Jeremy Corbyn is neither the cause of Brexit nor is he a participant in government Brexit policy, but his incoherence is helping the Tory Right.
The truth that is suppressed by friends is the readiest weapon of the enemy.
Robert Louis Stevenson
Saturday June 23rd saw around 100 000 people from all political parties march through the centre of London to oppose Brexit and call for a second referendum. The cry went up, “Where’s Jeremy Corbyn?” who, of course, was not there. Supporters of Corbyn’s leadership need to state frankly some home truths.
Brexit is the most significant development in British politics so far this century; and Jeremy Corbyn’s position on the issue is a complete mess. In the 2016 referendum, Labour campaigned for Remain, but Jeremy’s backing was only half-hearted, as his views were still frozen in a eurosceptic hangover from the Benn years a generation before.
Essentially today Corbyn has evolved a neutral stance hovering between the three factions that divide Labour MPs on the issue - the view of the wider Labour membership, overwhelmingly anti-Brexit and radical hardly seems to count.
One faction is the Brexit supporters or sympathises (some of them post -referendum converts) who support Brexit on xenophobic grounds. These MPs, mostly, representing northern English small towns, want to echo the anti-immigrant prejudices which motivated much of the Leave vote. Their main issue is to stop free movement, and as representatives of indigenous people, instead of working people irrespective of nationality, they can’t really be considered left-wing or progressive at all.
A second faction are the so-called Lexiteers. These people believe that EU rules would prevent a future Labour government from implementing a genuine socialist programme.But the chance of a majority of Labour MPs after the next election supporting such a programme is remote. If, on the contrary, a future Labour government were to achieve the same level of social progress as in those EU countries of north-west Europe, Jeremy Corbyn would be heralded the most successful socialist prime minister in Labour history. In short, Lexiteers are fantasists, who are doing nothing more than helping the political right.
The third faction is that mass of Blairite Labour MPs who oppose Brexit, but have now reconciled themselves to campaigning for a soft Brexit in which the UK stays in the customs union and some parts of the single market. Their fault is that they are thoroughly anti-Corbyn and see Brexit entirely through the lens of business interests. Their ideal solution would be to allow freedom of movement for capital, services and goods, but to restrict the free movement of people..
For the sake of people’s rights, economic prosperity, Ireland and opposition to xenophobic populism, one would have expected Jeremy Corbyn to come out as a firm opponent of Brexit. But he does nearly nothing, except mutter that 52 percent of the electorate in 2016 backed Leave, so he supports Leave. Since when has the policy of the Labour Party been made by a poll of the British electorate? Why does he oppose a second referendum?
Labour’s position is thus utterly incoherent. The Labour Party just talks nonsense while the damage of Brexit - both economic and political - is being done by the Right of the Tory Party, almost unopposed.
Showing posts with label Brexit. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Brexit. Show all posts
27 June 2018
9 March 2018
Brexit: the physics of political power
The Brexit negotiations demonstrate the physics of political power - simple facts the Brexiteers don't like.
Brexit is a catastrophe in the making: a human tragedy for the 3-4 million people caught on the wrong side of the Channel, and an economic disaster for Britain waiting to happen.
Yes, the British electorate voted to leave the EU, but it was the choice of the Tory government to go further and decide to exit the Single Market and the Customs Union. Instead, they want a trade deal on their terms, but they should first of all recognise two things.
First, they need to acknowledge that politics is in large part the physics of power. And here the simple fact is that the economy of the remaining EU27 is six times the size of Britain's. Future impediments to trade as a result of Brexit threaten a massive 15% of British GNP, the proportion earned from exporting to the the EU27. But for the EU27 only 3% of their GNP is derived from exports to Britain. Thus London needs a transitional deal in the short term and a trade agreement in the long run much more than Brussels does.
Second, the EU27 are not going to do Britain any favours. In the first instance, they are acting to protect their interests as their declaration makes clear:
“European integration has brought peace and prosperity to Europe and allowed for an unprecedented level and scope of cooperation on matters of common interest in a rapidly changing world. Therefore, the Union’s overall objective in these negotiations will be to preserve its interests, those of its citizens, its businesses and its Member States.”
But it is not just that Britain is weaker than the EU27 and that the states remaining in the EU will not sacrifice their economic advantages for Britain's sake. There is another underlying asymmetry in the negotiations. The British government is desperate to show that Brexit will be a success and that leaving the EU does not carry huge economic costs. The EU, on the other hand, even if it doesn't admit it, wants to demonstrate that withdrawal confers no advantage on the leaving state.
The Brexiteers can say what they wish and pretend that the negotiations are between two equal teams: team UK and team EU27. They can convince themselves of anything for the right-wing populist press, but nothing changes the underlying structure of the power situation.
And to add to that, Mssrs. Davis, Johnson and Fox can hardly complain of the EU27 serving their own self-interest (acting as gang in their terms) as their own reasons for supporting Brexit, however miscalculated, are based on making a virtue of selfishness. So when Minister Liam Fox complains of ‘blackmail’ by the EU27, he has no moral case; all he is doing is recognising that the UK, as the weaker party, is losing out.
Brexit is a catastrophe in the making: a human tragedy for the 3-4 million people caught on the wrong side of the Channel, and an economic disaster for Britain waiting to happen.
Yes, the British electorate voted to leave the EU, but it was the choice of the Tory government to go further and decide to exit the Single Market and the Customs Union. Instead, they want a trade deal on their terms, but they should first of all recognise two things.
First, they need to acknowledge that politics is in large part the physics of power. And here the simple fact is that the economy of the remaining EU27 is six times the size of Britain's. Future impediments to trade as a result of Brexit threaten a massive 15% of British GNP, the proportion earned from exporting to the the EU27. But for the EU27 only 3% of their GNP is derived from exports to Britain. Thus London needs a transitional deal in the short term and a trade agreement in the long run much more than Brussels does.
Second, the EU27 are not going to do Britain any favours. In the first instance, they are acting to protect their interests as their declaration makes clear:
“European integration has brought peace and prosperity to Europe and allowed for an unprecedented level and scope of cooperation on matters of common interest in a rapidly changing world. Therefore, the Union’s overall objective in these negotiations will be to preserve its interests, those of its citizens, its businesses and its Member States.”
But it is not just that Britain is weaker than the EU27 and that the states remaining in the EU will not sacrifice their economic advantages for Britain's sake. There is another underlying asymmetry in the negotiations. The British government is desperate to show that Brexit will be a success and that leaving the EU does not carry huge economic costs. The EU, on the other hand, even if it doesn't admit it, wants to demonstrate that withdrawal confers no advantage on the leaving state.
The Brexiteers can say what they wish and pretend that the negotiations are between two equal teams: team UK and team EU27. They can convince themselves of anything for the right-wing populist press, but nothing changes the underlying structure of the power situation.
And to add to that, Mssrs. Davis, Johnson and Fox can hardly complain of the EU27 serving their own self-interest (acting as gang in their terms) as their own reasons for supporting Brexit, however miscalculated, are based on making a virtue of selfishness. So when Minister Liam Fox complains of ‘blackmail’ by the EU27, he has no moral case; all he is doing is recognising that the UK, as the weaker party, is losing out.
Brexit: Britain humbled
Far from ‘taking back control,’ Brexit has humbled Britain.
From an establishment point of view, Brexit has diminished Britain. Before the referendum, the UK, in equal standing with Germany and France, was one of the three hard-hitters in the EU. The UK had a tailor-made EU membership, with exemptions, dispensations and a budget rebate. It was the ‘respected’ representative of US interests inside the EU; and the UK was a vehicle for the City and International firms passporting into Europe. All of that is now going or has already gone.
Today, the British elite, along with the electorate, is severely divided about what to do with referendum result. Very few are still holding out hope for retention of full EU membership. Most of business, the trade unions and a majority of popular opinion want to cling to the European Union through a ‘soft Brexit.’ That means retaining membership of the Customs Union and the Single Market. But while this option is to be much preferred to to any hard withdrawal, it would inevitably mean Britain becoming a mere rule-taker; i.e. accepting EU law without having a say in its creation.
But a soft Brexit is an anathema to the Tory Brexit elite, who have the whip hand in the May Government. They want the UK to spurn the European social-market model all together and fall into step with the US economy. After the shocks of a hard withdrawal, they desire the creation of a society of low taxes, minimal rights for workers and consumers, with little or no social welfare - a European America or a Singapore on the Thames.
Nevertheless, such a long-term ‘pro-capitalist’ project is a shaky policy for the Tory Party to adopt, because it commands little electoral support and is the mirror opposite of what most working-class Leave voters want. In addition, such a strategy is of little immediate benefit to a great deal of business, which today is struggling not to be impeded in European markets.
But to understand the Brexit elite, we have to realise that for these Tories economic calculation is not everything. The Tory Brexiters are also driven by a Europhobic nationalism, which has always balked at the idea of the UK being an equal partner of other European states, let alone being subject to pan-European law. They cling to a delusional sense of their own ‘Anglo-Saxon’ superiority come what may.
One thing is clear, Brexit entails a loss of power and influence for Britain. The UK is no longer a leading partner in the EU but an isolated medium-sized country being forced to chose to which economic superpower it subordinates itself - the EU27 or the US. For the country’s institutions it's not about taking back control but about national humiliation.
From an establishment point of view, Brexit has diminished Britain. Before the referendum, the UK, in equal standing with Germany and France, was one of the three hard-hitters in the EU. The UK had a tailor-made EU membership, with exemptions, dispensations and a budget rebate. It was the ‘respected’ representative of US interests inside the EU; and the UK was a vehicle for the City and International firms passporting into Europe. All of that is now going or has already gone.
