Postmodern politics

In an interview with the Times Jess Phillips says of May and Corbyn:

There is an old-fashionedness about both of them. They are of a bygone era. It’s a bit like The Good Life – she’s Margo and he’s Tom. Their politics are so seventies. It’s hate migrants, love miners. They’re both in this terrible situation where they’re very traditional, very stubborn, bloody difficult people.

This is a false equivalence. There’s a massive difference between the two. May’s hatred of migrants has ruined lives: caused the deportation of British citizens, forced people out of work and denied them healthcare. Corbyn’s 70s politics has had done much less damage*.

What we have here is an example of a dominant but under-appreciated feature of our age - a postmodern politics in which words and appearances are everything and consequences and reality are nothing.

Now, I stress that Ms Phillips is perhaps the least of offenders here: her stance on domestic violence, for example, betokens a lively awareness of ground truth.

Instead, what she’s given us is an example of something described elsewhere in the Times by Janice Turner. As she says “deeds matter far less than words”. So, for example, Davos men “espouse philanthropy while recoiling at any mention of tax”, and men who take private jets can establish their green credentials with just a few words.

There are though, many more examples:

 - Brexiters obsess about trade deals, oblivious to the fact that these do little to actually boost trade, and to the fact that membership of the EU is not the binding constraint upon the UK exporting more to non-EU countries. This makes sense only if we regard trade deals as an end in themselves, an expression of our sovereignty rather than as a means to greater prosperity.

 - The Tories and centrists – with the connivance of the BBC – have redefined the economy to mean the public finances, where what matters is giving the impression of being in control of government borrowing: the truth, of course, is that no such control exists as government borrowing is the counterpart of private net saving. As John Kay has said, we have “government by announcement” in which policy statements are all that matter to the exclusion of ground truth.

 - The BBC is keen to report splits and gaffes but recoils from detailed policy analysis. As John Humphrys said when asking what type of Brexit Leavers wanted, this is “all getting a wee bit technical and I’m sure people are fed up to the back teeth of all this talk of stuff most of us don’t clearly understand.” That was more than two years after the referendum; in a rational reality-based policy the issue would have been resolved long ago.

 - The likelihood that austerity has shortened life expectancy and caused tens of thousands of deaths has been under-reported on the BBC. And when somebody tries to mention this fact – as Aditya Chakrabortty did on Question Time last year – they are treated as if they have committed a gross solecism. Which in fact they have – of bringing reality into a politics which attempts to deny it.   

 - For the centre and right, the financial crisis was like the Gulf war for Jean Baudrillard: it did not take place (pdf). They show no sign of having learned that capitalism is more fragile and less dynamic that we thought in the 1990s, and so we require very different economic policies.  

What we have, therefore, is a politics of hyper-reality wherein:

What passes for reality is a network of images and signs without an external referent, such that what is represented is representation itself. 

Our problem is not merely that politics has been distorted by fake news and Russian money. It is that mainstream politicians, and much of the media, has effaced reality almost completely.

* Yes, he might well have emboldened anti-semites – but the material damage this has done to Jews is not (yet?) comparable to that done to many of the Windrush generation.

Comments

[Dave Timoney]

I think you're being generous in considering Phillips the least of offenders. She may well be a good constituency MP and has effectively campaigned on domestic violence and other issues, but she has achieved little and seems only too happy to be known for her performance.

In a more serious, substantive political culture, I suspect she would be pretty obscure. Her promotion by the media appears to be because her ego is large enough to fill the policy void of centrism. The problem then is not just that we have effaced reality, but that we are beginning to breed monsters.

[Scratch]

"It’s hate migrants, love miners."

Heh. One wonders what La Phillips feels the correct attitude towards miners ought to be.

I don't think this is a cheap shot, it seems to be a core (and increasingly explicit) current within bourgeois liberal ideology.

[Ray Thomson]

Other crucial difference is that Labour's not been in power for a while.

[e]

JP's ground truth is but a part – highlighting egregious consequences, with little or no concern for cause beyond masculinity, is to offer nothing but support for more prison places. (My apologies if at some point somewhere a connection with socio-economic stress and a good life is made, I haven't seen or heard any such).
And are you being fair, fact/data driven, re who might be emboldening anit-semites?

[ltr]

Yes, he might well have emboldened anti-semites...

[ Care to explain this absurd, really awful, accusation. I am appalled at this absurd accusation. ]

[Brian]

To Chris it looks like post-modern politics. To me, it looks like developing world politics: corruption, dishonesty, lies, massive wealth transfers below the radar. We thought we’d export British values, but it seems more like we’ve imported everyone else’s bad habits.

[Coco]

“There’s a massive difference between the two. May’s hatred of migrants has ruined lives: caused the deportation of British citizens, forced people out of work and denied them healthcare. Corbyn’s 70s politics has had done much less damage*.”

Whether or not the conclusion about the relative unsuitability of the two for a leading political office is correct: This argument strikes me as being far below the standard of this blog.

Of course May has done much more damage than Corbyn – as Ray Thomson has stated, she has political power and he hasn’t. Would she have been in opposition, her hatred of immigrants wouldn’t have had much practical effect either. And only if Corbyn gets to govern will we find out how much damage his myopia (Israel-related and otherwise) will do in practice.