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Introduction
David Cameron's leadership of the Conservative Party has been marked by pronounced political turbulence. Elected on a 'modernising' platform in 2005, his tenure as Leader of the Opposition witnessed both the removal of Tony Blair as prime minister and major fluctuations in the poll performances of both major political parties. Relatedly, the early hopes that Cameron might be able to win office in times of continued national prosperity were dashed by the economic crises of 2008 and consequent recession. Cameron eventually became prime minister in May 2010 only after the Conservatives agreed to enter a coalition Government with the Liberal Democrats, having failed to win an overall majority in the General Election. Nonetheless, during the last 5 years Cameron has attempted to transform the image of the Conservative Party through a series of political and ideological manoeuvres. This article focuses on Cameron's efforts to ideologically re-position the party. In the growing literature on the contemporary Conservative Party a number of pieces have analysed change under Cameron through comparisons with Thatcherite, 'One nation' and other historical stands of Conservative thought (for example, Denham, 2007; O'Hara, 2007; Bale, 2008; Beech, 2009). In contrast, this article focuses on comparing the discourse and ideology of Cameron's Conservatives to that of new Labour, in particular 'third way' ideas. In addition, it examines how far the Conservatives' current ideological stances may be underpinned by a set of contemporary 'triangulating' political philosophies.
New Labour's Third Way
For many years New Labour and Tony Blair would define their approach as 'third way'. The third way was presented as a set of ideas which transcended traditional ideological positions and, indeed, the Left-Right political divide. In the early years of his premiership, Tony Blair argued that third way ideas were ahead of their time, suggesting that in the long term politics would be fought upon the ground staked out in his third way approach. More recently, Blair argued that what he called rampant political and ideological 'cross-dressing' is likely to become a permanent feature of British politics (Blair, 2006). Over time the third way became largely associated with Tony Blair's early years in office. Nonetheless, a number of commentators have commented on the relative coherence and consistency in the discourses employed by New Labour...