Today, the British elite, along with the electorate, is severely divided about what to do with referendum result. Very few are still holding out hope for retention of full EU membership. Most of business, the trade unions and a majority of popular opinion want to cling to the European Union through a ‘soft Brexit.’ That means retaining membership of the Customs Union and the Single Market. But while this option is to be much preferred to to any hard withdrawal, it would inevitably mean Britain becoming a mere rule-taker; i.e. accepting EU law without having a say in its creation.
But a soft Brexit is an anathema to the Tory Brexit elite, who have the whip hand in the May Government. They want the UK to spurn the European social-market model all together and fall into step with the US economy. After the shocks of a hard withdrawal, they desire the creation of a society of low taxes, minimal rights for workers and consumers, with little or no social welfare - a European America or a Singapore on the Thames.
Nevertheless, such a long-term ‘pro-capitalist’ project is a shaky policy for the Tory Party to adopt, because it commands little electoral support and is the mirror opposite of what most working-class Leave voters want. In addition, such a strategy is of little immediate benefit to a great deal of business, which today is struggling not to be impeded in European markets.
But to understand the Brexit elite, we have to realise that for these Tories economic calculation is not everything. The Tory Brexiters are also driven by a Europhobic nationalism, which has always balked at the idea of the UK being an equal partner of other European states, let alone being subject to pan-European law. They cling to a delusional sense of their own ‘Anglo-Saxon’ superiority come what may.
One thing is clear, Brexit entails a loss of power and influence for Britain. The UK is no longer a leading partner in the EU but an isolated medium-sized country being forced to chose to which economic superpower it subordinates itself - the EU27 or the US. For the country’s institutions it's not about taking back control but about national humiliation.
26 February 2018
Brexit: Blair paved the way
The policies of Tony Blair and New Labour paved the way for Brexit.
Tony Blair is rightly loathed. For the left, Blair takes pride of place among the Judas Iscariots, Vidkun Quislings and Ramsey MacDonalds. But should we re-evaluate him in light of his opposition to Brexit? Can the progressive left share a platform with this war criminal? The answer is a resounding no on multiple grounds. But one basic reason, often not singled out, is that Blair did more than anyone else to pave the way for the disastrous referendum result of June 2016. How is that so?
The New Labour government took steps to make sure that the UK became a Mecca for central and east European casual workers. In 2004, ten states, mostly former ‘socialist’ countries, joined the EU. Britain was one of only three (the other two were Ireland and Sweden) that immediately permitted workers from the new member states to take up employment in Britain’s weakly regulated employment market. Blair’s reasons were seemingly simple: to provide labour in Britain’s credit boom economy, keep wages down and see xenophobia prevent a united working class response to growing inequality.
As New Labour embraced marketisation, praised wealthy oligarchs, ciritised and privatised the public sector and marginalised trade unions, economic inequality continued to grow. Blair did not give birth to the ‘left behind’ in the post-industrial wastelands; Thatcher had already done that. But he did take away hope that Labour could make a difference to the lives of ordinary working people. As hope evaporated, especially following the financial crisis of 2008, anomic anger exploded and the 2016 referendum provided an outlet for that anger for the Barnsleys, Stokes and Hartlepools.
But even so why did so many in Britain think the UK was different and better, so that it could profitably stand alone, while the rest of Europe needed the EU? After all, economic analysis suggests the exact opposite. Post imperial illusions played a part, but the single biggest injection of national arrogance were Blair’s wars around the globe. With the exception of France, Britain is the only military power in the EU. And Blair, locked in an alliance with the US, loved military might. With Gordon Brown in tow, he promoted militarism, relished it, thereby bolstering the myth of British difference, superiority and strength.
And Blair’s was also responsible for Brexit for what he didn’t do. In 2002 he could have overcome Brown’s opposition and taken the UK into the Euro. Yes, had other things been the same, Britain would have had a worse recession in 2008, but Brexit would have been just too difficult to contemplate in 2016.
So when Blair gets up to put the case for reversing Brexit - and he does so rather eloquently - we should remember his role in bringing it about. In this, as in everything else, Blair is the consummate hypocrite.
Tony Blair is rightly loathed. For the left, Blair takes pride of place among the Judas Iscariots, Vidkun Quislings and Ramsey MacDonalds. But should we re-evaluate him in light of his opposition to Brexit? Can the progressive left share a platform with this war criminal? The answer is a resounding no on multiple grounds. But one basic reason, often not singled out, is that Blair did more than anyone else to pave the way for the disastrous referendum result of June 2016. How is that so?
The New Labour government took steps to make sure that the UK became a Mecca for central and east European casual workers. In 2004, ten states, mostly former ‘socialist’ countries, joined the EU. Britain was one of only three (the other two were Ireland and Sweden) that immediately permitted workers from the new member states to take up employment in Britain’s weakly regulated employment market. Blair’s reasons were seemingly simple: to provide labour in Britain’s credit boom economy, keep wages down and see xenophobia prevent a united working class response to growing inequality.
As New Labour embraced marketisation, praised wealthy oligarchs, ciritised and privatised the public sector and marginalised trade unions, economic inequality continued to grow. Blair did not give birth to the ‘left behind’ in the post-industrial wastelands; Thatcher had already done that. But he did take away hope that Labour could make a difference to the lives of ordinary working people. As hope evaporated, especially following the financial crisis of 2008, anomic anger exploded and the 2016 referendum provided an outlet for that anger for the Barnsleys, Stokes and Hartlepools.
But even so why did so many in Britain think the UK was different and better, so that it could profitably stand alone, while the rest of Europe needed the EU? After all, economic analysis suggests the exact opposite. Post imperial illusions played a part, but the single biggest injection of national arrogance were Blair’s wars around the globe. With the exception of France, Britain is the only military power in the EU. And Blair, locked in an alliance with the US, loved military might. With Gordon Brown in tow, he promoted militarism, relished it, thereby bolstering the myth of British difference, superiority and strength.
And Blair’s was also responsible for Brexit for what he didn’t do. In 2002 he could have overcome Brown’s opposition and taken the UK into the Euro. Yes, had other things been the same, Britain would have had a worse recession in 2008, but Brexit would have been just too difficult to contemplate in 2016.
So when Blair gets up to put the case for reversing Brexit - and he does so rather eloquently - we should remember his role in bringing it about. In this, as in everything else, Blair is the consummate hypocrite.
4 February 2018
Brexit: a affront to progressive values
The ideology behind Brexit is an affront to the values of progressive the left.
We often tend to think of Brexit only in terms of its adverse legal and economic consequences. Yet, the meaning of Brexit is more than just junking a set of legal arrangements between the UK and twenty-seven other European states. Brexitism, if I can coin that term, and the whole set of discourses which sustain it, are based on a frontal assault on the core values of the political left. These values inter alia are:
1. Universalism: the idea that people, irrespective of nation, religion or ethnicity, are of equal worth and should have the same rights and responsibilities.
2. Cosmopolitanism: the idea that the mixing of cultures has the potential to enrich, rather than undermine.
3. Liberalism: the idea that it not, in the first instance, up to society or the state to tell people how to live, but people should be able to do their own thing, providing they do not undermine the same right for others.
Brexit is an affront to each of those values. It addresses itself to the particularism of one people, not to people as people. It accredits value to one culture, a supposed Britishness and seeks to shut out others from its space. And it undermines the right of choice: the locking in or locking out of people at British borders - and by implication the persecution of those who straddle them.
Ukipery circulated the virus of Brexitism, which took hold - principly among England's non-metropolitan middle class and in its post-industrial wastelands and rotting seaside resorts - to such an extent that it won a majority of the voting electorate in June 2016. But today that virus has spread to take hold of the Conservative Party and government. It is present in what we might call National Labour, too (e.g. Frank Field, Kate Hoey, et al.) and casts a long shadow over Labour as a whole. In short, it is a pollutant across British society.
The election of Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader in 2015 was the biggest victory for the Left in Britain in a generation, but we need to make sure sure that Corbynism promotes universalism, cosmopolitanism and liberalism at the heart of its political thinking.
We often tend to think of Brexit only in terms of its adverse legal and economic consequences. Yet, the meaning of Brexit is more than just junking a set of legal arrangements between the UK and twenty-seven other European states. Brexitism, if I can coin that term, and the whole set of discourses which sustain it, are based on a frontal assault on the core values of the political left. These values inter alia are:
1. Universalism: the idea that people, irrespective of nation, religion or ethnicity, are of equal worth and should have the same rights and responsibilities.
2. Cosmopolitanism: the idea that the mixing of cultures has the potential to enrich, rather than undermine.
3. Liberalism: the idea that it not, in the first instance, up to society or the state to tell people how to live, but people should be able to do their own thing, providing they do not undermine the same right for others.
Brexit is an affront to each of those values. It addresses itself to the particularism of one people, not to people as people. It accredits value to one culture, a supposed Britishness and seeks to shut out others from its space. And it undermines the right of choice: the locking in or locking out of people at British borders - and by implication the persecution of those who straddle them.
Ukipery circulated the virus of Brexitism, which took hold - principly among England's non-metropolitan middle class and in its post-industrial wastelands and rotting seaside resorts - to such an extent that it won a majority of the voting electorate in June 2016. But today that virus has spread to take hold of the Conservative Party and government. It is present in what we might call National Labour, too (e.g. Frank Field, Kate Hoey, et al.) and casts a long shadow over Labour as a whole. In short, it is a pollutant across British society.
