This report from the Heywood Fellowship traces the evolution of UK national strategy since 1850, identifying eight major historical “turning points” that reshaped state priorities and ideology – from Victorian laissez-faire through welfare statism, to neoliberalism and beyond.

Each era’s strategic worldview, purposes, and assumptions are analysed through how policymakers mobilised the nation’s “five capacities.” The paper argues that national strategy evolves through recurring cycles of continuity and disruption, reflecting responses to crises and societal change. It offers a historical framework for future strategy-making that learns from these ideological shifts to balance stability with adaptive renewal.