The first New Left, Blue Labour and English modernity.
| Author | Rutherford, Jonathan |
| Position | The Labour Party and the New Left |
This essay is about the first New Left and Blue Labour. They are both examples of emergent currents of thinking and action at times of political hiatus on the left. In this hiatus what counts is not policy but the energy of emerging political moods and intellectual currents. They begin to re-orientate thinking and action, reconfiguring existing political fault-lines, and once more connecting people with political agency. Policy follows.
The first New Left and Blue Labour are different in their politics, but they share a common historical thread. They mark the beginning and the closing of a specific historical period. It begins with the changes in economy and society in the 1950s, the social liberal revolution of the 1960s, and the historical defeat of the left in the neo-liberal economic revolution of Margaret Thatcher in 1979. It closes in 2008 with the self-destruction of this economic revolution and the subsequent unfolding revelations of deceit and corrupt behaviour in political, civic and commercial life.
The first New Left began in 1956, 57 years ago. It emerged out of the decline of the post-war welfare consensus, and the rise of a new kind of consumer capitalism. Its key figures were Edward Thompson, Raphael Samuel, Stuart Hall, Raymond Williams, Richard Hoggart, Charles Taylor and Alasdair MacIntyre. It lasted six years and after its demise they continued their work, creating a significant body of political and cultural thinking and philosophy.
Blue Labour emerged out of the self-destruction of the neo-liberal revolution and the search within the Labour Party for a viable political and economic alternative. It was conceived by Maurice Glasman in 2009 and was carried forward by a small group of politicians and academics. It had an extraordinary impact both within and outside the Labour Party, stimulating debate and often polarising opinion. In 2011 it crash landed. Those involved dusted themselves down and carried on.
What do these two intellectual movements tell us about the social and economic liberal revolutions in English society and politics over the last 57 years? And why does it matter to a Labour Party, which in 2010 suffered arguably its worst election defeat since 1918? These are the questions I address in this essay.
1956 and the first New Left
The first New Left emerged at a conjunction of historical trends. 1956 was the year of Krushchev's 'secret speech' and the Soviet invasion of Hungary, which broke the dominance of the Communist Party of Great Britain over a whole cohort of left-leaning intellectuals in Britain, and opened up the space for an independent, extra-parliamentary left. Edward Thompson and John Saville began publishing their cyclostyled journal, The Reasoner. Both were expelled from the Party, and in 1957 they launched The New Reasoner, one of the two journals associated with the first New Left.
1956 was the year of the post-imperial humiliation of Suez. The long Victorian age of Empire was drawing to a close. The Windrush generation of Caribbean migrants was a new presence, marking the beginning of a post-colonial and multicultural English society. The post-war years had seen the creation of a welfare state and a social democratic consensus. The consensus was the achievement of a long historical struggle by the counter-movement to laissez-faire capitalism, and it indicated an era drawing to a close. A period of sustained affluence was changing the culture and aspirations of the industrial working class. New forms of production and consumption were reconfiguring class relations. The cultural and social foundations of the labour movement were starting to erode. What next for the Labour Party?
In 1956 Anthony Crosland published an answer in his The Future of Socialism. He did so by partially dismissing the question. He said the post-war welfare settlement was permanent and capitalism had been transformed. 'Is this still capitalism?', he asked, and answered: 'No' (Crosland, 2006 [1956], 46). The Future of Socialism became the inspiration for future generations of Labour social democrats, but it also defined the limitations of this strand of Labour thinking, not only around political economy, but also culture.
Crosland signalled this warning in his final few pages on 'Liberty and gaiety in private life' and on 'Cultural and...
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