The election of Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader in 2015 was the biggest victory for the Left in Britain in a generation, but we need to make sure sure that Corbynism promotes universalism, cosmopolitanism and liberalism at the heart of its political thinking.
12 January 2018
Leave voters and the Brexit elite
Disconnects are usual between leaders and the led. But nowhere is this more extreme than between the average Leave voter and the Tory Brexit Westminster elite.
According to statistics the typical Brexit voter is likely to be white-English, resident outside the large metropolitan areas, as well as older, poorer and less well-educated than Remainers. In assessing why Leavers voted for Brexit, we find miscalculation of how Brexit would affect Leavers’ own economic interests mingled with the toxic allure of xenophobic nationalism.
The Leavers’ arguments were essentially not different from those peddled against outsiders throughout history, from the arrival of east European Jews at the beginning of the twentieth century to blacks in the 1950s, or Asians in the 1970s. “They take away our jobs, they drive down wages, they push up housing costs, they strain the resources available for health and education.” In 2016 there was also the financial myth that EU withdrawal would free up 350 million a week from EU contributions which could be redirected to the NHS.
These supposed financial advantages were alloyed with xenophobia and nationalism. “We will get our country back.” “We will take back control [against them, the other].” Outsiders would go or at least stop coming. The Brexit appeal was about nostalgia, the recreation of an England long gone: the England of fish and chips and Max Bygraves shows, an England where the only foreigners were the occasional “paki” on the corner and the odd Italian barber. In short, Leavers saw Brexit simultaneously as a step to improving their lot economically and securing a more ethnically homogeneous community, both ethically and socially. Brexit for them was a sub-conscious drive to turn back the clock to the society that existed under the Keynesian state managed capitalism in the decades following the Second World War.
But the Tory Brexit elite have no intention of turning back the clock. Their main complaint against the EU is not freedom of movement, but the inhibitions that the EU places on the even further extension of neo-economic liberalism. They recognise that exiting the EU will lead to capital flight (non-investment, re-location); a mass influx of cheap low quality commodities, including food, from around the world. Unemployment will grow and state revenues will fall, bringing about a near end to welfare spending and disaster for the NHS. But the Tory Brexit elite will “solve” the problem through an internationally competitive economy of low wages with a minimal welfare state and limited employment and consumer rights - and all this while waving the Union Jack.
If Brexit was an act of desperation, driven by the worst of motives, by those marginalised and left behind in Britain, the consequences of the referendum will only tighten the noose around their necks.
According to statistics the typical Brexit voter is likely to be white-English, resident outside the large metropolitan areas, as well as older, poorer and less well-educated than Remainers. In assessing why Leavers voted for Brexit, we find miscalculation of how Brexit would affect Leavers’ own economic interests mingled with the toxic allure of xenophobic nationalism.
The Leavers’ arguments were essentially not different from those peddled against outsiders throughout history, from the arrival of east European Jews at the beginning of the twentieth century to blacks in the 1950s, or Asians in the 1970s. “They take away our jobs, they drive down wages, they push up housing costs, they strain the resources available for health and education.” In 2016 there was also the financial myth that EU withdrawal would free up 350 million a week from EU contributions which could be redirected to the NHS.
These supposed financial advantages were alloyed with xenophobia and nationalism. “We will get our country back.” “We will take back control [against them, the other].” Outsiders would go or at least stop coming. The Brexit appeal was about nostalgia, the recreation of an England long gone: the England of fish and chips and Max Bygraves shows, an England where the only foreigners were the occasional “paki” on the corner and the odd Italian barber. In short, Leavers saw Brexit simultaneously as a step to improving their lot economically and securing a more ethnically homogeneous community, both ethically and socially. Brexit for them was a sub-conscious drive to turn back the clock to the society that existed under the Keynesian state managed capitalism in the decades following the Second World War.
But the Tory Brexit elite have no intention of turning back the clock. Their main complaint against the EU is not freedom of movement, but the inhibitions that the EU places on the even further extension of neo-economic liberalism. They recognise that exiting the EU will lead to capital flight (non-investment, re-location); a mass influx of cheap low quality commodities, including food, from around the world. Unemployment will grow and state revenues will fall, bringing about a near end to welfare spending and disaster for the NHS. But the Tory Brexit elite will “solve” the problem through an internationally competitive economy of low wages with a minimal welfare state and limited employment and consumer rights - and all this while waving the Union Jack.
If Brexit was an act of desperation, driven by the worst of motives, by those marginalised and left behind in Britain, the consequences of the referendum will only tighten the noose around their necks.
8 January 2018
Brexit: Corbyn should reject Leavers' arguments
Jeremy Corbyn should not respect the reasons most Leaver voted for Brexit
It is worth examining the argument, often heard, that the Labour leadership is right to back Brexit because seven out ten of Labour seats voted for Leave.
First numbers. Yes, 70% of Labour MPs may have a majority of their constituents who voted Leave, but that does not mean that a majority of the Labour voters in those seats backed Brexit. Sure, in the post-industrial towns of England, there are some seats where a majority of Labour voters probably did back Leave, but it is fewer than the touted 70% of Labour seats.
The vast majority of Brexit votes were cast for one of the following reasons, or both. First, Brexit would yield an economic advantage for ordinary people. Well, this argument is simply wrong. The other reason was the attraction of xenophobic nationalism.
So when Jeremy Corbyn talks about respecting the referendum decision, it is legitimate to ask, which of those two motivations for Brexit should be respected and promoted by Labour? Economic fallacies, or respect for xenophobic nationalism?
Those who support Corbyn and the Left, but are utterly opposed to British nationalism and xenophobia, need organisations to starting fighting within Labour (and outside it) for the policies and values in which we believe.
It is worth examining the argument, often heard, that the Labour leadership is right to back Brexit because seven out ten of Labour seats voted for Leave.
First numbers. Yes, 70% of Labour MPs may have a majority of their constituents who voted Leave, but that does not mean that a majority of the Labour voters in those seats backed Brexit. Sure, in the post-industrial towns of England, there are some seats where a majority of Labour voters probably did back Leave, but it is fewer than the touted 70% of Labour seats.
The vast majority of Brexit votes were cast for one of the following reasons, or both. First, Brexit would yield an economic advantage for ordinary people. Well, this argument is simply wrong. The other reason was the attraction of xenophobic nationalism.
So when Jeremy Corbyn talks about respecting the referendum decision, it is legitimate to ask, which of those two motivations for Brexit should be respected and promoted by Labour? Economic fallacies, or respect for xenophobic nationalism?
Those who support Corbyn and the Left, but are utterly opposed to British nationalism and xenophobia, need organisations to starting fighting within Labour (and outside it) for the policies and values in which we believe.
22 December 2017
Brexit: the myth of British superiority
The arrogance behind British nationalism is not supported by facts
One of the nationalistic-xenophobic assumptions of Brexiters is that Britain is in some way ‘better’ than its European neighbours, and, for that reason, should not be in a union with them. How else could the following comment on passports by the pro-Brexit Conservative MP Andrew Rosindell be interpreted?
“The humiliation of having a pink [sic] European Union passport will now soon be over and the United Kingdom nationals can once again feel pride and self-confidence in their own nationality when travelling…”
However, the myth of British superiority is worth probing with a few comparative facts, contrasting Britain with its immediate European neighbours. Let me take these to be Ireland, France, Germany, Benelux (Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg) and Scandinavia, all democracies since the Second World War. It is worth noting that this group of countries, including Britain, contains a majority of the EU’s population and wealth.
Among these countries, according to the IMF in 2017, Britain is the poorest in GNP per head, with $ 43 500 per year – only marginally below France, but well below Germany on $ 49 800. The smaller countries of Benelux, Ireland and Scandinavia are all considerably richer. And by the end of 2017, as a consequence of Brexit, Britain’s economic growth is lagging behind that of Eurozone, exacerbating rather than reducing the difference.
For working people, their situation is even worse than their mainland European counterparts. Britain is the most economically unequal, with inequality at an index of 34, while France and Germany both score 29. (To understand these figures, zero represents complete equality, while inequality in the United States stands at 40.)
In fact, Britain is more unequal today than at any point since the middle of the nineteenth century; And with welfare cuts in a deteriorating economy, inequality is growing further in the UK. In absolute terms, in the period 2009-16, a massive 70% of households experienced stagnation or a drop in income.
Inequality is linked to a dysfunctional society. Just to take one example, in every 100 000 people, Germany imprisons 81, France 118, but Britain a staggering 150.
If the current situation is bad, the future is worse. Brexit is already causing capital investment to avoid Britain, and for business to relocate out of the country. The prospect of trade barriers after March 2019 further impedes the economy. The Tory Brexit elite, with a whip hand in the May government, want to spurn the European social-market model all together and fall into step with the US economy. After the shocks of EU withdrawal, they seek a society of low taxes, minimal rights for workers and consumers, with little or no social welfare - a European America or a Singapore on the Thames.
The outlook is grim.
One of the nationalistic-xenophobic assumptions of Brexiters is that Britain is in some way ‘better’ than its European neighbours, and, for that reason, should not be in a union with them. How else could the following comment on passports by the pro-Brexit Conservative MP Andrew Rosindell be interpreted?
