Introduction: The massive contradiction

Something we’ve had to get used to under neoliberalism, for example, in the UK, is that institutions we’ve long valued, supported and defended, like the NHS and BBC, have become contradictory and ambiguous. We fight for the licence fee and public broadcasting because we know that without the BBC, UK broadcasting will suffer and it will be a free-for-all of destructive market forces and empire-building media moguls like Rupert Murdoch. However, we also weep over BBC news shifting to the right and becoming the amplifier of the neoliberal press. It failed miserably over issues like the decades-long Jimmy Saville sex abuse scandal, became over-bureaucratised, kow-towing to government. The NHS remains a jewel in the crown for many, but it's been hollowed out by privatisation, its staff overloaded and bullying endemic.

These realities highlight the issue at the heart of this book – the working through of the struggle now taking place between our personal politics and the formal politics they routinely challenge. As we saw during the pandemic, UK health and care workers struggled unto death – in too many cases – to do their jobs to the best of their ability, while for-profit organisations milked anti-COVID-19 budgets for billions.