A reader called Ellie Comber wrote this comment on the blog overnight:
I admit to being very frightened that democracy will be annihilated and that evil and greed will get the upper hand. Democracy is our safeguard against ruthless, amoral, uber-wealthy groups trampling on the rest of us and bringing in a new Dark Age. Please could you write about where you see any glimmerings of hope in the UK?
It is a fair question. In fact, it's one of the questions of our age. When politics feels hollow, when wealth and power concentrate ever more tightly, and when public services crumble under the weight of neglect, it is not alarmist to fear for democracy; it is realistic. So where, amid that darkness, can any light still be found?
People still care
The most obvious, and most easily overlooked, source of hope is in fact in Ellie Comber, who wrote that message. She cares. Other people care. They write, argue, protest, volunteer, and turn up. They have not switched off. Even those who have given up on democracy as it now is still argue what should be done about it.
The most dangerous moment for democracy is not when people are angry, but when they are indifferent. That point has not yet arrived. Every letter written, every local campaign fought, every act of solidarity, from food banks to climate activism, is democracy in its living form. It is not found in Westminster, but in the communities and streets of this country.
The economic story is being rewritten
For decades, we were told there was no alternative to neoliberalism: that markets knew best, that government was the problem, and that inequality was somehow a sign of success. That illusion is breaking down. What is more, politicians are noticing.
Even within the establishment, there is a growing recognition that the economy does not work. Think-tanks, business groups, and even central banks now talk about well-being, resilience, and public investment. That intellectual shift matters. Every political change begins with an idea, and the old ideas are collapsing under their own contradictions.
Some politicians are also in this group. The Greens and Plaid Cymru look to be so. Your Party might be in due course. The SNP leadership dithers, but its membership does not. There are signs of hope and awareness in politics, then.
The young are not captured by old ideologies
It also seems that the younger generations are not wedded to the myths of the free market or the empire. I know there is a problem with some young men finding fascism appealing, but that is not typical. Most young people see through the housing con, the debt trap, and the climate crisis. Many may not yet be politically organised, but the values they express on fairness, sustainability, and cooperation are fundamentally democratic.
When the demographic tide turns, as it must, those values will matter more than any old political slogan.
Communities have not given up
What staggers me is just how much resistance there is to the failing neoliberal state within our communities. From community pubs to local energy projects, food banks, community interest companies, and local social media, all are re-emerging across the country. These are not just practical projects. They are also acts of self-government that reject the failure of neoliberal government and its denial of the importance of people and the places where they live.
Each one is a small but real act of resistance to centralisation and corporate control, and each proves that people can govern themselves better than distant elites can.
The cracks in the edifice are widening
Power always looks impregnable until the day it collapses. Empires, markets, and ideologies all fall when they lose legitimacy. The neoliberal state is now in that phase — unable to solve problems, unwilling to admit failure, clinging to narratives no one still believes.
That is dangerous, but it is also the precondition for renewal. History shows that when the old order loses coherence, imagination suddenly finds the space to break through.
We are learning to care again
Finally, hope lies in the rediscovery of care as a political principle. The pandemic, the climate crisis, and the collapse of public services have reminded millions that we depend on each other and that care, not competition, sustains life.
That understanding is seeping back into public consciousness. Once it takes root, it changes everything.
Hope is not a feeling. It is an act and a choice to believe that what we do still matters. It lives wherever people refuse to give up on truth, kindness, and solidarity.
Just look around you, and you will see people do care. Some do in their professional lives. Others do in their social lives. Some volunteer. Others lend support. But wherever you look, you can find people who clearly still do care, and know that we are fundamentally interdependent beings, needing each other more than anything else, and that our relationships with others, including those we do not know well or at all, and who are different to us, really do matter.
Democracy may look fragile, but it survives through those quiet refusals to succumb to the indifference that neoliberalism demands and to insist instead that life should not be ruled by greed or fear. As long as that insistence continues, there is hope enough to work with.
Taking further action
If you want to write a letter to your MP on the issues raised in this blog post, there is a ChatGPT prompt to assist you in doing so, with full instructions, here.
One word of warning, though: please ensure you have the correct MP. ChatGPT can get it wrong.
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https://youtu.be/izddWXUuQ9g?si=gbTeyjT8UBJfaMNc
Half a million people marching for Palestine, easily as many as the Tommy Robinson rally. There’s hope for you.