“The humiliation of having a pink [sic] European Union passport will now soon be over and the United Kingdom nationals can once again feel pride and self-confidence in their own nationality when travelling…”
However, the myth of British superiority is worth probing with a few comparative facts, contrasting Britain with its immediate European neighbours. Let me take these to be Ireland, France, Germany, Benelux (Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg) and Scandinavia, all democracies since the Second World War. It is worth noting that this group of countries, including Britain, contains a majority of the EU’s population and wealth.
Among these countries, according to the IMF in 2017, Britain is the poorest in GNP per head, with $ 43 500 per year – only marginally below France, but well below Germany on $ 49 800. The smaller countries of Benelux, Ireland and Scandinavia are all considerably richer. And by the end of 2017, as a consequence of Brexit, Britain’s economic growth is lagging behind that of Eurozone, exacerbating rather than reducing the difference.
For working people, their situation is even worse than their mainland European counterparts. Britain is the most economically unequal, with inequality at an index of 34, while France and Germany both score 29. (To understand these figures, zero represents complete equality, while inequality in the United States stands at 40.)
In fact, Britain is more unequal today than at any point since the middle of the nineteenth century; And with welfare cuts in a deteriorating economy, inequality is growing further in the UK. In absolute terms, in the period 2009-16, a massive 70% of households experienced stagnation or a drop in income.
Inequality is linked to a dysfunctional society. Just to take one example, in every 100 000 people, Germany imprisons 81, France 118, but Britain a staggering 150.
If the current situation is bad, the future is worse. Brexit is already causing capital investment to avoid Britain, and for business to relocate out of the country. The prospect of trade barriers after March 2019 further impedes the economy. The Tory Brexit elite, with a whip hand in the May government, want to spurn the European social-market model all together and fall into step with the US economy. After the shocks of EU withdrawal, they seek a society of low taxes, minimal rights for workers and consumers, with little or no social welfare - a European America or a Singapore on the Thames.
The outlook is grim.
23 October 2017
"British Jobs for British Workers” is a xenophobic and racist slogan
"British Jobs for British Workers” is a xenophobic and racist slogan: the left can debunk it.
In the 2016 EU referendum, opposing the migration of workers from central and eastern Europe into Britain was the key issue for many Leave voters, and one which was highlighted by the xenophobic UKIP party. The Leavers’ arguments were as simple as they were wrong. They said the the migrant workers took away ‘our’ jobs, depress wages and put pressure on housing and other social services. Moreover, they undermine the cultural homogeneity of ‘our’ country.
Essentially this xenophobic/racist argument is the same as the one used to oppose and discriminate against the Catholic Irish in the nineteenth century, Jews escaping pogroms at the beginning of the twentieth, blacks from the West Indies and Asians from Africa and the Indian subcontinent in the post-war period. By contrast, the British moving abroad for economic reasons are never labelled as migrants, but as ‘expats.’
It is completely correct to oppose this racism, to point out that the economy is boosted by young, migrant workers and to defend EU freedom of movement as an essential liberty. But in opposing racist lies, we shouldn’t blind ourselves to truths lurking behind the racist propaganda.
Let’s take a hypothetical case to illustrate the point. What is the sense of school cleaners in an English town commuting monthly from Romania? The workers live in appalling overcrowded conditions and receive no more than the minimum wage, while indigenous people in the town join the lines of the unemployed. At the same time a pressure is put on the local housing stock. Do circumstances such as these prove the xenophobes’ argument?
Not at all. The situation in that English town would be no different if the cleaners came not from Romania, but from Scotland or another part of Britain. The effects on local resources and local unemployment would be the same. The issue for certain jobs is not, as the racists claim, “British jobs for British workers,” but local jobs for local people. There is nothing wrong in principle in offering employment first to people who have lived in the area for a certain amount of time. Nationality has nothing to do with it. If a Romanian has lived in the town for say two years, s/he is at the front of the queue. The Brit from the other end of the country is not.
Once we accept in principle the idea of local jobs for local people in certain limited instances, we solve much of the ‘legitimate’ complaint and reveal the xenophobic and racist character of the slogan, “British jobs for British workers.”
In the 2016 EU referendum, opposing the migration of workers from central and eastern Europe into Britain was the key issue for many Leave voters, and one which was highlighted by the xenophobic UKIP party. The Leavers’ arguments were as simple as they were wrong. They said the the migrant workers took away ‘our’ jobs, depress wages and put pressure on housing and other social services. Moreover, they undermine the cultural homogeneity of ‘our’ country.
Essentially this xenophobic/racist argument is the same as the one used to oppose and discriminate against the Catholic Irish in the nineteenth century, Jews escaping pogroms at the beginning of the twentieth, blacks from the West Indies and Asians from Africa and the Indian subcontinent in the post-war period. By contrast, the British moving abroad for economic reasons are never labelled as migrants, but as ‘expats.’
It is completely correct to oppose this racism, to point out that the economy is boosted by young, migrant workers and to defend EU freedom of movement as an essential liberty. But in opposing racist lies, we shouldn’t blind ourselves to truths lurking behind the racist propaganda.
Let’s take a hypothetical case to illustrate the point. What is the sense of school cleaners in an English town commuting monthly from Romania? The workers live in appalling overcrowded conditions and receive no more than the minimum wage, while indigenous people in the town join the lines of the unemployed. At the same time a pressure is put on the local housing stock. Do circumstances such as these prove the xenophobes’ argument?
Not at all. The situation in that English town would be no different if the cleaners came not from Romania, but from Scotland or another part of Britain. The effects on local resources and local unemployment would be the same. The issue for certain jobs is not, as the racists claim, “British jobs for British workers,” but local jobs for local people. There is nothing wrong in principle in offering employment first to people who have lived in the area for a certain amount of time. Nationality has nothing to do with it. If a Romanian has lived in the town for say two years, s/he is at the front of the queue. The Brit from the other end of the country is not.
Once we accept in principle the idea of local jobs for local people in certain limited instances, we solve much of the ‘legitimate’ complaint and reveal the xenophobic and racist character of the slogan, “British jobs for British workers.”
25 August 2017
End Labour’s Brexit Incoherence
Opposing Hard Brexit is not issue-number-one for Labour, but we still need coherence
In the June 2017 General Election Jeremy Corbyn was completely correct to emphasise the bread-and-butter issues that impact directly on working people’s lives: eternal austerity, mushrooming inequality, the running down of public services in health education and transport, and the unaffordability of housing - ideas encapsulated in the slogan “For the Many Not the Few.” The Liberal Democrats highlighted opposition to Brexit and flopped.
The reason is clear. The vast majority of British voters are not affected directly by Brexit. Most do not live or work in the EU27, nor did they ever plan to do so. Few have family members with other EU passports.The loss of European political rights is prioritised only by politically conscious progressives; and the negative economic impact of Brexit for most people is indistinguishable from the other failings of British capitalism.
But, because Brexit is not issue-number-one, that can’t justify Labour’s obscurantism. There seem to me to be three possible reasons (none of them good) why Jeremy lines up by default behind the Tory Brexiteers and doesn’t clearly call for retaining membership of the Single Market and the Customs Union. Remaining in these institutions would remove the economic cost of withdrawal from the EU and keep Freedom of Movement. What are Corbyn’s not-very-good reasons?
First, by not saying anything coherent, Labour keeps the focus on the Tory Government. Brexit is likely to be a disaster, mainly economic, leading to division within, and opposition to, the Tories. Labour, it could be argued, will benefit in the 2022 election.
Second, Hard Brexit will remove any legal restrictions on Britain. A future majority Labour Government could then start implementing ‘socialism in one country.’
Third, that minority of Labour voters, and potential voters, who are ardent Leave supporters, would be so incensed by retaining freedom of movement that they would be able to prevent the election of a Labour Government.
For me none of these arguments adds up, nor do they justify Labour’s muddled messages on Brexit and on freedom of movement in particular.
As things are going at present, from the end of March 2019 Freedom of Movement will exist from Donegal to Athens, from the Arctic Circle to Sicily and from Tallinn to Lisbon, with just the UK excluded. Britons will be locked in - lacking the right to retire to Spain, study in Berlin or work in Paris. The Polish plumber in London may be able to stay with “settled status” as a second class citizen, but his younger brother can’t come to work with him. No socialist should be muddled about opposing such a state of affairs.
Postscript: At the end of August 2017, the Labour leadership let it be known that now Labour would support continued membership of the Single Market and the Customs Union for at least between two and four years after the UK leaves the EU in March 2019. The issue of permanent membership would be left open. On the desirability of freedom of movement, Labour's message remains muddled.
In the June 2017 General Election Jeremy Corbyn was completely correct to emphasise the bread-and-butter issues that impact directly on working people’s lives: eternal austerity, mushrooming inequality, the running down of public services in health education and transport, and the unaffordability of housing - ideas encapsulated in the slogan “For the Many Not the Few.” The Liberal Democrats highlighted opposition to Brexit and flopped.
The reason is clear. The vast majority of British voters are not affected directly by Brexit. Most do not live or work in the EU27, nor did they ever plan to do so. Few have family members with other EU passports.The loss of European political rights is prioritised only by politically conscious progressives; and the negative economic impact of Brexit for most people is indistinguishable from the other failings of British capitalism.
But, because Brexit is not issue-number-one, that can’t justify Labour’s obscurantism. There seem to me to be three possible reasons (none of them good) why Jeremy lines up by default behind the Tory Brexiteers and doesn’t clearly call for retaining membership of the Single Market and the Customs Union. Remaining in these institutions would remove the economic cost of withdrawal from the EU and keep Freedom of Movement. What are Corbyn’s not-very-good reasons?
