Its goal is to promote coherent and practical policies based on its founding principles of: free markets, "small state," low tax, national independence, self determination and responsibility.

It was co-founded by Sir Keith Joseph, Alfred Sherman and Margaret Thatcher[2] in 1974 to challenge the post war consensus of Keynesianism, and to champion economic liberalism in Britain.

[3][4] The centre has since played a global role in the dissemination of free market economics alongside policy proposals claimed to be on the basis of responsibility and individual choice.

[7] Keith Joseph's keynote speeches, also published by the CPS, aimed to lead the way in changing the climate of opinion in Britain and set the intellectual foundations for the privatisation reforms of the 1980s.

The CPS continually advocated a liberal economic approach and was hugely influential during Margaret Thatcher's administration, operating as a key driving force towards her hallmark policies of privatisation, deregulation and monetarism[8] In her own words, its job was to 'expose the follies and self-defeating consequences of government intervention....'to think the unthinkable'.

Another key publication was The Performance of the Privatised Industries (1996) – a four volume statistical analysis which showed how the privatization agenda had benefitted the consumer by ushering in lower prices and higher quality service.

[15] The report sought to identify the politicians, institutions and commentators who the authors felt had tried to take Britain into the European single currency and claims to expose attacks carried out by the Euro supporters.

Oborne particularly identifies William Hague, Iain Duncan Smith and Lord Owen as three voices of opposition to early Euro entry that suffered personal attacks from these sources.

[16] Dominic Raab MP's November 2011 paper Escaping the Strait Jacket called for the number one economic and social priority for the Coalition beyond deficit reduction to be to encourage job creation.

George Trefgarne's 'Metroboom: lessons from Britain's recovery in the 1930s' sought to revise the perception of the decade as universally destitute, a view attributed to Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls.