The FT's youthful, and unashamedly Tory, political commentator Sebastian Payne has a piece in that paper today in which he suggests that the Labour Party conference had little of substance to offer but was, instead, all about the cult of Jeremy Corbyn.
Let me get the obvious statement over and done with. Of course there is a Jeremy Corbyn cult. And I know the man well enough (not well, but well enough) to suspect he may be rather embarrassed by that fact. That would not be surprising. After years in the political wilderness this has, I am sure, not only taken some getting used to but was quite clearly not what he sought. That, if anything, probably only adds to its appeal to those in Labour who want to exploit it for advantage. Let me also note that if they do so it would hardly be surprising. May, after all, thought she could play the same card until it spectacularly backfired.
It's worth drawing out that comparison, briefly, because it is telling. May thought she could run a general election on the basis of her believed appeal to the exclusion of others. It failed. The others did not feel indebted to her. The appeal of her as an individual did not survive scrutiny. That was because there was found to be no substance to back up the claimed personality.
In contrast Corbyn does now have the loyalty of the majority in his party, and even if they are surprised by it they realise that their future prospects are largely dependent upon him. But he's also quite specifically not excluding them: indeed, he's conciously highlighting their contributions. Corbyn may have a following but he is highlighting the strength that brings.
More importantly, there is substance to Corbyn and those following him. I strongly suspect that this is what worries Payne and many like him. The fact is that what is really behind the cult of Corbyn is a belief that he represents something different. For the first time a whole body of people believe that there is a way of saying that not only is neoliberalism a failed economic philosophy, both in principle and practice, but that there is a popular political leader who is willing to say that who has a chance of being elected on the back of it. It is this that is the real substance to the cult of Corbyn, and is what makes it so different from the belief in May that so extraordinarily vapourised when put to the test.
Of course this scares the right: Thatcher may be put into reverse.
But that too is the risk to Corbyn and those around him. A vast number of people have been signed up to Labour. Let's not beat around the bush: democrats on all sides of the spectrum should be applauding that fact. Politics is cool again. But most of those signed up now were not around in the sixties, seventies and eighties. And, unlike The Rolling Stones, Corbyn cannot play a back list to deliver Satisfaction.
The world has moved on. Corbyn deserves his popularity. He's done something extraordinary. And he's right to call out neoliberalism. But he has to do more than offer to buy out PFI, renationalise railways, deliver rent controls and build more social housing to deliver the alternative.
Neoliberalism is a simple cult. All it really says is that competition is the only way to efficiently allocate resources in society and that to achieve this the state must keep its nose out of almost everything so that market mechanisms have the best chance of being effective by ensuring that the tax take is kept to a minimum, maximising the impact of personal spending preferences as a result. There is nothing more to the philosophy than that, although of course there are many unspoken themes behind that statement. That's why it is so easy for its proponents to be so effective: the message is easy to deliver, however wrong it may be in theory, evidential support and consequence.
Corbyn's challenge is to now build on the following he has created and the intellectual opposition that underpins it to build an alternative to neoliberalism that is as deliverable. I have a suggestion. Corbyn has to offer a vision of a world in partnership, where the state and private sectors and individuals and organisations, all work together to best effect to ensure that the most appropriate person or organisation delivers what people need with regulation making sure that all honour the obligations to which they commit, whilst in those areas where there is either a natural monopoly or where need and not income dictate demand then the collective power of society at large, operating through the the medium of government, will ensure that the best possible services that can be supplied with the resources that are available are on offer to all who need them.
Is that quite as succinct? No, it isn't. But it has the benefit of being plausible, and is evidentially appropriate.
Is that socialism as some knew it? No, it isn't. It quite specifically embraces a properly regulated private sector where private ownership of business continues to be acceptable.
Is that green? Yes, I think so. The reference to available resources is meant to suggest that.
Is that sufficient to both guide and explain policy? I believe so. Just try it against most of the promises made this week and they fit.
And might it be explained on the doorstep? I'd have thought so.
I'm not saying that I have got the wording perfectly right. As usual, this is being written before breakfast. But I'd suggest it's a basis for discussion. Because something like this moves Corbyn beyond the allegation of cult and retro-fitted 80s style politics into a turbo-charged force for change.
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I don’t think that Corbyn is a cult. He gets challenged all of the time. In that case he is the most besieged cult I have ever seen.
If Corbyn is a cult then so are you. And you are not. Mind you there maybe some who do treat you like a cult. I certainly don’t always agree with you (and you with me). But your vision of a courageous state certainly deserves to be tried. That does not make you a cult in my view and Labour’s ideas are also the same – new ideas that should be tried because the ideas that currently hold sway have been found not to work. This is the story of human advancement after all.