First, by not saying anything coherent, Labour keeps the focus on the Tory Government. Brexit is likely to be a disaster, mainly economic, leading to division within, and opposition to, the Tories. Labour, it could be argued, will benefit in the 2022 election.
Second, Hard Brexit will remove any legal restrictions on Britain. A future majority Labour Government could then start implementing ‘socialism in one country.’
Third, that minority of Labour voters, and potential voters, who are ardent Leave supporters, would be so incensed by retaining freedom of movement that they would be able to prevent the election of a Labour Government.
For me none of these arguments adds up, nor do they justify Labour’s muddled messages on Brexit and on freedom of movement in particular.
As things are going at present, from the end of March 2019 Freedom of Movement will exist from Donegal to Athens, from the Arctic Circle to Sicily and from Tallinn to Lisbon, with just the UK excluded. Britons will be locked in - lacking the right to retire to Spain, study in Berlin or work in Paris. The Polish plumber in London may be able to stay with “settled status” as a second class citizen, but his younger brother can’t come to work with him. No socialist should be muddled about opposing such a state of affairs.
Postscript: At the end of August 2017, the Labour leadership let it be known that now Labour would support continued membership of the Single Market and the Customs Union for at least between two and four years after the UK leaves the EU in March 2019. The issue of permanent membership would be left open. On the desirability of freedom of movement, Labour's message remains muddled.
4 April 2017
Jeremy Corbyn is hamstrung over Gibraltar
Jeremy Corbyn can’t state the obvious on Gibraltar because he has gone along with Brexit.
At the end of March it became known that Spanish diplomats had succeeded in inserting a clause into the provisional treaty governing the transition after Britain leaves the EU in March 2019. The clause states that those transitional arrangements will only apply to Gibraltar if Spain agrees.The British Government which desperately needs a transitional agreement to prevent a cliff edge departure from the EU can neither veto nor opt-out; they just have take what they are given - or walk away with nothing.
Now whether the tax-haven Gibraltar is ruled by Britain or Spain doesn’t interest me, nor does the loss of international power by the British state. But there is a point here. The Brexiteers who are all British nationalists of one sort or another, claimed that EU departure was about ‘taking back control.’ Yet the reality, as highlighted by the Gibraltar issue, shows the exact opposite: a massive loss of ability for the British state to wield influence and control.
And, had Jeremy Corbyn continued to oppose Brexit after the referendum - of course mainly for reasons nothing to do with Gibraltar - he could have pressed home the point that power and influence are seeping away from Britain, and the Brexiteers’ triumphalism of a powerful, proud and independent nation is a mere delusion. But with Corbyn de facto co-sponsoring Brexit with the Tories, and inevitably falling into step with with the nationalist discourse that accompanies it, the Labour leader is hamstrung and can’t make the point.
At the end of March it became known that Spanish diplomats had succeeded in inserting a clause into the provisional treaty governing the transition after Britain leaves the EU in March 2019. The clause states that those transitional arrangements will only apply to Gibraltar if Spain agrees.The British Government which desperately needs a transitional agreement to prevent a cliff edge departure from the EU can neither veto nor opt-out; they just have take what they are given - or walk away with nothing.
Now whether the tax-haven Gibraltar is ruled by Britain or Spain doesn’t interest me, nor does the loss of international power by the British state. But there is a point here. The Brexiteers who are all British nationalists of one sort or another, claimed that EU departure was about ‘taking back control.’ Yet the reality, as highlighted by the Gibraltar issue, shows the exact opposite: a massive loss of ability for the British state to wield influence and control.
And, had Jeremy Corbyn continued to oppose Brexit after the referendum - of course mainly for reasons nothing to do with Gibraltar - he could have pressed home the point that power and influence are seeping away from Britain, and the Brexiteers’ triumphalism of a powerful, proud and independent nation is a mere delusion. But with Corbyn de facto co-sponsoring Brexit with the Tories, and inevitably falling into step with with the nationalist discourse that accompanies it, the Labour leader is hamstrung and can’t make the point.
1 April 2017
Corbyn should realise that Brexit will screw working people
Jeremy Corbyn is wrong to support and downplay Brexit. He should oppose processes which attack working people.
March 29th 2017 saw the British Government finally triggering Article 50 to start the two year process of leaving the European Union. In the House of Common, Jeremy Corbyn hardly made headlines when he repeated his Brexit mantra “Brexit is the will of the people,” and no to Britain becoming a low tax, low regulation economy.
Quite clearly Corbyn doesn’t feel strongly about Brexit. He probably thinks it is an issue which will just fade away. Or he might even harbour illusions of it granting his vainly hoped-for majority Labour government, elected in 2020, extra powers. In the meantime, however, he wants to concentrate on economic issues and leave talking about Brexit to others.
But what Corbyn fails to understand is the link between Brexit and the increased exploitation of working people. Brexit is already causing capital flight, for instance the news the following day that Lloyds and J. P. Morgan were moving some of their operations outside the UK. And on top of that, much more capital simply won’t flow into Britain in the first place. Trade barriers increase costs. So put simply the Tories, to maintain profit levels, will need to increase exploitation through a further cutting of wages, taxes,employment rights and benefits.
It won’t be long before the economic price of Brexit becomes obvious. And Corbyn will pay heavily for his foolishness in co-sponsoring Brexit with the May Government.
March 29th 2017 saw the British Government finally triggering Article 50 to start the two year process of leaving the European Union. In the House of Common, Jeremy Corbyn hardly made headlines when he repeated his Brexit mantra “Brexit is the will of the people,” and no to Britain becoming a low tax, low regulation economy.
Quite clearly Corbyn doesn’t feel strongly about Brexit. He probably thinks it is an issue which will just fade away. Or he might even harbour illusions of it granting his vainly hoped-for majority Labour government, elected in 2020, extra powers. In the meantime, however, he wants to concentrate on economic issues and leave talking about Brexit to others.
But what Corbyn fails to understand is the link between Brexit and the increased exploitation of working people. Brexit is already causing capital flight, for instance the news the following day that Lloyds and J. P. Morgan were moving some of their operations outside the UK. And on top of that, much more capital simply won’t flow into Britain in the first place. Trade barriers increase costs. So put simply the Tories, to maintain profit levels, will need to increase exploitation through a further cutting of wages, taxes,employment rights and benefits.
It won’t be long before the economic price of Brexit becomes obvious. And Corbyn will pay heavily for his foolishness in co-sponsoring Brexit with the May Government.
12 March 2017
Brexit: Corbyn Screwed Up
Jeremy Corbyn steered Labour into unconditionally supporting Brexit. In so doing he stained progressive politics and sunk the Left.
When Jeremy Corbyn was elected to the Labour leadership in 2015, my hopes were rekindled that for the first time in decades a progressive force had emerged in British politics. But Corbyn’s decision to whip the PLP into voting unconditionally for the May Government’s hard Brexit finally dashed any such optimism. There are some mistakes in politics which are survivable, and some which are not. Corbyn’s Brexit stance, I believe, falls into the latter category.
Let us add up the damage.
1. Corbyn aligned Labour alongside the xenophobia which is the cause and effect of Brexit. Many right-wing Labour MPs are seemingly happy to accommodate themselves to the wave of anti-liberal, foreigner-hating nationalism now sweeping England, but the tragedy for the progressive left is that Corbyn joined them. His commitment to Freedom of Movement is dead, even if he continues to plead the case of the three million or so non-British EU nationals resident in the UK.
2. Seventy percent of Labour voters, and an even larger majority of Labour members, voted for Remain. The vast bulk of the young left that joined to support Corbyn’s leadership campaigns saw Britain’s future in the EU. Many will now be seeking new political homes, or abandoning politics altogether. The future for the left in the party without them is bleak.
3. Corbyn threw away the chance of building any kind of progressive alliance with other centre and left-leaning parties: the Liberal Democrats, SNP and the Greens. A key element of any working arrangement would have been opposing Brexit and the consequences of Brexit. The official Labour position, namely, that it will win the 2020 General Election single handed is highly improbable.
4. Brexit will impede trade and drive away investment. And, as the economic negatives become apparent, Labour will lack any credibility in blaming Theresa May’s hard Brexit on the Tories. Corbyn led Labour through the Tory lobbies and thus willed the consequences.
Following the House of Commons vote to endorse a hard Brexit backed by Corbyn, the Labour leader tweeted,"Real fight starts now. Over next two years Labour will use every opportunity to ensure Brexit protects jobs, living standards & the economy." This must rank among the most pathetic utterances in modern political history, as he vouched to fight the consequences of his own actions. Corbyn hopelessly mis-analysed the situation, lost friends without finding new ones, damaged the left, and stained Labour as a progressive movement.
It is hard not to agree with Martin Kettle writing in The Guardian (02-March-2017), "There is nothing socialist about this, nothing social democratic, nothing liberal, nothing progressive, nothing moral, nothing with any optimism or imagination.”
When Jeremy Corbyn was elected to the Labour leadership in 2015, my hopes were rekindled that for the first time in decades a progressive force had emerged in British politics. But Corbyn’s decision to whip the PLP into voting unconditionally for the May Government’s hard Brexit finally dashed any such optimism. There are some mistakes in politics which are survivable, and some which are not. Corbyn’s Brexit stance, I believe, falls into the latter category.
Let us add up the damage.
