hard to put aside differences when you both believe in the same thing (ie nothing). British centrism suffers from the fact that it has absolutely nothing to sell to the public, its economic policies are often to the *right* of Johnson’s Tories while its gestures toward patriotism are perceived as half-arsed and insincere. Can anyone actually describe what Davey or Starmer would do differently if elected tomorrow morning? Most people in Britain wouldn’t be entirely sure who these guys even are
Arguably because UK parties are already effectively broad coalitions. The notion that you can just sort of combine all the opposition parties (well in a UK context, Labour, the Greens, Lib-Dems, Plaid and SNP) into some sort of progressive alliance, or just a ‘not the Tories’ alliance falls a bit flat given the ideological differences between the parties. Could they cooperate? Sure. But then the Lib Dems could cooperate with the Tories just as handily, the SNP and Plaid have core platform positions that are somewhat antithetical to the Labour and Lib Dem unionist positions and the greens meander from socialism, through federalism and out to a bit of authoritarianism too.
They can and do cooperate in opposition of course, but you’d be hard pressed to put together a broad thrust political platform bar on a couple of issues (and not enough for a full legislative platform that could be sold to the public).
I’d also argue that this:
*”As for the notion that the British would reject a pact as unsporting, Nigel Farage stood down candidates in Tory-held seats in 2019 and will doubtless do the same in 2023 or 2024 if he revives his movement. “*
Somewhat misses the point because it was essentially a single issue that allowed that to come through. The same isn’t true of the other parties, doubly so given that the Lib Dems, Greens, Labour and so on all have fairly strong positions that would have to be set aside. T
>The centre-right plays the electoral system by operating as a united bloc, to the demonstrable advantage of the Tory party.
And Labour is a block broadly occupying the centre left, the benefit that the Tories have isn’t that they have no-one to compete with (there are the lib Dems, there are various right wing parties…), it’s that they are actually unified around a broad set of policies and less internally fractured (bar possibly on Europe up until the referendum) and so more able to deliver that single block of votes, as well as policies.
The Lib Dems are barely centre left, the SNP and Plaid morph around their core ideological positions with the SNP perfectly capable of occupying the centre right as the centre left, and the Greens have a different core agenda that they don’t see aligning to the Lib Dem/Labour positions.
Being ‘not the Tories’ isn’t exactly a unifying or coherent political position in and of itself, not for the parties involved, nor for the voters. I mean there is an issue right now with some on the Labour party fringes seeing a Labour party under Starmer as not being sufficiently left leaning enough and so not something that they might want to vote for, preferring to wait for a leader or a shift in policy to pushing now to remove the Tories, how in that context do you build unity outside too?
I can find no reason why the centre-left shouldn’t follow suit, unless it subconsciously wants to lose, which, judging by its behaviour, is a possibility you should never dismiss.
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hard to put aside differences when you both believe in the same thing (ie nothing). British centrism suffers from the fact that it has absolutely nothing to sell to the public, its economic policies are often to the *right* of Johnson’s Tories while its gestures toward patriotism are perceived as half-arsed and insincere. Can anyone actually describe what Davey or Starmer would do differently if elected tomorrow morning? Most people in Britain wouldn’t be entirely sure who these guys even are
Arguably because UK parties are already effectively broad coalitions. The notion that you can just sort of combine all the opposition parties (well in a UK context, Labour, the Greens, Lib-Dems, Plaid and SNP) into some sort of progressive alliance, or just a ‘not the Tories’ alliance falls a bit flat given the ideological differences between the parties. Could they cooperate? Sure. But then the Lib Dems could cooperate with the Tories just as handily, the SNP and Plaid have core platform positions that are somewhat antithetical to the Labour and Lib Dem unionist positions and the greens meander from socialism, through federalism and out to a bit of authoritarianism too.
They can and do cooperate in opposition of course, but you’d be hard pressed to put together a broad thrust political platform bar on a couple of issues (and not enough for a full legislative platform that could be sold to the public).
I’d also argue that this:
*”As for the notion that the British would reject a pact as unsporting, Nigel Farage stood down candidates in Tory-held seats in 2019 and will doubtless do the same in 2023 or 2024 if he revives his movement. “*
Somewhat misses the point because it was essentially a single issue that allowed that to come through. The same isn’t true of the other parties, doubly so given that the Lib Dems, Greens, Labour and so on all have fairly strong positions that would have to be set aside. T
>The centre-right plays the electoral system by operating as a united bloc, to the demonstrable advantage of the Tory party.
And Labour is a block broadly occupying the centre left, the benefit that the Tories have isn’t that they have no-one to compete with (there are the lib Dems, there are various right wing parties…), it’s that they are actually unified around a broad set of policies and less internally fractured (bar possibly on Europe up until the referendum) and so more able to deliver that single block of votes, as well as policies.
The Lib Dems are barely centre left, the SNP and Plaid morph around their core ideological positions with the SNP perfectly capable of occupying the centre right as the centre left, and the Greens have a different core agenda that they don’t see aligning to the Lib Dem/Labour positions.
Being ‘not the Tories’ isn’t exactly a unifying or coherent political position in and of itself, not for the parties involved, nor for the voters. I mean there is an issue right now with some on the Labour party fringes seeing a Labour party under Starmer as not being sufficiently left leaning enough and so not something that they might want to vote for, preferring to wait for a leader or a shift in policy to pushing now to remove the Tories, how in that context do you build unity outside too?
I can find no reason why the centre-left shouldn’t follow suit, unless it subconsciously wants to lose, which, judging by its behaviour, is a possibility you should never dismiss.