Many more, surely?
I don’t know the numbers to compare, but I would think so. I’m hopeful of the No Kings demonstrations in America next weekend. The turn out for that should really shake the Trump regime. They are already calling it “In American”, a desperate accusation by a failing government, and eerily similar to the accusations made by our government against pro Palestinian protests. A sign of a joint right wing playbook being used, a playbook that is losing effectiveness.
A member of the Labour government apparently said today on national TV that those were “Hate Marches”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cly9y7gg6eqo
These ministers are Zionist to their core.
[…] those things matters, as I have already noted elsewhere this […]
Here is a local story that gives me hope. I had no involvement in this at all. It was a grassroots campaign, without money, but with local commitment and passion. The developers and council retreated in shock.
https://thebristolcable.org/2023/07/western-slopes-homes-planning-rejected/
Another sign of hope – the publisher of the story, community owned and expanding, local paper, The Bristol Cable.
When people organise, stuff happens.
Yay…
“The bottom line is that while Friedman’s economic model [neoliberalism] is capable of being partially imposed under democracy, authoritarian conditions are required for the implementation of its true vision. For economic shock therapy to be applied without restraint — as it was in Chile in the seventies, China in the late eighties, Russia in the nineties and the U.S. after September 11, 2001 — some sort of additional major collective trauma has always been required, one that either temporarily suspended democratic practices or blocked them entirely”. Source: The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism by Naomi Klein (p.11) https://amzn.eu/d/gzsLqLf
In that book she cites how Lebanon needed to rebuild after the Israeli invasion. What she calls the international community proposed luxury hotels, casinos and other attractions to draw in the rich and their money. The local people , with Hezbollah playing a major part with Iranian money, insisted on houses for the people being built where they had been before. Not shunted somewhere else. Klein says they knew the local builders and which ones could be trusted -and who did the work for less than the international corporations.
I haven’t verified how accurate this account is but it seems likely. I expect similar issues will arise with the reconstruction of Gaza. This is part of point ten of the ‘Trump Plan’ for Gaza.
“A Trump economic development plan to rebuild and energise Gaza will be created by convening a panel of experts who have helped birth some of the thriving modern miracle cities in the Middle East. Many thoughtful investment proposals and exciting development ideas have been crafted by well-meaning international groups,”
My hope is that other voices-Turkiye, Egypt, possibly European, will chart a better course.
No other comment from me on this except to say that I think that both you and Ellie deserve thanks for this, so thank you.
Thanks
I think it is important to recognise that approximately 1% of the population are likely ‘psychopaths’ (for want of a better term) – that is someone who does not have the same moral foundations as the vast majority of the population.
Whilst they are a small proportion, they have a disproportional influence on our political and media discourse, as someone who only has their self-interest at heart is much more likely to say and do what they need to get power and influence. This is also the case on social media.
Hope, as you say, lies in recognising that huge majority of the decent. But we also need to be calling out the morally vacuous and not assuming that everyone is driven ultimately by shared interests.
Accepted.
I am very aware of divergence, both good and bad, and both exist.
I have said this before so feel free to delete. Evil tends to trip itself up. Neo-liberals and the billionaire class, on the whole, are driven by selfishness and so they lack a structure for the common good. They can’t organise for that because of rivalry and jealousy.
We also have too many who prefer to make dismissive ‘smart’ comments about any proposal. I imagine they think it makes them look cleverer than those who want solutions. They contribute nothing.
The ‘progressive’ forces -for want of a better term have a greater potential to come together in the common good. Unfortunately, they also have too many who insist on their view or reject other perspectives. Debate is necessary, and there are possible different ways forward but we need to find a better joint narrative about HOW to achieve that better caring society.
We have to talk to each other about finding a way forward. My hope is that Greens, rank and file Labour, many Lib Dems and non-affiliated can find a way of doing so.
And thanks to Richard and team for what they do.