1. Corbyn aligned Labour alongside the xenophobia which is the cause and effect of Brexit. Many right-wing Labour MPs are seemingly happy to accommodate themselves to the wave of anti-liberal, foreigner-hating nationalism now sweeping England, but the tragedy for the progressive left is that Corbyn joined them. His commitment to Freedom of Movement is dead, even if he continues to plead the case of the three million or so non-British EU nationals resident in the UK.
2. Seventy percent of Labour voters, and an even larger majority of Labour members, voted for Remain. The vast bulk of the young left that joined to support Corbyn’s leadership campaigns saw Britain’s future in the EU. Many will now be seeking new political homes, or abandoning politics altogether. The future for the left in the party without them is bleak.
3. Corbyn threw away the chance of building any kind of progressive alliance with other centre and left-leaning parties: the Liberal Democrats, SNP and the Greens. A key element of any working arrangement would have been opposing Brexit and the consequences of Brexit. The official Labour position, namely, that it will win the 2020 General Election single handed is highly improbable.
4. Brexit will impede trade and drive away investment. And, as the economic negatives become apparent, Labour will lack any credibility in blaming Theresa May’s hard Brexit on the Tories. Corbyn led Labour through the Tory lobbies and thus willed the consequences.
Following the House of Commons vote to endorse a hard Brexit backed by Corbyn, the Labour leader tweeted,"Real fight starts now. Over next two years Labour will use every opportunity to ensure Brexit protects jobs, living standards & the economy." This must rank among the most pathetic utterances in modern political history, as he vouched to fight the consequences of his own actions. Corbyn hopelessly mis-analysed the situation, lost friends without finding new ones, damaged the left, and stained Labour as a progressive movement.
It is hard not to agree with Martin Kettle writing in The Guardian (02-March-2017), "There is nothing socialist about this, nothing social democratic, nothing liberal, nothing progressive, nothing moral, nothing with any optimism or imagination.”
7 March 2017
Socialism and nationalism are not compatible
You can be a nationalist or a socialist, but you can’t be both.
A nationalist is someone who prioritises allegiance to a national group ahead of other political considerations. Thus those Labour politicians who talk about 'the will of the British people' as a trump card in politics are nationalists – just like the fascists who shout out "Britain First." Of course, there are many different varieties of nationalists. Politicians and parties combine their nationalism with other political objectives; and some varieties are far less odorous than others. Yet whatever the type, there are two reasons why socialists do not embrace nationalism.
First, the nationalist, by virtue of making the national group the most important factor of identification, creates a dichotomy between those who are members of the defined national group and those who are not. People are divided, favoured and discriminated against by characteristics that they cannot, or at least cannot easily, change. Socialists, in contrast, are universalists, whose politics embrace people irrespective of nationality or ethnicity. Nationalism and socialism cannot be combined because one negates the other.
Second, the nationalists’ construction of the concept of a nation is a historical undertaking, which involves looking backwards to find historical customs, myths, language usage, etc. which supposedly bind the people of the nation. By looking backwards, nationalism tends to be conservative and finds its ideals in the past. Socialists, in contrast, believe in freeing people from historical oppressions and see the ideal world as something to be created by human beings in the future. And that future is based on what is progressive from a combination of all human history, not that of one nation.
Internationalism is not the opposite of nationalism. Internationalism involves the recognition of different nationalisms and works for them to coexist on a friendly and cooperative basis. The opposite of nationalism is anationalism (or cosmopolitanism), which seeks the unity of people irrespective of nationality or ethnicity.
One thing should be made clear. Someone who calls for autonomy or independence for a territory, is not for that reason alone, a nationalist. For instance, the demand for an independent Scotland can be less nationalistic than those wielding the unionist rhetoric of the 'integrity of the British nation.'
In England Brexit has fuelled nationalism, and socialists need to confront it.
A nationalist is someone who prioritises allegiance to a national group ahead of other political considerations. Thus those Labour politicians who talk about 'the will of the British people' as a trump card in politics are nationalists – just like the fascists who shout out "Britain First." Of course, there are many different varieties of nationalists. Politicians and parties combine their nationalism with other political objectives; and some varieties are far less odorous than others. Yet whatever the type, there are two reasons why socialists do not embrace nationalism.
First, the nationalist, by virtue of making the national group the most important factor of identification, creates a dichotomy between those who are members of the defined national group and those who are not. People are divided, favoured and discriminated against by characteristics that they cannot, or at least cannot easily, change. Socialists, in contrast, are universalists, whose politics embrace people irrespective of nationality or ethnicity. Nationalism and socialism cannot be combined because one negates the other.
Second, the nationalists’ construction of the concept of a nation is a historical undertaking, which involves looking backwards to find historical customs, myths, language usage, etc. which supposedly bind the people of the nation. By looking backwards, nationalism tends to be conservative and finds its ideals in the past. Socialists, in contrast, believe in freeing people from historical oppressions and see the ideal world as something to be created by human beings in the future. And that future is based on what is progressive from a combination of all human history, not that of one nation.
Internationalism is not the opposite of nationalism. Internationalism involves the recognition of different nationalisms and works for them to coexist on a friendly and cooperative basis. The opposite of nationalism is anationalism (or cosmopolitanism), which seeks the unity of people irrespective of nationality or ethnicity.
One thing should be made clear. Someone who calls for autonomy or independence for a territory, is not for that reason alone, a nationalist. For instance, the demand for an independent Scotland can be less nationalistic than those wielding the unionist rhetoric of the 'integrity of the British nation.'
In England Brexit has fuelled nationalism, and socialists need to confront it.
7 February 2017
Brexit: a sense of foreboding
Britain voted for Brexit in June 2016: eight months later we are still in the phoney war.
As a kid my grandmother and I often took the 113 bus home. I loved travelling on the upper deck of the red London bus. As we turned into Edgwarebury Lane, Granny and I had to prepare to get off, and she warned me, “Don’t stand up before we’ve turned the corner. You’ll fall.” Doubting the wisdom of Granny’s words, I stood up without holding on saying, “See, I didn’t fall.” “Yes,” said Granny, “but we haven’t turned the corner yet.”
Something like that is very much how I feel today about Brexit, the almost mindless amputation of the UK from the EU and the EFTA single market. Britain is going to a very lonely place, and while it is true that very little has happened in the phoney war so far - except for a rise in fear and a drop in the value of sterling - the gathering dark clouds are ominous.
Business will gravitate out of the UK to EU countries simply because it makes more sense to have easy access to hundreds of millions of workers and consumers than to sixty-five millions. The UK will respond by becoming an economic dependent on the US and accelerating towards a low-regulation, low-wage economy.
Who loses? Higher unemployment, lower pay, worse working conditions and poorer social provision will affect all working people. But non-British EU citizens in Britain and British citizens in other EU countries will face the brunt. At worst it means expulsion, creating the worst ethnic cleansing in Europe, Yugoslavia aside, since World War Two. At best four million people will experience discrimination and insecurity in their adopted homelands.
If the future beholds a toxic mix of ascendant xenophobic nationalism and economic dislocation, we have much to fear. Reassuring White Papers and statements by Tory ministers tell us what government wants and what they hope will happen. They might tell us, “Get over it,” but it hasn’t happened yet, and the pain is likely to be bigger and more long-lasting than we think.
As a kid my grandmother and I often took the 113 bus home. I loved travelling on the upper deck of the red London bus. As we turned into Edgwarebury Lane, Granny and I had to prepare to get off, and she warned me, “Don’t stand up before we’ve turned the corner. You’ll fall.” Doubting the wisdom of Granny’s words, I stood up without holding on saying, “See, I didn’t fall.” “Yes,” said Granny, “but we haven’t turned the corner yet.”
Something like that is very much how I feel today about Brexit, the almost mindless amputation of the UK from the EU and the EFTA single market. Britain is going to a very lonely place, and while it is true that very little has happened in the phoney war so far - except for a rise in fear and a drop in the value of sterling - the gathering dark clouds are ominous.
Business will gravitate out of the UK to EU countries simply because it makes more sense to have easy access to hundreds of millions of workers and consumers than to sixty-five millions. The UK will respond by becoming an economic dependent on the US and accelerating towards a low-regulation, low-wage economy.
Who loses? Higher unemployment, lower pay, worse working conditions and poorer social provision will affect all working people. But non-British EU citizens in Britain and British citizens in other EU countries will face the brunt. At worst it means expulsion, creating the worst ethnic cleansing in Europe, Yugoslavia aside, since World War Two. At best four million people will experience discrimination and insecurity in their adopted homelands.
If the future beholds a toxic mix of ascendant xenophobic nationalism and economic dislocation, we have much to fear. Reassuring White Papers and statements by Tory ministers tell us what government wants and what they hope will happen. They might tell us, “Get over it,” but it hasn’t happened yet, and the pain is likely to be bigger and more long-lasting than we think.
29 January 2017
Brexit: victory for the British far right
Brexit and right-wing xenophobic nationalism are symbiotically related. Each is the result and cause of the other.
The decision by the May government to plough on with its preparations for a hard Brexit is certainly injurious to business, but it is even more harmful to the interests of ordinary working people. Let’s list the damage:
In the first instance Brexit propaganda targeted East European EU citizens in the UK, but behind that veneer lay racist antipathy to anyone not white British. Thus the defining moment in Ukip's campaign was Nigel Farage standing in front of a poster showing long queues of Syrian refugees in Slovenia - an issue nothing to do with Britain’s EU membership. But that did not matter a jot to Farage; the poster was promoting racist fear of ‘the other’, and the message hit home in its intended constituency.
