2020s >> 2025 >> no-1447-march-2025

The dialectic taking place among political opponents at the present time is that there is a polarisation and a narrowing of political thought taking place in the UK. Put simply, we are seeing a decrease in compromise and increased partisanship. Will this lead to a more tribalised political system as some political commentators have suggested?

In the UK since Brexit there has no doubt taken place a fragmentation of politics and right wing populist views taking charge of the narrative.

Mr Farage has been the main proponent of a populist free market economy encouraging the idea that we should engage in a society of competitive individuals vying for a higher proportion of the goods available in the land. Some kind of anarchic free for all society that ignores the welfare of the people and encourages fierce competition with no moral arbiters.

With the rise of marginal parties that, in my view only offer a very short lifespan, it is a grim foreboding for the future. Socialism seems to have taken a back seat at the present time. With the arrival of revisionist Keir Starmer, the Labour party lacks the bravery to attack free enterprise head on. Public ownership is still very fragmented and piecemeal.

Farage and his cohorts continue to feed the electorate with misinformation, racial prejudice and bigotry. They continue to foster the political agenda with an attack on the use of rules in a free market economy as it, in their opinion limits among other things the freedom of speech. Ignoring the facts that rules act as a protective cocoon for the collective and limit greedy individuals from appropriating all that is available.

There is also a view from liberal commentators that there is an oligarchy taking shape. And this oligarchy with all its wealth, power and influence will eventually threaten democracy.

Is this however just another example of pop up populist fear mongering? I think so. In the UK Nigel Farage, the so called ‘Man of the People,’ the messiah in waiting is without doubt a dangerous opponent of socialism. Although a racist and fear monger, he is no political slouch. An educated raconteur with plenty of political muscle. He is very persuasive in that ‘boyish’ tone of innocence he portrays to the gallery.

But his reform party in my view is an enigma. It will not last the distance. It has no real substance. It can be viewed as some kind of short fix that will only satisfy the electorate for a short while.

The impulse will stutter and die out. It just does not have the bedrock of support to be a lasting political party. It is no tour de force.

But having said that, they are perversely a real and present danger. The narrative in the political cauldron at the moment is change and not for the better. The right wing is attempting to batter doors
down.

The rich and powerful would have us believe that ruthless competition is the way forward. Jim Ratcliffe, a part shareholder in Manchester United in is search for that ultra-competitive spirit is tearing the club apart by ignoring the needs of the workforce. Socialism needs to be more aggressive in its defence of equality and fairness.

I would take Thomas Moore’s pragmatic view of socialism which would be based on the practical considerations of socialism and as Marx stated, with the rise of technological development’s the modes of production change over time creating new and revolutionary structures.

In the UK we have a truly diverse culture and I would hope that this will produce a profound cultural shift and a more progressive society which will see the disappearance of class divisions. As a last thought could AI have a dramatic effect on the conditions of our social relations.

BARRY WATTS, Dover

Reply
You make a lot of separate points so we can’t really address all of them. It’s undoubtedly true that in the US and Europe the political pendulum has swung towards the right in recent years, as rocketing prices and unaffordable housing have put a squeeze on workers, which together with wars and climate change don’t offer young people much hope for the future.

In such dire times, it’s common to think less about progressive ideas and more about loss aversion, and never mind other problems. Ably assisted by social media, the right has amplified the general unease into a clickbait hysteria of xenophobia, anti-wokism and conspiracy yarns which drowns out adult debate and promotes gleeful mediocrities like Farage who know how to exploit it. They don’t need arguments as long as they get attention. And having no coherent political or ideological theory is not a weakness but an advantage for such ‘pop-up populists’, because it means they can rebrand any time they like.

The left is in a state of despair and disrepair. Bernie Sanders and Jeremy Corbyn were unable to turn back the capitalist clock with their supposedly radical state-ownership programmes. Anti or post-capitalists, overlooked since Occupy, fail to be heard above the noise.

But the right is also fragmented and confused. Some hanker for a ruthless, stateless Adam Smith parody that never could feasibly exist. Many want a return to 19^th century protectionism. Trump meanwhile is going in contradictory directions with new isolationist tariffs combined with expansionist rhetoric, prompting dark forebodings of a future global war.

Is the new oligarchy threatening democracy, you ask, as if ‘democracy’ is what we’ve got? The rich do seem to be enjoying a new Gilded Age, but just look how they bend the knee to Trump, to Putin, to Xi. That’s not the act of invincible plutocrats. They fear the state’s power to break them if it chooses. And they need the state’s power to maintain order, without which they can’t continue to profit.

Is all this bad for socialism’s prospects? The barrage of soundbite and counter-soundbite is certainly a source of general confusion, but workers’ collective interest remains crystal clear for anyone to see. You hint that future technology might create new structures through which to challenge the system. Possibly so, but it doesn’t take technology to make a revolution. Only we workers can do that. – Editors.

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