24 May 2013updated 27 Sep 2015 3:57am

Progressive Capitalism by David Sainsbury: A new centre ground is being forged

This book is equally important for what it says and for who is saying it. A decade ago, this prospectus would have seen its author branded “Red Sainsbury”. Now it is sensible and mainstream.

By Andrew Adonis

Progressive Capitalism: How to Achieve Economic Growth, Liberty and Social Justice
David Sainsbury
Biteback, 256pp, £20

This book is equally important for what it says and for who is saying it. The argument that growth, liberty and social justice require a fundamental reform of capitalism is rapidly moving from the left to the mainstream; and nothing symbolises this more than that David Sainsbury, the epitome of the progressive mainstream since his days in the vanguard of David Owen’s SDP in the 1980s, should be making it.