Thanks
Dear Ellie,
I must admit that there are days when I feel the same way. However, as Richard has pointed out, there are some more encouraging signs which still give me hope. It was hardly picked up in the mainstream media (apart from in the Daily Mirror which produced an 8 page special) but a couple of weeks ago, there was published the Giga Poll (funded by the green entrepreneur Dale Vince) which surveyed the views of over 45,000 people in the UK. It showed that, contrary to the view expressed by the neoliberal political class, Britain is more tolerant, more united, more open-minded than the hate fuelled rhetoric would have you believe. People are not tearing each other apart over culture wars, they are worried about real issues: the cost-of-living crisis, the NHS, jobs, housing and the climate crisis.
You can access it via his website, dalevince.com
I must also admit that, as a household, we are customers of Ecotricity and attended a match at Forest Green Rovers. In the latter case in particular we saw a wonderful and genuine community spirit throughout the club. The vegan food and beer before the match was really good. Recently, along with the local MP (who is also a local GP) the club launched a programme where patients can be prescribed free tickets to home matches to alleviate feelings of loneliness and isolation.
I do believe that all is not lost but we cannot rely upon the current crop of self-serving, cowardly and puerile politicians in the main parties to build the courageous, caring state that will be essential for our survival. We need to treat them with as much contempt as they have treated the public for the last 45 years. It is, I guess, payback time for those politicians who have caused this mess. The peoples’ fight back starts now!
By the way, Dale Vinces’s book, Manifesto, is a pretty good read and may leave you feeling more optimistic by the end.
And now, I’m off to one of my local nature reserves….
Thanks.
And enjoy whatever is the other end of your binoculars, if you take them with you.
Bit that just shows I now doubt I can walk without them. And they do not need to be mega expensive ones.
Nowadays binoculars have become almost mandatory!
Over breakfast I spotted the same heartwarming article in the Guardian online that Ian Stevenson has referred to. As an exiled Brummie it made me proud. It also chimed with the audience in Shrewsbury in this week’s awful BBC QT – I am seeing increasing evidence that some members of the public are now beginning to openly question the neoliberalism/far right assertion that Britain is broken. Let’s all spread the message – Britain is not broken (but if it is, it is the neoliberalism/the far right that broke it)
I find optimism and hope both in what I see around me every day, and in the long patterns of history.
Although the economic and political mess made by big business is depressing, people don’t reproduce the social relations of capitalism when they have the choice. If my lawnmower breaks down I go and borrow my neighbour’s, and he happily lends it – no charge – indeed if he did try to rent it to me he would be ridiculed by the whole community. Our normal human relations, in our families and communities, remain grounded in generosity, gifting and mutual aid – and this expresses itself also in the enormous networks of community groups, civil society, co-operatives, social enterprise, much of the public sector – and, I would argue, in most small business, that’s actually embedded in local or online communities, just trying to make a living doing a good job for others.
And in history’s long run the left wins too. Of course progress is stopped, and reversed in some places and times – Americans are living through this now – but take a longer view, and what seemed like extreme left ideas in times past come to be accepted as common sense consensus. The sorts of victories the left has – ending slavery, organising in trade unions, extending the franchise, entrenching human rights, introducing free state education, state-funded health care, gay marriage, minimum wages, etc, etc – are very hard to reverse, simply because most people value them highly – and people value them because they are what humanity really is, everyday, in our families and communities.
an example of local grass roots actions
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/oct/12/brummies-united-against-racism-birmingham-poster-campaign-takes-on-the-far-right
“Think-tanks, business groups, and even central banks now talk about well-being, resilience, and public investment.”
“The SNP leadership dithers, but its membership does not.”
The SNP dithers about how to achieve independence but they don’t dither about well-being and public investment whether that’s in health, education or helping poverty stricken (imposed by Westminster) children. Having a household budget imposed on Scotland doesn’t help.
SNP is the ONLY political party with power (power that’s massively limited by Westminster) who actually care about the public.
People who don’t live in Scotland cannot know the full story of how the Scottish government is deliberately hamstrung by Westminster; they think they know how things are run here and they try to explain(!) it to Scotland but they don’t know.
Take a look at what’s reserved and what’s devolved and remember that Scotland’s economy is not run by Scotland but by Westminster.
And remember this too: Reeves (and other Chancellors before her) try, and fail, to “balance the books”. Scotland does that every year by necessity. So who’s good at managing budgets? Certainly not Westminster.
Noted.
There were several groups of people clearly heading for the Peace March joining the train at Westbury yesterday morning, and on our previous trips to London
Thank you both, Ellie and Richard