In fact – as you suggest at the end of your piece – let us get rid of the idea that there is a ‘Corbyn cult’ shall we? It’s an idea that comes from the naïve and entrenched, reductionist opposition. So why give it credence by using it?
All I see in Corbyn is someone who sums up the frustrations and the disappointments of Labour party members about the Blair era. This was an era that involved Labour being more ‘market friendly’ and trying to take on board swing voters as well as going a long with a rampant right wing American government. It tried to be all things to all people and ended up alienating those who went onto UKIP etc., and failed to regulate capitalism properly. It wanted your support but was always listening to more powerful voices.
The alternative provided by Corbyn does not make Corbyn a cult. Rather I put it to you that this makes him something I have always believed about you in part: It makes him a Leader. Not a cult.
Yes I know that you will poo-poo my comment because as you will rightly point out you are not a politician. But you have fulfilled (and continue to fulfil consciously or unconsciously) the role of a leader in putting forth alternative visions about making things better – fairer. That’s what leaders do. Fix a point where we need to be and devise ways of achieving it.
Corbyn seems to be doing that.
But also time has played a big part in all this. It is time that has been the revelator concerning neo-liberalism /Thatcherism. It has also justified Marx’s concerns. I hope Corbyn and his party use this time well.
I agree with that last sentiment
I express some reservations about some of the rest….
The biggest danger with the Corbyn cult is that Corbyn himself begins to believe the shifting media hype.
Well before they left office both Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair were IMO barking mad. There was a parallel story outside the political sphere of the destruction of Michael Jackson. I’ve been reading a collection of great military disasters and there are common threads.
Americans who voted for Donald Trump are going to be very disappointed when they discover that it is not only his feet they are made of clay. Omniscience and omnipotence (megalomania and invincibility) are qualities of the gods.
The ancient Romans knew about the relationship of Hubris and Nemesis and employed someone to whisper in the ear of great men to remind them of their mortality. We have lost the tradition of the court fool in close proximity and he is now banished to HIGNFY where he can be safely ignored. Same function, but homeopathically diluted.
Media pundits will continue to taunt Corbyn on his inability to win the argument on scrapping Trident even in ‘his own party’. They believe that they have scored a point, and unearthed a bit of hypocrisy without realising that The Labour Party is not ‘his’ party. It is the party he belongs to and it has a collective will, which it seems to be rediscovering. And as long as he remembers that he has the makings of a great leader.
Adoring fans, I hope, will look elsewhere for a deity or be disappointed.
I hope he will get the message that the SNP is not a natural foe. Picking a destructive fight with an ally, thus creating an unnecessary second front, is the height of folly. No party has a monopoly on progressive politics and there are more than a few neoliberals lurking on his back benches.
Where is the left intellectual/philosopher or even just someone with a coherent vision to write a new “Future of Socialism” and challenge Hayek, Friedman and the rest (or even May who even now is about speak in praise of the wonders wrought by the current orthodoxy) and who, unlike Corbyn, can be self-consistent?
Sometimes other people can capture your own thoughts better than you can express them yourself. Thank you, Pilgrim Slight Return, for encapsulating my thoughts about the Labour Leader and the Author better than I could.
Richard, your comment, “I express some reservations about some of the rest….” also exemplifies the point being made!
Thanks
I believe George Monbiot has written a book, “Out of the Wreckage”, about that new vision. From what I’ve read so far he’s seeking to create a narrative of “belonging”, to topple and replace a failed neoliberal narrative of extreme self-interest. I’ve only just started reading it so can’t comment as yet.
I am told the first half is good and the second half loses touch with reality
Monbiot must have produced a populist book then? – a book of two halves to appeal to the football obsessed masses!
“There is nothing more to the philosophy than that” I think there is a good deal more, and not just undercurrents. For example, it turns people into “human capital”, it brings competition into every sphere of human endeavour, especially the workplace, it conceives of the world as wholly and only economic with winners and losers. I give you “homo economics”.
I say there are implications
“Neoliberalism is a simple cult. All it really says is that competition is the only way to efficiently allocate resources in society and that to achieve this the state must keep its nose out of almost everything […] That’s why it is so easy for its proponents to be so effective: the message is easy to deliver.”
But the message is also easy to refute: Markets allocate efficiently only if all players have approximately the same marketpower, ie wealth. It follows that redistribution of wealth is a prerequisite to market efficiency. And who is supposed to this, if not the government?
Of course
Isn’t that in what my alternative says?
It’s not whether Corbyn can be turned into a ‘deliverable political philosophy’. It’s whether Corbyn can successfully deliver an already existing political philosophy that would deliver the fairer society and sustainable economy he alludes to.
