It’s hard to shake the feeling that we’ve lost control of the things that matter most in our lives. Our politics is fragmenting, our household finances are precarious and a new class of billionaire technocrats is consolidating its grip on power. In the face of such uncertainty, how can we – as citizens, parents, friends and neighbours – regain our autonomy and rebuild a brighter, fairer future? 

In Control, Claire Ainsley argues that addressing this profound loss of agency over the forces shaping our lives is the central challenge of our time. She identifies how the pressures of global capital, rapid technological ‘progress’ and weakened political autonomy have left governments struggling to deliver and citizens increasingly disenfranchised. In this gap between expectation and reality, voters’ trust is eroded, general anxiety spirals and populist narratives gain traction by exploiting society’s base fears.

Drawing on such diverse fields as psychology and political strategy, as well as her own experience of policymaking in Westminster, Ainsley proposes a new ‘philosophy of control’ to better equip us – as individuals and as a society – to take on the myriad challenges of our time. We can only break the political deadlock and navigate our collective malaise, Ainsley argues, by taking back control from all-powerful markets and hamstrung states, unlocking our individual freedoms in the process.

Robust in its analysis and hopeful in its proposals, Control offers a practical roadmap for rebuilding trust in democracy by putting people back in the driving seat of their own lives.

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Reviews

“Hugely ambitious and genuinely radical, Claire Ainsley asks the very biggest of questions about what’s gone wrong with our politics. If there is an important lesson from the Starmer era that the Burnham government needs to learn, here it is.”

Andrew Marr

“A fascinating and timely analysis of the sense of helplessness and crisis that broke politics – and of how voters and politicians can take back control.”

Rachel Sylvester, political editor, The Observer

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