The causes of the current explosion of right-wing populism are various, but one idea needs to be knocked on the head. It is false to claim the existence of high numbers of non-British EU citizens in a locality caused a high Leave vote. It did not. Those areas with the highest number of non-British EU citizens, such as London, Manchester or Bristol, voted Remain. Ukip propaganda was most successful wherever multicultural communities were lacking, not where they existed.
Right-wing populism is the diametric opposite of everything socialists stand for. The Labour Party is not properly the party of British working people; it is the party of workers in Britain, irrespective of race, ethnic background or nationality. Socialists support multicultural and cosmopolitan communities across the UK, and defend the free movement of EU citizens as a basic acquired right. There is no such thing as a Left-wing Brexit because the political reality is that Brexit is a tool of the right to restrict individual freedoms and social solidarity in favour of authoritarian nationalism, xenophobia and ethnic chauvinism.
Labour has responded badly to the referendum result. While the result does give Prime Minister May a mandate to pursue Brexit, it does not bind the Labour Party to anything. If a majority in a referendum had voted for capital punishment, would Labour then support it? Of course not. Labour policy is made by its members, not by national referenda.
Sadly, Labour has backed the triggering Article 50, mostly in a misguided attempt of stave off Ukip’s advance in northern seats. Yet, the more right-wing populism is accommodated, the more acceptable and stronger it becomes. The more Labour capitulates to Ukip’s agenda, the more it betrays the young, and the multicultural and progressive communities in the metropolitan centres across England.
On Labour’s right-wing, politicians have been quick to accommodate themselves to the xenophobic upsurge. Rachel Reeves among others has sung the praise of immigration controls on EU citizens. Andy Burnham, Labour’s candidate for mayor of Manchester, has chided Labour for prioritising access to the internal market over ending free movement. But the left, too, has not disentangled itself entirely from the right-wing populist offensive. John MacDonald has foolishly spoken of Brexit as an “enormous opportunity.” Well it is, but only for the enemies of the left. Jeremy Corbyn, for his part, while courageously defending free movement, has sometimes given the impression that Brexit is a low priority issue.
Labour should echo the Liberal Democrats, Greens and SNP in opposing Brexit. Insofar as Brexit is unstoppable, we should strive to remain in the European Economic Area (the so-called Norway solution), and with that retain free movement. And, if Britain does in the end leave the EU, which seems likely, we should work with the left across Europe for Britain to rejoin.
The decision by the May government to plough on with its preparations for a hard Brexit is certainly injurious to business, but it is even more harmful to the interests of ordinary working people. Let’s list the damage:
- Economic pain: sterling down, lower investment and the prospect of tariffs
- Workers rights: a bonfire of EU-created employment rights can be expected..
- Mass insecurity: for millions of EU residents in the UK and reciprocally for UK citizens in other EU states;
- Locked in: British citizens will have no right to live and work in mainland Europe.
- Scotland: to be taken out of the EU against its will.
- Northern Ireland: the re-imposition of a ‘hard’ border will threaten the peace process;
- Racism and xenophobia: stimulated and legitimised in Britain.
- European Identity: undermined and fractured.
- Pan-European socialism: a united fightback across the continent undermined.
In the first instance Brexit propaganda targeted East European EU citizens in the UK, but behind that veneer lay racist antipathy to anyone not white British. Thus the defining moment in Ukip's campaign was Nigel Farage standing in front of a poster showing long queues of Syrian refugees in Slovenia - an issue nothing to do with Britain’s EU membership. But that did not matter a jot to Farage; the poster was promoting racist fear of ‘the other’, and the message hit home in its intended constituency.
The causes of the current explosion of right-wing populism are various, but one idea needs to be knocked on the head. It is false to claim the existence of high numbers of non-British EU citizens in a locality caused a high Leave vote. It did not. Those areas with the highest number of non-British EU citizens, such as London, Manchester or Bristol, voted Remain. Ukip propaganda was most successful wherever multicultural communities were lacking, not where they existed.
Right-wing populism is the diametric opposite of everything socialists stand for. The Labour Party is not properly the party of British working people; it is the party of workers in Britain, irrespective of race, ethnic background or nationality. Socialists support multicultural and cosmopolitan communities across the UK, and defend the free movement of EU citizens as a basic acquired right. There is no such thing as a Left-wing Brexit because the political reality is that Brexit is a tool of the right to restrict individual freedoms and social solidarity in favour of authoritarian nationalism, xenophobia and ethnic chauvinism.
Labour has responded badly to the referendum result. While the result does give Prime Minister May a mandate to pursue Brexit, it does not bind the Labour Party to anything. If a majority in a referendum had voted for capital punishment, would Labour then support it? Of course not. Labour policy is made by its members, not by national referenda.
Sadly, Labour has backed the triggering Article 50, mostly in a misguided attempt of stave off Ukip’s advance in northern seats. Yet, the more right-wing populism is accommodated, the more acceptable and stronger it becomes. The more Labour capitulates to Ukip’s agenda, the more it betrays the young, and the multicultural and progressive communities in the metropolitan centres across England.
On Labour’s right-wing, politicians have been quick to accommodate themselves to the xenophobic upsurge. Rachel Reeves among others has sung the praise of immigration controls on EU citizens. Andy Burnham, Labour’s candidate for mayor of Manchester, has chided Labour for prioritising access to the internal market over ending free movement. But the left, too, has not disentangled itself entirely from the right-wing populist offensive. John MacDonald has foolishly spoken of Brexit as an “enormous opportunity.” Well it is, but only for the enemies of the left. Jeremy Corbyn, for his part, while courageously defending free movement, has sometimes given the impression that Brexit is a low priority issue.
Labour should echo the Liberal Democrats, Greens and SNP in opposing Brexit. Insofar as Brexit is unstoppable, we should strive to remain in the European Economic Area (the so-called Norway solution), and with that retain free movement. And, if Britain does in the end leave the EU, which seems likely, we should work with the left across Europe for Britain to rejoin.
20 January 2017
Are the British UKIP and the American Trump fascists?
The fascistic aspects of UKIP and Trump are not enough to label them fascists
Talk on the left often compares the anti-liberal xenophobic nationalism behind Brexit and Trump with the rise of fascism in the 1930s. Is the comparison valid?
Some similarities clearly exist: the attack on liberal values, on rational expertise and cosmopolitanism, through a promotion of ethnic chauvinism, authoritarian nationalism and economic protectionism; and all of this tied up with a vision of a utopian future created out of an imagined past. These ideas do contain elements of fascism, so the label ‘fascistic” could be legitimately applied to the thinking and also to those who promote it.
Yet outside eastern Europe, the populist right has worked within, rather than threatened, democratic structures – and the mainstream populist right have so far not engaged in a cult of organised violence against their domestic opponents. Thus attaching terms like fascist, let alone Nazi, to UKIP and similar parties would be inaccurate.
But, of course, the world today is different from that of the 1930s. Then the workers’ movement was a powerful contender for power; now it is not. Business, today, much of it multinational, does not need nationalist extremists to protect its interests against a weak and largely unorganised working class. So the far right’s main opponent is bourgeois liberalism, not socialism or communism; and therefore its configuration and tactics are different.
But the lesson of the Nazi assumption of power should teach us one thing. Weimar democracy was far from perfect, but Germany until 1933 was a civilised country. In a relatively short time the Nazi regime was able create a chamber of horrors with the complicity of the existing state apparatus. The vulnerability of liberal democracy should never be underestimated. Who would have thought a year ago that EU citizens in the UK, many who have been resident for years, would be be reduced to bargaining chips in the May government’s Brexit negotiations?
Talk on the left often compares the anti-liberal xenophobic nationalism behind Brexit and Trump with the rise of fascism in the 1930s. Is the comparison valid?
Some similarities clearly exist: the attack on liberal values, on rational expertise and cosmopolitanism, through a promotion of ethnic chauvinism, authoritarian nationalism and economic protectionism; and all of this tied up with a vision of a utopian future created out of an imagined past. These ideas do contain elements of fascism, so the label ‘fascistic” could be legitimately applied to the thinking and also to those who promote it.
Yet outside eastern Europe, the populist right has worked within, rather than threatened, democratic structures – and the mainstream populist right have so far not engaged in a cult of organised violence against their domestic opponents. Thus attaching terms like fascist, let alone Nazi, to UKIP and similar parties would be inaccurate.
But, of course, the world today is different from that of the 1930s. Then the workers’ movement was a powerful contender for power; now it is not. Business, today, much of it multinational, does not need nationalist extremists to protect its interests against a weak and largely unorganised working class. So the far right’s main opponent is bourgeois liberalism, not socialism or communism; and therefore its configuration and tactics are different.
But the lesson of the Nazi assumption of power should teach us one thing. Weimar democracy was far from perfect, but Germany until 1933 was a civilised country. In a relatively short time the Nazi regime was able create a chamber of horrors with the complicity of the existing state apparatus. The vulnerability of liberal democracy should never be underestimated. Who would have thought a year ago that EU citizens in the UK, many who have been resident for years, would be be reduced to bargaining chips in the May government’s Brexit negotiations?
16 January 2017
Trump promises UK a trade deal
Britain will become a US economic satellite.
Britain is inexorably hurtling towards a ‘hard’ Brexit. This is not only a disaster for the millions of EU citizens in Britain and British citizens in other EU countries, but exiting the European internal market will throw Britain into the clutches of the Trump’s America, economically and politically.
In the EU British capitalism was a major player, but under US tutelage, Washington will have the whip hand. Trade agreement there may be, but it will be on US terms.
