Something is going on that can’t explained by Gordon Brown not being Tony Blair. Now as the cuts bite and Labour’s poll rating is inflated we can’t hide from the fact that Labour is in a mess. We have our own particular problems but something seismic and systematic is happening to social democracy.
In an essay in this week’s New Statesman we try to get to grip with the nature of the crisis of social democracy and suggest a way out. We call it new socialism. As the poor get poorer and the planet burns, as financialised capitalism proves itself incapable of anything other than greed and social destruction – the onus is on us to think long and hard about how we make people’s lives better.
And that is where we start. With a view that for the vast majority of people in Britain life was, is and will continue to be tough. Living in a world where markets are too free and the state is too remote defines a life that is anxious, insecure, and simply exhausting. Why? Because those markets and the state are out of our control. Social democracy, in whatever form, has to be about the broad mass of people exerting individual and especially collective control over their lives.
To get to such a point we have to begin with the crisis of social democracy which is rooted in long-terms trends; globalisation, the replacement of mass production by flexible specialisation, an atomising culture and the decline of working-class identities. Old Labour refused to face up to such challenges, New Labour embraced them too uncritically.
The challenge, then, is to align core values of equity, sustainability and democracy to this changed world so that it bends to us and not us to it, in a way that brings on board a majority of our nation. This demands the following:
• The promotion of a post-material politics to match our commitment to the redistribution of more resources to the least well off
• This ties in with the challenge of growth beyond planetary sustainability – instead of just money we have to redistribute other things we value, like time
• A critical engagement with capitalism to regulate it in the interests of people and not just profit – much of this needs to happen at a transnational level – think of a pan European minimum wage as one example
• The development of the democratic state to replace the failures of the market and bureaucratic state in which producers and citizens create and recreate more efficient and responsive services
• Finally, it demands a move beyond Labourism – the view that a singular party can deliver ‘socialism’ from above. Instead it’s the politics and practice of pluralism that will enable meaningful change to take place. Labour remains essential but so too are other parties, movements and groups to build a progressive consensus.
Early New Labour reflected much of this kind of approach. It was critical of free market excesses like the fat cat utility chiefs and taxed them accordingly. It talked of community and not just the bottom line. It looked out to the Liberal Democrats and commissioned Roy Jenkins to provide proportional alternatives to first past the post. Initiatives like the New Deal and sure start embodied forms of public engagement that weren’t statist and didn’t mimic the market.
Labour has proved itself capable of transformation. It must do so again. The cuts and the boost in the polls are in danger of allowing us to sleep walk to the next election. Instead, it’s time to think hard and long about who we are and how we make the paradigm shift towards the good society.