While agreeing with a lot of what he proposes, I have little faith that Corbyn will and can LEAD (caps intended) the UK out of the mire onto greener pastures. I’ve never considered him to be Prime Minister material (even if he does end up in No 10) and doubt the LP has the intellectual depth to understand fully both the available alternatives and the complexity of unravelling Neo-liberalism, so deeply and subconsciously entrenched in western society.
It (Neo-liberalism) has been one of the most ‘successful’ political revolutions in recorded history. And it appeared to deliver a lot of what it promised. But it’s a 100% Ponzi scheme, doomed to failure, bringing down millions of innocent people with it. It’s already entered this final stage, which could take a generation before its final demise. Pretty much as Marx explained.
In the grand scheme of history, Corbyn is certainly a much needed catalyst. A prophet albeit with a cult following. A sort of John the Baptist figure, but not a Messiah. Also, it’s never a good idea to proclaim publicly you’ll be the next Prime Minister, is it?
There’s a cult around Corbyn that is unhealthy and frankly a bit immature. “Oh Jeremy Corbyn” the audience sings, while adherents refer to him as the “absolute boy” Really this nonsense has to stop.
But credit where its due: he has driven a refreshing and long needed opposition to the current order. He is talking about things that were off the agenda for years, and has galvanised a Labour party that had lost some its fire and idealism.
So far, so good. There is wind in Labour’s sails, it has had a good GE, followed by a very positive conference.
But now the hard part. His and the partys challenge is to move beyond where it is and to really develop a solid core of genuinely progressive policies, and to convince enough of the electorate to back them.
“Neoliberalism is a simple cult. All it really says is that competition is the only way to efficiently allocate resources in society….. ”
Really?
For people who are keen on “competition” neo-liberals do so very well at monopoly and oligopoly, almost to the exclusion of everything else.
The sadly disgraced former governor of New York, Eliot Spitzer summed it up well:
“One of the biggest lies in capitalism is that companies like competition. They don’t. Nobody likes competition.”
But that’s what the cult says….
Of course it may not be true
In fact we know it isn’t
So what we know is that they lie
I was around in the sixties, seventies and eighties and I signed up to Labour, and there are many more in my age group that did!
Sue, Yes me too. I was personally recruited by Mrs Thatcher!
Couldn’t stomach the Party when her son Tony took over in government though.
I know that this is coming in late and I realise that almost nobody will see it but I have been thinking about this one and just wanted to note a couple of thoughts for the record.
I am not sure that neoliberalism is simply a cult with a simple philosophy. It probably fails that description by virtue of the fact that declines to acknowledge or identify itself, Nobody describes themselves as a neoliberal. We do that for them. The more significant point that I wanted to make is that neo-liberalism is more than a cult or idea it represents at least three other things:
1. It is (or was?) an attempted counter-revolution or reactionary movement (thus “neo”) that sought to reverse the progress of pre-war, democratic socialists, Keynesianism and, arguably, the 1960’s social revolution, then replace that with a selective restoration of the laissez-faire economics that pre-dated (and caused) the Great depression.
As a reactionary movement it could be vaguely compared to the Bourbon Restoration in France (or Spain?), ill-conceived, incomplete and doomed to eventual failure. Like most counter-revolutions, neoliberalism fails because the past cannot be sustainably revived and there are underlying reasons why the original revolution (or progressive changes) occurred in the first place.
2. Neo-liberalism is also the vehicle through which the corporate sector has conducted an undeclared war against democracy and civil society. I won’t expand but this is clearly evident in “regulatory capture” (ironically, one of their phases) with one example being the Wall St old boys network that established the Washington Consensus. It is also evident in the corrupting lures of the lobbying mega-industry that effectively controls parliaments and in anti-sovereign trade treaties. ISDS is the perfect emblem of this undeclared war. Its not all bad news or one-way traffic though. The success of the anti-tobacco movement is one example of a victory for civil society
3. Neo-liberalism is the vehicle through which multinational corporations have shifted from a world of excess capacity and diminishing capital returns ( the Western World) to their final frontier – the Developing World, by introducing the race-to-the-bottom that they call “free-trade”. This is new in some respects but reactionary to the extent that it revives colonialism and the modus operandi of the South Sea, Hudsons Bay, Dutch and British East India companies
Come to think of it, points 2 & 3 here are pretty much inseparable. Neo-liberalism is an anti-democratic agenda for global corporate control and any “deliverable” political philosophy should at least begin (begin) to recognise that. Ultimately, and beyond that beginning, we should be looking for an end to the limited liability corporation as a legal entity.
There are alternatives but I’ll save that for another time perhaps.
I like the analysis
I agree very strongly with 1
2 and 3 follow from that I said, I think