… and why not? After all, as we now live in a de facto one ideology state (and that ideology is populist utilitarianism), what difference do the antics of what goes on in Parliament really make? The sooner we have the government doing away with this fiction of political process and just start ruling mostly by administrative edict, the better really. Far too many people are just hiding behind comfortable fictions.
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Perry de Havilland wrtes:
” Far too many people are just hiding behind comfortable fictions.”
Hear! Hear! And the most pernicious of these is that “Dave” is suddeny going to leap, Superman-like, from No.10 Downing St, the morning after he is elected P.M. (which will not happen) revealing himself as a true Conservative.
He is not. He is a product of his ill-educated generation and ( pace Karl Marx) his class. Never having had to struggle, he is unaware of either its necessity for ‘ordinary people’, nor of its innate societal value.
In effect, as Mr. de Havilland says, we live in a one-ideology state. Which is, to all intents and purposes, a one-party state, as well.
Well said to GCooper.
1. Dave is not going to leap, with his stupid smile (remind you of anyone?) out of the telephone box as prime minister. He is not going to be elected. He is not what people want. He is a puff of vapour.
2. Yes, a product of his class. (Tony Blair has just revealed that he had one of those insightful flashes when he read Trotsky’s biography or speeches or something and it led him into politics. Like, he can read?) He’s a lefty product of all those lefties in his well-insulted family.
These are the Katherine Hepburn liberals – judgemental, rich, blessed with overweening confidence, born into families that could afford to be communist – especially in the guise of caring for the world. Dave comes from that world. Well-connected for centuries (I mean, how bloody awful! Why choose him?), rich, doesn’t understand normal people but feels their pain. And, needless to say, has a twerpy little “solution” involving taxpayers’ money.
“populist utilitarianism” nicely describes the moral nihilism at the heart of this form of politics. A useful term indeed.
Mind you, any politician who confesses that the reason he entered politics in the first place was because he read Trotsky’s biography probably deserves all the help he can get. Perhaps Daveyboy can be the one to drive the icepick home.
As pointed out in the “Cameron’s a Blairite” thread below, the lack of radical distinction between the policies of the major parties in a democratic system is the default state of affairs. This doesn’t mean it’s a one party or one ideology state, but it is simple democratic politics – you will not get power when you position yourself on the extremes.
EG
And as pointed out to you repeatedly by a number of people, then there is little point pretending the sham that elections really matter. You are also quite self-contradictory when on one hand you say there is little difference between the parties and then on the other that Britain is not a one ideology state. Your comments are rarely very cogent and this one is typical. At least it has the rare advantage of being mercifully brief for once.
The point at issue is that Cameron’s brand of Conservatism is a carbon-copy of Blairism, giving the electorate little choice in an election beyond choosing which person gets to be Prime Minister. Now, I am not suggesting that the Tories could or should embrace radical libertarianism in their manifesto, which would be electoral suicide. (I am in favour of incremental progress in a general direction, however slow). What I would like to see, however, is a party that does at least lean clearly in favour of smaller government, individual liberty, rolling back the regulatory monster of Brussels/Whitehall, etc. That is not what is happening. We are still being asked to take DC on trust.
I don’t expect mainstream political parties to offer wildly differing policies simply to differentiate themselves. But without some difference, large numbers of voters simply are disenfranchised. No wonder turnouts are falling.
It’s called the political consensus, and is a feature of all first-past-the-post democratic systems. The parties are fairly close together on each side of the consensus, with few fundamental differences but with many differences of emphasis on specific things. There is no contradiction in this.
Britain isn’t a one ideology state. It’s not a particularly ideological state at all, since most people don’t give a toss about ideology.
EG
What Alex said.
Modern British politics reminds me of an arrangement you saw in Soviet-controlled Eastern Europe; there’s the National Communist Party and the National Peasants Party, which put up candidates in all the elections, so how can you say we do not have democracy, comrade? The fact that the two parties have exactly the same policies just goes to show that the people are committed to communism!
A number of gullible people in the West were taken in by such claims. It never occurred to these fools that the political class is not quite the same thing as the people of the nation, and consensus in one does not require consensus in the other.
Britain isn’t a one ideology state. It’s not a particularly ideological state at all, since most people don’t give a toss about ideology.
EG, I actually agree with that statement. The vast majority of the UK population could not tell the difference between socialism and a bowl of cornflakes.
