and Politics in the Department of History and Politics at Queen's University Belfast. Stuart completed his doctorate at QUB, where he was also research fellow and lecturer in modern British history before holding an Irish Research Council Post-doctoral Fellowship at University College Dublin and a teaching fellowship at King's College London. His first book, No Solution: the Labour government and the Northern Ireland conflict 1974-79, was published with Manchester University Press in 2016. Paul Corthorn studied at the Universities of Cambridge and Durham. Before coming to Queen's in 2006, he held lectureships at Anglia Ruskin, Liverpool, and Oxford Universities. He is joint editor of the Labour History Review and an Associate of the Cold War Studies Programme at the London School of Economics. In 2009 he won a QUB 'Rising Stars' Teaching Award. In 2012 he was a By-Fellow at Churchill College, Cambridge. In 2015 he organised an international conference at Queen's on 'Socialism and the Cold War in Western Europe'. Sean O'Connell is Professor of Modern British and Irish Social History at Queen's University Belfast. His research interests have focused on consumer credit, working class communities, gender history, and oral history. His next monograph is a study of the history of joyriding. Sean is editor of Oral History amongst his administrative roles.