AND THE THIRD SHALL BE FIRST

The rise and fall of the Third Way (Andrew Leigh, June 09, 2003, Online Opinion)

In 1998, a new term hit the political scene. According to two of the most powerful leaders in the developed world, US President Bill Clinton and British Prime Minister Tony Blair, the "Third Way" was the ideology of the future. Their declarations, and a series of subsequent Third Way summits, evoked strong responses from political parties in all parts of the ideological spectrum. For a while, momentum began to build behind the phrase. But five years on, the Third Way movement seems largely to have lapsed, at least as measured by media and academic interest in the past three years.

It is possible to distil five ideas that encapsulate the core of Third Way thinking: transcending the distinction between left and right; advancing equality of opportunity; employing mutual responsibility; strengthening communities; and embracing globalisation. [...]

If one accepts that the theory of the Third Way was relevant to modern social democratic parties, then there are two possible reasons why it might have slipped from prominence in recent years. One is that it explained too much - and has now been accepted by the majority of social democratic parties in the developed world. The alternative is that it explained too little, and has declined because policymakers have realised that it does not provide guidance on the most difficult choices to be made in government. [...]

The mere fact that the Third Way arose in the late-1990s makes it difficult to see how it could have affected the move to the right by many social democratic parties over the previous two decades. Indeed, it seems more likely that the electoral success of conservative political parties in Britain, the US and Germany during the 1980s was a much more significant factor in a transition that had begun even before the collapse of Eastern European state socialism in 1989-90. But likewise, critics of the left are wrong to say that the Third Way has declined because of its rejection of their values.

Most mainstream policymakers in social democratic parties today sit comfortably within the scope of the Third Way. Yet so would many conservative policymakers, and therein lies the rub. [...]

For many policymakers, the very generality of the Third Way has meant that it does little to help them choose between competing proposals. As Ralf Dahrendorf, Director of the London School of Economics, has argued, the Third Way is a politics that speaks of the need for hard choices but then avoids them by trying to please everybody.

The main problem of the Third Way seems quite obvious, that it is nothing more than conservatism with a smiling face and without the courage of its convictions. So if you look at the defining characteristics above, they are basically tenets of conservative, except for the "transcending" schtick, which seemingly means adopting conservatism without admitting it to yourself. So, for instance, a Bill Clinton can campaign on transforming welfare, but when a Republican Congress hands him a bill to actually do so, one that requires people take responsibility for their lives, he ends up having to fight and even veto it, because accepting he's become a Republican is so devastating psychologically. And when it comes time to truly restore and strengthen community, by reducing government services and making people look to family, friends, neighbors, associations and churches for help, the
Third Wayers, like the communitarians before them, find themselves constitutionally unable to take the step. The same personal motivation that makes them cloak their conservatism in liberal dress seems to prevent them from taking the difficult actions that will displease many people and make them seem mean. But we all know what happens to folks who want everyone to like them and who try to please everyone, in the long run no one takes them seriously. Posted by Orrin Judd at June 10, 2003 8:05 AM