It is not difficult to start a political party in the UK, and there are hundreds of them. If you feel that the Conservatives do not offer a meaningful alternative to Labour, and you think you have such a meaningful alternative, then get out of your armchair and start a party to promote it.
Go here to find out the background information you need, and here to download the forms to register your party.
This is what UKIP did, on the basis of a feeling that the Tories were no longer “conservative” and that there was a market for a more differentiated rightist policy. It turns out that there is not – the risible perfomance of UKIP in the last general election shows that pretty clearly. Furthermore, the attempt of the Tories in the late 90s and early 00s to open up a clear ideological gap resulted only in failure.
It is utterly laughable and verging on paranoid conspiracy theory to posit that the electorate is somehow being denied a choice. If the main political parties don’t offer what you want, offer it yourself.
In the context of a libertarian alternative to the current political consensus, you’re wasting your time – libertarian solutions are electoral poison in the UK. Funnily enough, they don’t work in the US either, as the dismal performance of “America’s third largest party” demonstrates time and again.
It seems that the tragic truth is that people simply don’t want libertarianism. Dearie me, what to do?
EG
True, but I’m not sure that’s a bad thing. I am far from convinced that a politicised electorate is really in anyone’s interest.
EG
The notion that we are a one party state is laughable. There were at least 7 candidates on my last general election ballot paper.
Yes, those are small parties, but that’s not because the evil state is stopping them from growing. It’s because no-one wants to vote for them, because they are either tiny religious outfits, or nutters, or, if you are really unlucky, UKIP.
Right now, most people in Britain want a touchy feely non-threatening, slightly nannying government. They don’t want to deal with difficult things like rights and ideology, they want environmentalism and help for single mums and less teenage pregnancy and stuff. And because we are a democracy, that’s what we’ve got.
Now, it would be supa-dupa if someone tried convincing the electorate that actually, their society might be going to hell in a handcart if they persist in this rather soft approach to government. However, no-one seems to be doing that. A few people here are bitching, but no-one even vaguely close to liberal/laissez-faire ideology is making an effort, much less headway, in changing anyone’s minds.
So it’s no surprise that Cameron is flavour of the month.
Euan,
You seem to have swallowed the Grauniad’s line that the Tory party moved massively to the right in the late 90s / early 00s. They did not – Hague’s manifesto had virtually no identifiable policies other than opposition to joining the Euro, while Howard’s manifesto was virtually identical to Bliar’s.
A manifesto written by Davey-boy, by the way.
It is utterly laughable and verging on paranoid conspiracy theory to posit that the electorate is somehow being denied a choice. If the main political parties don’t offer what you want, offer it yourself.
I am not so deluded as to imagine that a radical libertarian party stands a prayer in an election any time soon so I won’t be canvassing at your front door, you’ll no doubt be glad to learn. That said, if politics does continue to be nothing more than a choice between centrist robots, one risk will be mounting political corruption and statisis, as key issues get overlooked because parties are more interested in their image and cushy jobs than in doing anything useful. We’ll end up with the sort of corrupt politics that marked much of post-war Italy, for example.
I am far from convinced that a politicised electorate is really in anyone’s interest.
Up to a point, I’ll agree. But apathy has its risks, too.
No I haven’t. Don’t overlook the ludicrous “dog whistle” of Howard’s campaign, and the undertones of Europhobia and withdrawal in Hague’s. The Tories didn’t exactly go so far right as to advocate unilaternal withdrawal from the EU, flogging everything owned by the state and deporting Johnny Foreigner, but they went far *enough* right in an attempt to open up ideological difference with Labour – and it was far enough right for the electorate to say no.
One of the major reasons for that was the perceived threat of UKIP, which clearly made the Tory strategists move in a markedly more Eurosceptic direction to neutralise it. As it turns out, the threat is insignificant, but it took until the 2005 election before UKIP was seen as a busted flush.
EG
I can see why you would think that, but I think you’re wrong.
And that’s why I think you’re wrong. The notorious corruption of Italian politics is more attributable to a high number of choices given under the system of proportional representation, not a lack of choice.
Governments need to govern, within whatever limits are set. This means they need to be able to act with authority, and that in turn means they need a minimum level of agreement within themselves. PR systems tend to result in excessive influence being wielded by tiny parties, because each individual MP’s vote becomes incredibly important. The endless wheeling and dealing to reach a suitable compromise is the cause of much of this corruption, and the failure of these deals over trivial concerns led to (IIRC) 45 general elections in 43 years and general paralysis.
