I have suggested that it is time for those who oppose the hard and far right of politics to drop their petty battles in order to save society as we know it. I am under no illusions as to the implausibility of my suggestion: the comments that were offered by some yesterday show that there are those who would still prefer to argue about the purity of their version of a vision that has no chance of forming the back bone of an elected administration than face the reality of looming far right rule. But I will persist. That is the way change happens.
And let me be clear, the one thing I am not doing is calling for the perpetuation of the status quo. There is absolutely no prospect of electoral success on that basis, in my opinion. Although many politicians are unwilling to accept the fact, many people do realise that the economic order that existed from 1980 to 2008 has failed. They may not have done so in 2008 but the bizarre consequence of George Osborne's austerity programme has been to put the final nails in its coffin. Pragmatically that has been because the policy did not work. But there is more to it than that: I think people realise that austerity was prescribed as an article of faith and that if the economic system really worked as those proposing austerity thought then we would be well and truly out of the doldrums by now, but we are not. So people are not just facing a pragmatic disenchantment with the policy; they are also realising that the economic thinking that underpins it does not explain the way the world works.
The political consequence of that perception is significant. The Hard and Far Right policies now on offer appear to be a rejection of much of the economics that both got us into the mess of 2008 as well as the failed policies to resolve it. At their core those policies say people should sink or swim, and are indifferent to the consequences. They may ill formed, inconsistent and callous but they are at present the only consistent policy of rejection of neoliberalism on offer barring that provided by Greens, with which few will be familiar. Labour, LibDems, the Tory left and the Scots Nationalists do to large degree still offer largely similar economic prescriptions based on balanced budgets, myopic obsession with government cash flows, an inability to understand the way the real economy works and variation based only on supposed willingness to borrow to fund investment. As I have recounted here many times, these options nay fit the Overton Window but they come nowhere near meeting the needs of society. And they never will because they are based on two wholly false assumptions.
The first of these false assumptions is that the government is like a household and consequently plays a part like that of any other participant in the economy. This is just wrong. The government is wholly unlike any other participant in the economy. It makes the rules by which the game is played. It creates the money that underpins all transactions. Its debt is not now and has not ever been a problem since it was created in the seventeenth century. Instead its promise to pay that the debt in question represents underpins much of the security of the pensions and banking systems, which would effectively cease to function if that debt was repaid, all of which makes it debt unlike any other. And the government can, of course, unlike the rest of us write laws to back up its own claims to be paid. All if which means that the first pillar on which the new political consensus must be built is that the role of the government in the economy is essential, pivotal and absolutely unavoidable. But that has not been said by politicians and so the alternative - that it is right to let people sink or swim - has flourished in the vacuum that has been created.
The second false assumption is that politics does not matter. This is the basis for the anti-expert narrative. The foundation for that is in the attitude that I called that of cowardly politicians. That politics, of which we saw for two decades, said that whatever the problem was the market could solve it. The best solution according to cowardly politicians was, then, to walk away and let the market do its best. Any intervention, whether by a politician, or a civil servant, or any expert they engaged, would only make things worse. The market knew best and experts, expertise, opinion and argument on what best to do had to be avoided. This, of course, is wrong. Markets can be phenomenally useful and I am entirely in favour of their existence, but markets cannot and do not price a great many factors into their considerations. Bluntly, they fail to consider any issue that cannot readily be priced, and a great deal of what is important in life, both now and in the future, falls into that category. So markets cannot do the job cowardly politicians have tried to give to them. But the consequence has been that politics and experts have been said to cease to matter. And that is wrong.
Put these two assumptions together and you have the prevailing narrative that government and politicians have to get out of people's way, only markets matter, and that unfettered competition should prevail, with power rather than need being the principle determinant of social outcomes. And that is the challenge we face. We either have to say government matters again, and explain why, intervention driven by expert judgement makes the world a better place in ways that markets alone cannot achieve, or we give up the argument with the Hard and Far Right who reject these ideas altogether.
Don't doubt though how hard this will be for many politicians. Far too many of them believe that these assumptions are true. They find it almost impossible to think that the state really matters; that it can and should act, and its doing so will be for the public good. Very few of them understand economics as it really is. And it is definitely a minority that truly realise they have to form judgments on issues. And that has to change if society as we known it is to survive.
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A very good summary Richard, thanks for setting that out. The only point I would like to make is that the present crop of politicians don’t give a damn about what the population of the country suffers under their watch, they are only in it for personal advancement. They are captured by corporate interests it seems from the word go.
Sorry to sound so cynical but I see no way out of this quandary when experience shows us – such as campaigning against the Iraq war – led to the disaster foretold by anyone with half a brain.
I wish I knew what would change things and a post by George Monbiot in today’s Guardian shows how false citizen groups for example funded by vested interests swamp anything a band of volunteers can do…unfortunately.
But George keeps going nonetheless and so will I
Hear hear
A great piece – I can see where you are coming from Richard. But can you see UKIP and Labour workng together given the new leader’s intention of taking away the Labour vote?
The most likely new way forward is for the real caring compasionate Tories to work with say elements of the PLP and even the Corbynistas (minus the Shadow Chancellor please as he has shot his bolt as far as I am concerned).
Or for the PLP or the Corbynistas to work with the Greens.
But politics has become dominated by issues now in my view – not policy or vision even (yes I know – a most overated concept).
Politics has been hijacked really by businessmen – especially since the Thatcher government – who have worked from the inside to hollow out democracy and the role of the State and they continue to want to reduce the State to a husk. In doing so, they have over-simplified issues like markets actors tend to do and will come unstuck. Their luck will run out but at what cost to oridary people?
The worst part of the buisiness type thinking though is the acceptance and predeliction for having to destroy what exists now to create something better – the ‘creative destruction’ hypothesis. Whilst this in some ways seems sensible and even rational, the human cost is unacceptable – something to which the modern (ex-business) politicans seem inured to.
I can’t see UKIP and Labour working together
I would not want Labour to work with UKIP
They are the Hard Right
Labour just need to play on the new leader’s views on NHS and other policies which they are deluded into thinking will be really popular and UKIP could become irrelevant now that Brexit has been achieved. The immigration problem (and it IS a problem for traditional Labour voters) should now be allowed to fade away. But will they do it?
I’d endorse this, but it shouldn’t be underestimated how far most of our politicians on the supposedly progressive side of politics are from this. You could probably count on the Greens, but for the rest haven’t they spent the last few years defining themselves against this sort of approach? There will be a lot of persuasion to do.
My guess is many of those who have supported Corbyn would probably endorse much of this too. But you’ve been saying recently how McDonnell is sounding more and more like Ed Balls, so even there there’s a unwillingness to challenge the first assumption.
Meanwhile Tim Farron and the Blairite right in Labour have been defining themselves precisely against the kind of thinking that Corbyn and McDonnell have been thought to represent (without it must be said being able to outline much or an alternative beyond more of the same.
There are arguments here that have to be won.
Very incisive piece – for me particularly apposite “with power rather than need being the principle determinant of social outcomes.” Which neatly sums up the dictatorship we now have.
You can see why the idea of ‘taking back control’ would be appealing.
If only we had.
Indeed
If only we had
Richard
Listen and take note…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4WGQvraZdXg
Nick
….and remember no one person holds the monopoly on reality.
You are taking David Icke seriously?
Really?
Why not – I’ll listen almost anyone. That doesn’t mean I believe everything he or she says….with regard to David Icke some sensible stuff can be distilled from his more outlandish propositions. He was ahead of the curve in certain areas.
Don’t just batter the Hard Right.. the Hard Left are just as bad!!
I have never denied it
Where lines are drawn is an issue though