A Class Act?
A Class Act?
Paul Thompson: Class Politics and New Labour
Whether Gordon Brown?s disastrous aside about a “bigoted woman” does or does not reveal anything deeper about New Labour, contemporary politics, and working class voters (see Alan Johnson’s recent post), class has been a central undercurrent in this election. The Conservatives and their press supporters are hypersensitive to accusations of Tory toffs and the ultra-privileged lives of Cameron and his inner circle. And this is not without good reason, as this is what many voters say to pollsters and pundits. When the election campaign began Labour was repeatedly accused of “falling back on class warfare.” If only.
The truth is that though posh Tories are an easy target, Labour has long been completely muddled and muzzled on the question of class. In an early interview, Tony Blair stated that his goal was “to take class out of British politics.” As I have remarked elsewhere:
The reason for Blair and New Labour?s aversion to class is simple enough. The term is a social and political signifier of an old labour world that it wants to be seen to have left behind. Class in general and working class in particular evokes production, collectivism and council housing rather than consumption, individualism and aspiration. Blairite goals are social mobility and meritocracy-?raising standards for all rather than closing the gap. (Thompson, 2006)
Such judgements seemed to be confirmed by the 1997 landslide. New Labour had discovered the electoral elixir of appeal to aspirational, middle England voters. Talk of inequality was shunned and softer stories such as the knowledge economy–a land where everyone would have access to an ever-expanding number of professional, managerial and white collar jobs–was favored.
It wasn?t that successive Labour governments didn?t do anything for (and with its) working-class base. The minimum wage, tax credits, and Sure Start were the best known of a number of modest measures that we know from recent figures had real redistributive effects. What they didn?t do was talk much about it as this would clash with the dominant “all middle class now” message. And this matters. Politicians play a large part in the creation and articulation of social identities, and New Labour?s determination to erase every last trace of its old image ran the danger of rendering its heartland support voiceless (see Evans 1999).
In addition, despite the positive measures, there were policy areas in Labour?s mission of “Newness” that had disastrous consequences. The most significant was a blatant refusal to build or allow local councils to build anywhere near enough social/public housing. This fact, above all, fuelled anxieties about immigration. As Dagenham MP Jon Cruddas noted, there was “a failure to deal with material insecurities in many working class communities in terms of housing supply, vulnerability at the workplace and patterns of migration” (The Guardian, May 15, 2007). It is no accident that the British National Party draws most of its support from poor(er) white working class areas.
Even when it became clear that the party was hemorrhaging votes amongst core groups, any move to reconnect and radicalize policy was denounced by leading Blairite Ministers and ex-Ministers, such as Tessa Jowell and Hazel Blears, as upsetting aspirational voters and departing from their apparent favorite themes of individual opportunity, choice and responsibility (The Guardian , February 24, 2009). Class is, of course, not just about the misfortunes of those at the bottom, but the fortunes of those at the top. Until the financial crisis, Labour was utterly silent on such matters. There has been some progress such as the 50 percent tax rate for incomes over £150,000. But New Labour can?t find a language and relevant policies to articulate voter anger about the bankers and the people who have made themselves rich at public expense. This is not traditional, but contemporary class politics, and support for radical measures is far from confined to working class voters.
Problems of constructing a contemporary politics of class are clearly not unique to Labour. The American right seems to be able to fashion a language of economic populism that frequently outmaneuvers their Democrat rivals (as evidenced by the recent election of Republican Scott Brown in Massachusetts). Nor is this new. Thomas Frank?s What?s the Matter with Kansas? (2004) gave an extensive account of why many of the poorest citizens of Kansas vote for a right-wing Republican agenda, arguing that the conservative movement has managed to turn class differences into a cultural war that involved a “systematic erasure of the economic.” That is not the case in the UK. Rather, we have a convergence of cultural constructs and economic insecurities that New Labour has failed to address, let alone counter. Brown?s ill-judged comment has merely thrown an additional match into that tinder box.
(References: Cruddas, J. ?We were wrong about class: That?s why we lost votes?, The Guardian., 15 May 2007; Evans, G. (1999) ?For you, voter, the class war is not over?, Fabian Review 111; Frank, T. (2004) What?s the Matter with Kansas? How Conservatives Won the Heart of America, Metropolitan Books; Thompson, P. (2006) ?New Labour and Class?, Renewal: A Journal of Labour Politics, 14.1; Wintour, P. ?Don?t upset aspirational working class: Jowell warns Labour?, The Guardian, 24 February 2009.)