By contrast, a FPTP system such as we have in Britain avoids most of that because the individual vote is less important. This enables the government to act decisively without having to bribe, buy or influence micro-parties. It avoids corruption, but the alternative promotes it. This is one of the reasons PR is less favoured these days than previously.
Having said that, although party politics will continue to be a choice between two generally centrist parties it should be remembered that the location of the centre is not static. Over the past generation, it has moved significantly rightwards.
EG
Britain has not always been as blandly consensual as E Gray claims. In the early 1950s there was a very striking choice between Labour, the party of nationalisation, trade unionism and dirigisme, and a Conservative Party which announced that it wished to ‘set the people free’.
There were higher turnouts by far then, when most constituencies had a straight fight, than today, with a gaggle of minor parties joining the fray. More choice has not expanded the market.
Once back in government, the Tories turned out to have been lying. Meanwhile Labour called a halt to its Clause 4 enthusiasm and ‘Butskellism’, a predecessor of ‘Blameronism’, took the stage and hogged the limelight. Voters began to turn in despair to the Liberals and Nationalists, or just turn off. Memberships of parties had been colossal just after the war– the Young Conservatives alone had 1m– but politics rapidly dwindled into a spectator sport.
Even in 1979 Mrs Thatcher won more on a promise of being less incompetent than on ideology: her first manifesto was very cautious. The starkest theoretical divide was in 1983 when she trounced Footie: it covered NATO and EC membership as well as domestic affairs.
For the past 25-odd years, the gap has been closing till it’s tighter than a gnat’s chuff, and the electorate has never been so bored and disgusted with their democratic rights. Who cares which bunch of bourgeois careerists fails to make things work?
Yes, and I *have* tried to explain all that.
What you tend to see is a period of relative stasis in the political consensus lasting about a generation or two, then a period of readjustment as the consensus shifts – quite often condemning one party to opposition for a couple of terms – then a further period of stasis. And so on.
Labour shifted the consensus markedly left in 1945, but then didn’t know what to do next. The Conservatives adjusted this a little back to the right, and remained in power until Labour repositioned itself around the new consensus, and so there was a period of relative stasis. Similarly, Thatcher moved the consensus markedly rightwards in the early 80s, and Labour was condemned to opposition for 18 years until it had figured out a rational response. Once it had that, it gained power and adjusted the consensus a little back to the left, resulting in the Tories being in opposition until they repositioned themselves around the new consensus.
On the basis of that, it’s quite likely that the Tories will win the next election and will embark on a policy that will not be radically different than Labour’s. Perhaps a couple of elections after that there will be another shift in the consensus.
EG
Over the past generation, it has moved significantly rightwards.
Leaving aside my problems with the language of “left” and “right”, let’s just assume that is correct (a lot of people will contest just how far the changes have gone, but let’s leave that aside). What moved the “centre” rightwards?. What caused it? If you reply that it was caused by a backlash against things such as the crap state of the UK economy, or whatever, you still have to recognise that actual flesh and blood human beings with ideas in their heads (crazed libbo ideologues like Milton Friedman and Keith Joseph) played a role in this.
Ideas matter, they have an effect. And that is much of what drives me nuts about David Cameron. He’s an idea-free zone, at least for now. Maybe he’ll prove me wrong. I hope so.
Johnathan has put it best: Cameron is an idea-free zone. Like Blair, he is all empty gestures to disguise an empty head. Giving his conference speech without notes or prompts … and the point was? I mean it. What was the bloody point? How did that qualify him to be the leader of a party – yet the dimwit MPs who voted for him were impressed by it. Stage actors can remember 90 minutes worth of dialogue plus stage directions and gestures, which is an essential for their work. But how does the ability to remember a 20 minute speech qualify one to lead a big political party? I was shocked when the momentum swung away from Mr Davis sheerly because Cameron gave a 20 minute speech without notes. A piece of totally empty showmanship which should have alerted everyone.
David Cameron just demonstrates that he is more akin to a stale ‘ideas sponge’, soaking up yesteryear’s vote-winning spillage from Mandelson, Blair and Campbell, than he is capable at any kind of originality.
