TEN FOR THE FUTURE

THROUGHOUT its history, Britain has always managed to find the rare men of courage and invention to carry it through crises of war and peace. Today's happy few are not united by politics, class or a common ideology, but share independence of mind, impatience with worn-out formulas, and a dedicated eagerness to shape the future. Some of the pacemakers:

Educator John Vaizey, 33, spent nearly a dozen years in hospitals with osteomyelitis, but managed to reach Cambridge via a scholarship. Currently an economics don at Oxford, he has written five trail-blazing books on education. Vaizey eloquently advocates reform of an educational system that he says "is a reflection of the substantial inequalities of the English class system."

Industrialist Frank Kearton, 51, managing director of Courtaulds, Ltd., has boosted profits 25% in the last six months. Balding, bespectacled Kearton took a First in natural science at Oxford, flies 100,000 miles annually on Courtaulds business (which includes building four textile plants in Russia), and everywhere plugs his credo: "Make fiber cheaper than anyone else in the world, and don't market it until you can. Then you damned well get up, get out and sell, sell, sell."

Playwright Robert Bolt, 38, has scored on the stage with his prizewinning A Man for All Seasons and on film with his script for Lawrence of Arabia. The son of a small furniture-shop owner, Bolt followed the scholarship route to university, cleaned latrines for the R.A.F., and was a totally unhappy schoolteacher before turning to writing. By any definition a concerned man, Bolt has been jailed for his ban-the-bomb convictions and argues, "Much ink, perhaps some blood, will flow before we arrive at a genuinely modern and credible vision of what a human person is. But I think any artist not in some way engaged upon that task might as well pack up and go home."

Scientist Francis Crick, 46, one of four Britons who last December received Nobel prizes for their contributions to medicine and chemistry. Dr. Crick, together with British Colleague Dr. Maurice Wilkins and U.S. Biologist Dr. James Watson, successfully postulated the infinitely complex molecular structure of DNA, which carries the determining genetic code from generation to generation. Tall, worldly and vaguely Edwardian, Crick is an avowed atheist who once resigned a Cambridge fellowship when his college announced plans to build a chapel. (''Why should I support the propagation of an error?") He is a brilliant, nonstop talker, was trained as a crystallographer before switching to biology. Crick's Who's Who biography lists his recreation as: "Conversation, especially with pretty women."

Industrialist Sir Leon Bagrit, 60, believes that automation "is a matter of life and death to this country. It is to the second industrial revolution what the harnessing of power was to the first. Because we were the first in adopting new techniques 150 years ago, we have benefited ever since." Born of Russian-Jewish parents in Kiev, Sir Leon studied at London University, formed his own company in 1935, and since the war has headed the revamped firm of Elliott-Automation Ltd., which, outside the U.S., is the largest computer manufacturer in the world.

Politician Anthony Crosland, 44, a philosophical socialist who never lets himself be led by party doctrine. An Oxford man and ex-paratrooper, Crosland affects a languid, academic aloofness that enrages the militant left almost as much as his cheerful argument that socialism has no magic technique for speeding up economic growth, and in his equally candid concession that dynamic capitalist nations do not do too badly.

Educator Richard Hoggart, 44, a slum orphan from Leeds who became professor of English at Birmingham University and spent five years on his magnum opus, The Uses of Literacy, an influential study of the newspapers, magazines and popular entertainment, and their effect on the nation's culture. Hoggart radiates a deep optimism because he believes that "old habit patterns are breaking down. Many people are trying to find a new identity. From it all might come one day a fusion of the upper-class sense of service with the working-class sense of clan solidarity and friendship. Then you'd really have something fine."

Broadcaster Hugh Carleton Greene, 52, director-general of the BBC, which was long a symbol of all that was sedate, prudish and tradition-centered in British life. Under Greene, the younger brother of Novelist Graham Greene, "Auntie" has become fresher, brighter, more vigorous and broadminded. Its TV dramas are frank in theme and outspoken in language, and its satiric program, That Was the Week That Was, pokes fun at men and institutions in a way that is probably unique in world television. Greene freely credits commercial TV with having been the spur: "It's forced us to be more professional, and I think that now we're more professional than the competition."

Politician Sir Gerald Nabarro, 48, a Tory M.P. who came up the hard way from a London slum, ran away to sea at 14, and moved from laborer in a sawmill to factory manager and. ultimately, managing director of various lumber and engineering companies. In Parliament, Nabarro's deep, rolling voice never hesitates to puncture pride or pomposity. Nabarro couldn't care less about Britain's bluebloods and oldtime Tory aristocrats. "The policy of 'hiccuping,' or Treasury dyspepsia, is disastrous to production," he charged recently. "Boost home demand if you want to boost exports at competitive prices. Tackle vigorously the dreadful burden of taxation to give incentives at every level in order to produce and to sell more abroad."

Novelist Colin Maclnnes, 48, writes with superb knowledge and insight about Britain's teen-agers (Absolute Beginners) and coloreds (City of Spades), as well as on jazz, art and architecture. According to Maclnnes, "Class structures are getting all shaken up. Monarchy no longer caps the structure, and people aren't sure what class they're in any more. Our loss of power depresses other people, not me. We've been trying to figure out what we are if we're not a great power, and it's clear that we've got to pull up our socks. It should be an interesting time."

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