How will British capitalism operate as a US economic satellite? We know: freed of EU social legislation it will slash social spending, worker protections and wages. The working class Leave voters will rue that day in June 2016 when they backed Brexit.
Britain is inexorably hurtling towards a ‘hard’ Brexit. This is not only a disaster for the millions of EU citizens in Britain and British citizens in other EU countries, but exiting the European internal market will throw Britain into the clutches of the Trump’s America, economically and politically.
In the EU British capitalism was a major player, but under US tutelage, Washington will have the whip hand. Trade agreement there may be, but it will be on US terms.
How will British capitalism operate as a US economic satellite? We know: freed of EU social legislation it will slash social spending, worker protections and wages. The working class Leave voters will rue that day in June 2016 when they backed Brexit.
26 November 2016
Defend Free Movement
The free movement of EU citizens between member states was a major gain for ordinary working people. Brexit and Labour’s right-wing threaten it.
“I refuse to imagine a Europe where lorries and hedge funds are free to cross borders but citizens are not,” Martin Schulz, President of the European Parliament, October 2016.
In 2004 the New Labour government was one of only three in the EU to permit the immediate right of citizens from the new member states of central and eastern Europe to live and work in their country. Blair and Brown's decision in the matter was motivated by neither love nor international solidarity, but by a desire to dampen wage pressure in Britain’s inflated and credit-fuelled economy. East European migration into Britain was a policy of New Labour.
Yet, in the wake of the Brexit referendum leading right wing Labour MPs, including Rachel Reeves, Stephen Kinnock and Chuka Umunna, have called for Labour to end free movement. After Brexit, EU citizens will be able to move, live and work freely across the European continent, but the UK should, in their view, be locked out of free movement.
The hypocrisy and political bankruptcy of these right wingers is breathtaking. After rightly campaigning for EU membership, which guarantees freedom of movement, they subsequently underwent a conversion, now arguing that EU nationals should lose the right to live and work in the UK. Such an outcome would affect not only future arrivals, but also the million plus people already resident. Their reasoning is that the presence of people of other nationalities in the community prompted the Brexit vote; and the way to garner votes is to outflank UKIP and the Tory right by falling into step with the slogan, “Stop them coming; kick them out.” They probably know that such a policy by Labour would inflame xenophobia and further the racist attacks already taking place, but they presumably don’t care.
In their desire to curtail the free movement of people, these right wingers ignore a key fact. It was not those areas with the highest concentrations of non-British EU citizens (e.g. London, Manchester, Bristol) which voted for Brexit. The existence of strong multicultural communities did not lead to Brexit support. On the contrary, it was where xenophobic and racist propaganda was accepted and believed that a majority plumped for Brexit. The right wingers are not responding to a demand by those in places of high non-British EU settlement - they are accepting and building on the xenophobic and racist propaganda put out by UKIP and the far right, and are seeking to exploit prejudices and misinformation to their political advantage.
Socialists should condemn the whole mindset of these people. We should celebrate and support the fact that today people in the EU, including ourselves, can live and work in any EU country we choose. We need to defend that right for everybody, not undermine it. And as socialists in Britain, we should support workers and people in the community, be they English, Irish, Polish or whatever. Their idea propagated that we should favour one nationality and have others thrown out of their jobs, homes and the country is utterly repugnant. And fortunately, thanks to the re-election of Jeremy Corbyn, the ideas put forward by these Labour MPs will have no support from the leader of the Labour Party.
“I refuse to imagine a Europe where lorries and hedge funds are free to cross borders but citizens are not,” Martin Schulz, President of the European Parliament, October 2016.
In 2004 the New Labour government was one of only three in the EU to permit the immediate right of citizens from the new member states of central and eastern Europe to live and work in their country. Blair and Brown's decision in the matter was motivated by neither love nor international solidarity, but by a desire to dampen wage pressure in Britain’s inflated and credit-fuelled economy. East European migration into Britain was a policy of New Labour.
Yet, in the wake of the Brexit referendum leading right wing Labour MPs, including Rachel Reeves, Stephen Kinnock and Chuka Umunna, have called for Labour to end free movement. After Brexit, EU citizens will be able to move, live and work freely across the European continent, but the UK should, in their view, be locked out of free movement.
The hypocrisy and political bankruptcy of these right wingers is breathtaking. After rightly campaigning for EU membership, which guarantees freedom of movement, they subsequently underwent a conversion, now arguing that EU nationals should lose the right to live and work in the UK. Such an outcome would affect not only future arrivals, but also the million plus people already resident. Their reasoning is that the presence of people of other nationalities in the community prompted the Brexit vote; and the way to garner votes is to outflank UKIP and the Tory right by falling into step with the slogan, “Stop them coming; kick them out.” They probably know that such a policy by Labour would inflame xenophobia and further the racist attacks already taking place, but they presumably don’t care.
In their desire to curtail the free movement of people, these right wingers ignore a key fact. It was not those areas with the highest concentrations of non-British EU citizens (e.g. London, Manchester, Bristol) which voted for Brexit. The existence of strong multicultural communities did not lead to Brexit support. On the contrary, it was where xenophobic and racist propaganda was accepted and believed that a majority plumped for Brexit. The right wingers are not responding to a demand by those in places of high non-British EU settlement - they are accepting and building on the xenophobic and racist propaganda put out by UKIP and the far right, and are seeking to exploit prejudices and misinformation to their political advantage.
Socialists should condemn the whole mindset of these people. We should celebrate and support the fact that today people in the EU, including ourselves, can live and work in any EU country we choose. We need to defend that right for everybody, not undermine it. And as socialists in Britain, we should support workers and people in the community, be they English, Irish, Polish or whatever. Their idea propagated that we should favour one nationality and have others thrown out of their jobs, homes and the country is utterly repugnant. And fortunately, thanks to the re-election of Jeremy Corbyn, the ideas put forward by these Labour MPs will have no support from the leader of the Labour Party.
31 July 2016
Brexit: the nightmare becomes reality
On 23 June 2016 the United Kingdom voted in a referendum, 52 to 48 percent, to leave the European Union.
Brexit is a political, economic, and cultural disaster for Britain. The right-wing politicians who spearheaded the Leave campaign were the xenophobe, Nigel Farage (UKIP leader) and the Tory opportunist and showman Boris Johnson (former mayor of London), a man who aspired to replace Cameron as Prime Minister, but was stopped in his tracks by the Tory establishment.
The success of the Leave campaign was due to their hammering a single point: if Britain left the EU the number non-British workers and immigrants in the country could be reduced. Their campaign was openly xenophobic and sometimes racist. Yet the fact that this xenophobia bore fruit in Labour-voting heartlands outside the multi-cultural metropolitan areas was that it tapped into a well of anomic anger arising from the pains inflicted on working people by unbridled market fundamentalism (under both Tory and New Labour) since the 1980s.
Enhanced in English politics today, as a result of the Leave campaign, are two unpleasant right-wing forces. The first is the strengthening of illiberal, xenophobic and nationalistic ideologies, promoted by UKIP and right-wing elements in the Tory Party. This has already led to a string of street attacks on people judged “non-British.” The second force is an accelerated neo-economic liberalism advocating a bonfire of worker and consumer protections along with welfare rights and benefits. These two, xenophobic nationalists and free-market fantasists, may at times collide, but their dialectical dance on the political right will probably drown out the voices of the metropolitan liberal left, social democracy and wider progressive left.
The ramifications for British politics resulting from Brexit are huge, especially for Scotland which voted heavily to remain in the EU, and for Northern Ireland where some sort of re-imposed border with the Republic seems almost inevitable. Exactly when, or at what speed, Brexit will occur remains to be seen. But the threat and reality of a Britain excluded from the single market promises economic pain, which will in turn exacerbate the political tensions.
Brexit is a political, economic, and cultural disaster for Britain. The right-wing politicians who spearheaded the Leave campaign were the xenophobe, Nigel Farage (UKIP leader) and the Tory opportunist and showman Boris Johnson (former mayor of London), a man who aspired to replace Cameron as Prime Minister, but was stopped in his tracks by the Tory establishment.
The success of the Leave campaign was due to their hammering a single point: if Britain left the EU the number non-British workers and immigrants in the country could be reduced. Their campaign was openly xenophobic and sometimes racist. Yet the fact that this xenophobia bore fruit in Labour-voting heartlands outside the multi-cultural metropolitan areas was that it tapped into a well of anomic anger arising from the pains inflicted on working people by unbridled market fundamentalism (under both Tory and New Labour) since the 1980s.
Enhanced in English politics today, as a result of the Leave campaign, are two unpleasant right-wing forces. The first is the strengthening of illiberal, xenophobic and nationalistic ideologies, promoted by UKIP and right-wing elements in the Tory Party. This has already led to a string of street attacks on people judged “non-British.” The second force is an accelerated neo-economic liberalism advocating a bonfire of worker and consumer protections along with welfare rights and benefits. These two, xenophobic nationalists and free-market fantasists, may at times collide, but their dialectical dance on the political right will probably drown out the voices of the metropolitan liberal left, social democracy and wider progressive left.
The ramifications for British politics resulting from Brexit are huge, especially for Scotland which voted heavily to remain in the EU, and for Northern Ireland where some sort of re-imposed border with the Republic seems almost inevitable. Exactly when, or at what speed, Brexit will occur remains to be seen. But the threat and reality of a Britain excluded from the single market promises economic pain, which will in turn exacerbate the political tensions.
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