The perfectly-arranged Notting Hill in-kitchen photoshoot conferences, with just the right number of carefully strewn children’s toys, Teresa May in just the right “early morning” tousled yet perfectly coiffed hair and selectively diminished wine rack repeatedly made me want to retch when I saw that one, as did exactly the same imagery conjured up by a rustic Blair making tea while being adoringly looked on by she-of-the-letterbox-mouth in 1994. I now seriously look at the concept of a Conservative party never returning to power on its own steam, especially in 2009, but rather winning due to eventual voter dissatisfaction with Labour – something that Cameron seems to be trying to court albeit completely in the wrong way. It would be far better for the Tories to finish off the implosion started post-1997 and then, like some Phoenix from the ashes of diseased rhetoric, emerge possibly as a more defined force capable of dealing with Blair or Brown on its own terms and not by using Labour’s own unwholesome tactics.
Then again I think I’m giving too much credit for the ability of this party ever to reorganise itself …
I was at a town meeting where the public and officials were discussing a new set of unneeded, non scientific regulations were about to be dumped on the public by a government regulatory agency. I asked a local official, where in the State’s constitution they could set up citizens, employee them as agents, and make them legislator, executive, judge, police all in one political entity. He said he didn’t know, but that the elected officials couldn’t handle all the laws, so they must be delegated. So I asked him that one set of laws must go through the democratic process, and another set of laws just come off someone’s’ desk. He said those weren’t laws, they were regulations. I replied I could have men with badges and guns at my head in either case.
It shows that he has the intellectual capacity and the self-confidence to address a crowd without having to read from a prepared (generally by someone else) script. This is actually quite a rare talent in the modern politician.
EG
It shows that he has the intellectual capacity and the self-confidence …
Come off it. I once addressed 300 Italians in their own tongue without notes or prompts at La Sapianza University. It’s called ‘front’. Showing off a bit. Hogging the limelight. It’s no ‘rare talent’. You just have to know what you’re talking about. Cameron spent 20 minutes talking about nothing during that performance. I reckon he could have gone on all night.
It is amongst contemporary politicians. Davis doesn’t have it, for a start.
EG
Well that puts me in my place. It must be a ‘rare talent’ among politicians because David Davis is no Cicero. Game, set and match to you.
Now, now. Davis is a poor public speaker and appears hesitant & lacking in confidence. Cameron, by contrast, appears self-confident and at ease, quite happy to address the multitude unscripted – not many contemporary British politicians are like that. I gave the example of Davis since the two competed for the leadership and the contrast in style was striking, but there are numerous others.
How many Ciceros can you find in our current crop of plebeian tribunes?
EG
Most people are happy with the political status quo? I’m personally tired of the same three chords ad nauseam.
The identical Euan Blairther nonsense about the consensus was spouted in the 70’s till Thatcher smashed it to pieces.It only takes one person to say the emperor is sartorially challenged and the political landscape could be radically transformed.
It talking ad lib without notes is the sine qua non of political achievement then Euan would admire Hitler.Camoron is a sociopath – they are very good with people.(Chameleonic,shape shifting reptile…)
I hear that some Labour M.P.s are going to try and use the Education bill to get rid of selection at existing schools (not just any new taxpayer financed school that is created).
Some libertarians will think “great, another nail in the coffin of government education and a boast for private education”.
Whilst I am no fan of state education (the fact that my brain is not wired up correctly is not the only reason I have a rather dim idea about such matters as spelling – indeed if it had not been for an old lady in a village near me I doubt I would have learned to read) this would not be my view.
The late Murry Rothbard said there were two types of libertarian and they could be seen to differ by the way they reacted to things.
When some libertarians saw drunks shouting and urinating in a public library they might smile and think “the state is in decline”.
But when other libertarians saw the same scene they looked grim and thought “this is a fine library being destroyed”.
I know that the Grammar schools of Kent and other places only became state schools after the 1944 Act – and perhaps it is inevitable that they will decay under state control.
However, they are still good schools now – and I would be sad to see them go.
I believe that the most famous Grammar school of them all still exists in Birmingham – the school of Tolkien, Powell, and Denis Hills (you may not have heard of the last name – get his autobiography if you can).
As for Mr Cameron and co.
Well as they have already rejected the idea of Grammar schools they can only offer a half hearted defence.
To do otherwise would be to “live in the past”, which “the people do not want”.
As Euan Gray might put it.
Pete_London, I’m not sure what the argument is because I don’t read Euan Gray’s tedious posts so I may be missing 50% of the argument, although I doubt it. But I agree with you about Cameron’s 20 minutes of vacuity. No new ideas, just the flash of speaking without notes. As he had nothing to say, why would he have needed notes?
A showroom car salesman can speak for 20 minutes without notes.
