‘A socialism of utility – not posturing’

A recent FT piece by Janan Ganesh asked “Why must a socialist also be woke?” He was right about the political opportunity for “culturally moderate to conservative socialism combined with equitable economic socialism” (we dispensed with command and control economic policies long ago). In fact, he could be a lapsed Labour voter.

He’s correct to say that capitalists (particularly now those who accumulate financially rather than implementing inventive, risk-taking enterprise) have been “lucky in their enemies”. That’s largely because, through the voting generations, capitalism has been shrewd enough to mobilise the taunt of “the politics of envy” and everyone is naturally against that original sin. More prosaically, they have been able to convey, often through media that they own for that specific political purpose, that “the Left begins by taxing us – and then they will come after you, the hard-working people on modest earned incomes. Beware! Vote against their plundering – and now their weird wokeness!”.

Mr Ganesh says that capitalism “emphasises the individual”. He doesn’t acknowledge the reality that, over centuries, capitalist exploitation has often systematically suppressed individuality and, indeed, entrepreneurial competitor challenges. Neither does he recognise that many socialists, particularly those who always rejected Soviet Communism, have regarded their efforts to be firmly focused on collective endeavour and contribution for the explicit purpose of enabling meaningful and universal individual emancipation through parliamentary means. That actually defines democratic socialism, certainly in European systems.

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That emphasis on individual freedom is probably why it was rather easy to link the economic and social aspirations of socialism to the original – US Civil Rights – meaning of “woke”. From the 1920’s it meant being alert to prejudice and discrimination and in favour of mutual respect, civilised conduct and legal rights of citizenship. That, to answer Mr Ganesh’s headline question, is why socialists are generally willing to be that kind of “woke”.

In recent years, however, something called “wokeism” has, superficially and self-indulgently, been propounded as “socialism” by some in the posturing Left and, more cunningly, by the Right. The Democratic Socialists of America would be offering the historic version of “woke” now if they had stuck to the originating principles of their 1980’s founder, my friend and comrade, Mike Harrington. But, with exceptions like Bernie Sanders (when he leads rather than follows), Zohran Mamdami (who sensibly focuses on practical public needs and policy responses) and – latterly – Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez who showed herself to be an adroit (no pun intended) politician by saying recently that “Woke 1.0 was crazy”, too many haven’t.

Instead, “woke” has somehow metamorphosed into an obsessive affectation by some on the Left and a dismissive insult by the Right. By exploiting the grand title of “rebels” many Lefties (thankfully not all) have made their “wokeism” into tiresome self-righteousness on a good day and plain daft on a bad, gesture laden, wind-filled day. “Defund the police” is a case in point: The privileged will always have protection; the rest would be bereft. Absurd. And abolishing Defence? That means letting Putin take the White House instead of having it occupied by a glib, exploitative appeaser who can, and will, leave on constitutional schedule. Ridiculous, as Mr Ganesh says.

Here, in the UK, Jeremy Corbyn and most of those with him, can be acquitted of the extremities of “woke” pretentiousness.  We live in a time when disillusionment and anxiety has intensified the appeal of instantaneous simplicities to young generations. This is easy for socialists to understand, but not to embrace. We must instead recognise that “Labour must always prove that its idealism is not lunacy, nor its realism mere torpor”. The way in which some seemed to allow their pro-Palestinianism to degenerate into anti-semitism was unforgiveable. But, for a time, many Corbynistas were just the latest in a long line of fanciful self-indulgents on the British Left (“Hard” Left was always a lazy misnomer – they are rigid, but not resiliently steely). Like those before them, they appeared to think that, ultimately, widespread recognition of Conservative and capitalist injustice and inequity would strip away the “false consciousness” of the electorate and bring voters to “authentic”, daring socialism. Some still share that illusion, I assume. They always have. 

Zack Polanski is now seeking to attract much the same excited sentiment. He appears to be relegating the prominence of green (I.e. environmental) objectives having realised that “a plague on all their feeble, money grubbing, youth-ignoring, pragmatic houses” has stronger emotional appeal to (justifiably) anxious and insecure young cohorts.

Recognising that, and its causes and implications, is not patronising or mocking. It is a call to action for all of us – not just politicians, who know that a productive social and economic contract with young people must be rapidly and meaningfully established. No society can afford to lose the trust of its young.

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Socialism has had a bumpy existence. Theorists, and some enlightened practitioners, started using the term two centuries ago. As the Industrial Revolution roared to life, they were seeking to give new primacy to the needs and potential of a “just society”. Marx then invented “scientific” socialism (with, of course, the patronage of prosperous friends). In the hands of ruthlessly opportunistic disciples proffering liberation, that eventually turned into a Communist dictatorship of the proletariat that was inverted to be authoritarian rule over the working class. After 70 years, it collapsed under its own contradictions and incompetence. That fate was supposed to befall capitalism but, manifestly, it hasn’t.

If socialist “political entrepreneurs” anywhere focused resolutely on the tangible priorities of equity and quality and efficiency in production and distribution, surpluses would be generated in mixed economies, liberty enlarged and the responsibility and transparency that must accompany it matured. 

Considerate discernment, universal mutual respect of difference, pragmatic programmes and decisions. These are core essentials of the original “woke”. Freed from posturing they could become conventional and the intolerant “identity politics” of right and left made redundant. Practical socialist values would advance. The democratic societies that have accumulated even some of those attributes demonstrate the possibilities. They are now not oddities. They work, and with evident success.

Obviously, the outcome of such an evolution would not be Utopia which, thankfully, is unattainable. But, for a world in climate and political peril, it would have utility. And that must be attainable. Socialists believe in the realism of that. It is the motive for serving and representing humanity.

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