Lost Utopias: The Failure of Imagination in Welsh Politics and Fiction

Utopian rhetoric was prominent in Wales during the campaign for devolution. Similarly, in the years immediately following the referendum too, all parties in Wales emphasized the opportunity devolution represented to carve out a new Wales; a place where things would be done differently. In this chapter, he charts the gradual death of utopian thinking within Welsh politics, and how it has been inexorably replaced by a stale managerialism which emphasizes ‘there is no alternative’. Jamie Harris looks in particular at the environment sector in Wales and the gradual acceptance of nuclear power as a specific example of how expectations in Wales have been managed downwards. The chapter finishes by reflecting on the history of radical, utopian thought in Wales and how this might begin to flourish again in the future.