In defence of Labour Party History Junkies

The always excellent Hopi Sen has written about the surreal nature of ‘Labour realness’ debates.

Such internal party debates revolve around whether protagonists are mimicking the actions of Labour’s historical baddies, rather than a case on its merits, or, heaven forefend, in terms understandable and arresting to non-Labour partisans.

What seems to have sparked Hopi’s post was the Owen Jones-Simon Danczuk fracas on the Daily Politics over the proposed seven-day delay to benefits.

The argument seemed to degenerate into whether Jones was imitating a spangly-suited era Ben Elton, to which the Chavs author responded by quoting a three-decade old Neil Kinnock speech.

What Hopi said has a lot of merit. However, and not in particular contradiction to his post, a grasp of Labour history is important and can and should be used in internal debates. I would argue for three particular reasons.

1) We have to try to understand why Labour backed certain polices in the first place

Often we get hung up on policies in the Labour like nationalisation, or membership of the European Union, and we forget why we were in favour of them in the first place.

In the case of nationalisation, at least in the case of Clause IV, the policy was seen as a way of the workers getting their just rewards for their work (just read it word for word), and not having to give over their share of the wages to the boss’s profit.

And this partly explains why the Croslandite prescription of progressive taxation plus welfare spending is a problematic electoral sell.

Originally Labour intervention was intended to ensure that workers could keep the money they earnt – a visceral framing now echoed by the Taxpayers Alliance, the taxman taking the place of the bossman.

Crosslandism, that informed much of New Labour, is an abstract call to equality

2) We have to understand how previously Labour managed to achieve popularity.

When organisations fail there is often an examination of how it happened. But we often do not examine successes after the fact. Are we successful for the reasons we think we are?

A probably mythical urban legend is told about the condom maker Durex, who decided to diversify into sex aides.

The range failed miserably, and with the excess rubber products, they decided to melt them down and turn them into car airbags, that flew off the shelves. Durex thought they had been selling sex – they had in fact, been selling safety.

Whether true or not, it shows that we can’t take our previous success for granted.

I would argue that in 1945, Labour’s success was grounded in framing the Tories as being in favour of ‘economic chaos’ as opposed to Labour’s rational planning that would benefit the vast majority (the manifesto mentions socialism/socialist a grand total of three times, equality never).

Similar themes informed Wilson’s prospectus in 1964 and 1966, with the addition of a faith in the transformative power of science and technology.

The 1997 success carried from the 60s a faith in modernity, with a rejection of wanton divisiveness, whether that came from the Tories or  so-called ‘Old Labour’.

Such a survey offers such clues as to what could work now, and what might not.

The greatest politician may not be able to lead the British people to optimism right now – an electorate attracted to UKIP is a grumpy electorate, and that play may not be available to a Labour leader.

But given how the economy seems broken, a recovery only possible on the backs of consumers running down their savings and an over inflated housing market, a message of unity and economic order may have a resonance.

3) People are people, and you had better get used to it

Labour does need to figure out the best way forward, and as an institution made up of human beings, it has to be recognised that people do draw authority from history.

At a recent housing discussion at my CLP, the idea of nibbling at the green belt came up.

Right on cue, the spectre of Benny Rothman and the Kinder Trespass was raised. Hopi might think the 1980s are ancient political history, but in some CLPs the 1930s still take an active part in discussions.

I am sure in the opt-in/opt-out debate, Stanley Baldwin, 1920s edition, will have a walk-on appearance.

There was a reason why Crosland begins his masterpiece, The Future of Socialism, with an exhaustive survey of previous Labour thinkers.

Sociologists of religion talk about two processes that the faithful go through as they adapt their practice.

One is ‘traditioning’ – giving a modern practice traditional clothing and ‘contemporisation’ – giving a traditional practice modern clothing.

So, for example, when Rabbis started giving Sermons like Christian clergy, they do so behind a lectern with a Star of David on it, a classic piece of traditioning.

Meanwhile, many Rabbis will implore their congregants to observe the Sabbath to ‘recharge their spiritual batteries’ – an act of contemporisation.

There is a need to engage in such traditioning and contemporisation in the Labour Party, so people can understand how what they do now is in continuation of what they, and previous generations have fought so hard for.

For ( a very small) example, we almost certainly need to accelerate the trend of increased distance- and flexible learning in Further Education through the internet, to make a university education more affordable.

Such talk may scare off activists, who had a traditional bricks and mortar university education and do not feel comfortable denying it to future generations.

However, a gentle reminder that this is in the best traditions of the Open University, reportedly Wilson’s proudest achievement, can help persuade the sceptical that this is a progressive measure.

Having said that, much of this is a closed language to outsiders, and is best left to internal debates.

Kinnock managed to win his titanic battles quoting Bevan, in an act of traditioning, but that limited his appeal to a wider electorate. History is important to us, but we should remember, not that important to other people.