Stage actors not only learn their own lines for a 90 minute play, but they have to know everyone else’s lines, too; plus they have to learn their places. their stage directions and they have to remember their gestures and grimaces. I never cease to think this is remarkable. And they do it all as though this is the first time. My hat is off to them.
I wouldn’t want to be governed by them, despite their memories having a far greater capacity than Dave’s – but at least they’re giving a return for their box office money.
Dunno if the analogy is any way useful, but the “settling” to populist utilitarianism that has occurred in all states of the West in the last century seems very like a damped oscillation in physics / engineering. Huge perturbations in the system (World Wars, Russian and Chinese revolutions, 1989) cause oscillations that lessen as time passes to a stable stasis. What this indicates is that without changes in the characteristics of the system, we’re always going to finish up back at PU, no matter what happens or how violent the perturbations. Depressing.
To change the final condition you must change the characteristics of the system. Otherwise it’s Blair-Cameron stasis all the way down, no matter what you do, advocate or achieve.
Verity
I used to give his posts a miss too and slipped out of the habit. I’ll have to slip back into it. While I enjoy a debate as much as anyone (even with socialists) what puts me off are the tedious, circular arguments which go nowhere and his habit of shifting his line a touch when he’s found out. Arguing with a brick wall is more productive.
In short, Euan’s line is that Cameron’s famous 20 minutes of nothingness show he has ‘intellectual capacity’ and ‘self-confidence’. As you say, for the former, actors do it bigger and better. For the latter, Cameron’s family is wealthy and he went to Eton. Crikey, a wealthy Etonion, who’d have thought he’d have self-confidence?
Sadly Mr Blair does not mean “stasis” (at least as I understand the term), he and the government he heads means more taxes, more spending and more regulations.
Regulations that not only violate “economic freedom”, but also “civil liberties” (the distinction beteen the two, popularised by John Stuart Mill, is false in any case – civil activity is civil activty, whether it is organising a talk on philosophy or selling bread).
Sadly Mr Cameron does not really oppose this trend to ever greater statism.
This is not “self confidence”, it is the belief that the population will not accept any resistance to such “modernism” (although the many of the policies of today are similar to those of Louis XIV or some of the Roman Emperors – so I do not see why they should be called “modern”).
Mr Cameron and his friends seem to have given up on Britain.
I can see the arguements as to why it is sensible to give up (Britain does look like a hopeless case) – but to see them give up still upsets me.
Do not pretend that the trends in British society are lovely (to try and flatter the voters) – try and appeal to what the voters know, deep down, to be true (that the country is in a mess and the mess is getting worse – and that this mess must be fought).
It may well be that victory is not possible and that this country is in for grim times.
But then one should not pretend that all is well – in the hopes of getting the prestige of being “Prime Minister”.
Or tell a series of obvious lies (“public services will be made better for all” and so on) which would give one no mandate if one was elected to office.
One should either opt out of politics, or tell the truth (or at least some of it) and fight against the decay of the nation.
The latter course might not bring victory – but “it is better to have fought and lost than not to have fought at all”.
Paul Marks:
If you’re referring to my post, you misunderstand me. Sure, NuLab will continue to increase the reach of the state at every opportunity. My point is that Cameron’s men will not be a lot different, if they want to get elected. Bribe-’em-with-their-own-money politics works like all Hell. It’s the only game in town anywhere in the West. What I mean by stasis is that we get about the same type of government, no matter how we vote. And as time goes by, without big external perturbations, the parties become more and more indistinguishable – compare Thatcher vs. Foot a generation ago to Clone vs Clone today. This is observable just about everywhere today.
And that’s the way it is. Nothing you can do from within the system will change it.
I apologize to Thon Brocket for misunderstanding him.
Thon & Paul,
Have you read The Fourth Turning(Link)?
Thon, the book discusses much more complicated oscillations than a pendulum. Rather, four progressing phases that each is only derived from the previous one.
Paul, if you’ve read it, I’d be interested to know if you think there is any merit to his theory, historically.
The length and depth of each phase seems to vary a lot but it is a dynamic system.
To sum it up simply I believe he says no generation repeats the mistakes of their parents. Instead they repeat the mistakes of their great grandparents. Alternate phases resemble each other but four is the full cycle.
The copyright is 1997 but it seems to be predicting things quite well.
I just wrote a reply to Midweserner – but it did not turn up on the screen (“server error”).
Rather than write everything again I will just say that no I had not read the book – but I do have some thoughts on the matter.
If he wishes to know them he can contact me.