CHICAGO-SCHOOLED:

The rise and fall of New Labour: The architect of the Third Way argues that although the Blair-Brown years may not have been the new dawn promised in 1997, Labour’s achievements were still considerable. (Anthony Giddens, 17 May 2010, New Statesman)

From the outset, the architects of New Labour offered a compelling diagnosis of why innovation in left-of-centre politics was needed, coupled with a clear policy agenda. In outline, this diagnosis ran as follows: the values of the left - solidarity, a commitment to reducing inequality and protecting the vulnerable, and a belief in the role of active government - remained intact, but the policies designed to pursue these ends had to shift radically because of profound changes going on in the wider world. Such changes included intensifying globalisation, the development of a post-industrial or service economy and, in an information age, the emergence of a more voluble and combative citizenry, less deferential to authority figures than in the past (a process that intensified with the advent of the internet).

Most of Labour's policy prescriptions followed from this analysis. The era of Keynesian demand management, linked to state direction of economic enterprise, was over. A different relationship of government to business had to be established, recognising the vital role of enterprise in wealth creation and the limits of state power.

Hard as it is for the Left to accept, this diagnosis was pioneered by American economists advising Augusto Pinochet and then exported to Thatcher's England. Of course, the Right can't accept that Clinton and Blair pursued its conservative formula either. David Cameron, by bringing the Liberal Democrats into the fold, has a unique opportunity to make the Tories the first permanently Third Way party. The opportunity escaped George W. Bush on the scorched earth of Florida.

Posted by Orrin Judd at May 17, 2010 6:01 AM