Given that speculating on the outcome seems rather futile at this exact moment – especially as it is far too late to do anything about what may transpire – it is perhaps a fitting moment to return to the past, and the writings of Harold Wincott, the legendary IC editor that I briefly mentioned in this column last week. Because although he mostly wrote in the 1950s and 1960s, much of what the great man said resonates today. In his excellent discussion of Mr Wincott’s later life and work, former FT editor Geoffrey Owen describes him as a “defender of liberal capitalism”, and in that respect it is hardlysurprising that he believed in the power of the individual over the state to solve society’s problems, and in industrial policies of international openness rather than protectionism and restrictive practices – echoing the ideological fight at the core of current politics. Yet he was not an unbridled champion of capitalism, either, criticising among other things “stock options” that created a “privileged class among businessmen” and instead calling for “popular capitalism” on the basis that “the more we can give ordinary folk a stake in real wealth, the better it will be for all of us”.
Like Mr Wincott, we believe that broad participation in investment can only be a good thing – companies need funding to innovate, grow and create jobs, individuals that back their growth can enjoy more comfortable retirements, and widely owned companies are more likely, as Mr Wincott put it, to “give equal weight to the interests of those who own it, those who work for it... and the interests of the community at large”. And we, too, will continue to defend liberal capitalism by highlighting the excesses that can turn people away, unrestrained executive pay in particular – surely a catalyst for the divisive politics we are afflicted with right now – and industry structures that allow private investors to be exploited, among them the light-touch regulatory regime of Aim, which we discuss in this week’s cover feature on page 26.
You can read Mr Owen’s essay here: http://www.wincott.co.uk/lectures/Owenessay.pdf
