What the hell is going on in British politics?

The Casino de Montbenon in Lausanne (Switzerland) would be a perfect setting for a James Bond movie. Set in magnificent gardens and overlooking Lake Geneva and the Alps, criminals and villains could make their entrance or escape by speedboat or helicopter. The building itself is as beautiful as it is ornate, with the minor nuance that it has never housed a gambling hall.

As I sat in its vast dining room recently, I couldn’t help but feel a certain story unfolding around me—no ropes suddenly descending from the ceiling or gunshots echoing through the room—but the reason I had been invited to such an impressive stage suddenly became apparent.

As we sat in a secluded corner of the restaurant, the conversation suddenly trailed off and my host slowly leaned forward and said, “Tell me something, Matthew, and I hope you don’t mind me asking, but when we see what you’re going on in the UK we can’t help but think, “What the hell is going on? Can you explain it please?”

Surely it’s overly dramatic to suggest that the restaurant fell into awe, but there was certainly a long pause as my European friends and colleagues waited in deep anticipation for my response.

That response, at the time, was weak, clumsy, and incoherent.

Some might say that it was therefore a perfect reflection of the state of British politics.

But today’s chaos and confusion, betrayal and turmoil demand a more honest and considered response. Here, then, is a second attempt at answering what we might call, Bond-style, “the Montbenon question.”

First of all, what is happening is not just about Prime Minister Liz Truss. Her leadership – hers and the fact that she has been given the keys to 10 Downing Street – is symptomatic of a much deeper disease of British politics: the lack of a coherent national vision. A political party or leader without a clear vision of what it wants to achieve, why it wants to achieve it, and how it intends to achieve it is unlikely to enjoy the taste of power for long.

If there has been a central vision in British politics over the last decade, it has been shrouded in Brexit fairy tales. The result has been a political vacuum.

After years of pushing Brexit or trying to prevent it, the British political establishment has no vision of the future of the UK after it leaves the EU or how it can regain a significant role in the world.

Worse still, now that the country is on the other side of Brexit, it finds itself in a world that, as Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has shown, is almost defined by volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity. They are risks that require close friends and strategic alliances, not rigidity, closed thinking and empty rhetoric.

political exhaustion

The really significant dimension of British politics today is not that the Conservative government is in disarray – the effects of incumbency tend to weigh heavily on any party after a while – but that the Labor opposition is also weak.

Recent opinion polls may suggest that the Labor Party has gained a large lead over the Conservative Party, but my feeling is that this difference is fueled by (negative) disaffection towards the Conservatives rather than positive affection towards the new vision offered. by Labour. Survey data reveals that the number of people who answer “yes” to the question “does the Labor Party have a clear objective?” it has fallen from 65% in July 2019 to around just 40% today.

The Conservative is not the only party in trouble. The party system itself is deflating.

In the past, when a ruling party ran out of steam, when its vision had run out, the pendulum of party politics swung and “the others” had a chance to inject some new ideas. But if we are brutally honest, British politics seems to be the province of two (and a half) weak and tired parties, sustained only by a lopsided electoral system.

It may be that what is really happening is that the systemic and structural weaknesses in UK governance are simply becoming more apparent. British politics is imploding, to some extent, because the principles and processes through which it “does” politics are simply not aligned with the needs and demands of an increasingly diverse and forward-thinking population.

British political culture and the institutions and processes that underpin it remain elitist. This reflects its pre-democratic origins, but tribal tendencies and aggressive antagonism seem increasingly anachronistic. Westminster politics is simply disgraceful. There is too much yelling and not enough listening. It’s a most pathetic playground policy.

The fact that the prime minister and her (now former) chancellor were able to announce such a strident policy package in what they called a “mini-budget”, eschewing formal scrutiny and essentially “flying blind” (as Gov. of the Bank of England) with the nation’s economy reveals the heart of the problem.

Power is too centralized, the rules of the game are too opaque. As the government rows backwards and the opposition screams from the sidelines, a positive vision for the future is still lacking. A vision, for example, that goes beyond the current cost of living crisis and redefines the challenge of climate change as a positive opportunity to invest and innovate for future generations.

I have a feeling that the crisis in British politics that stimulated the Montbenon issue shows no signs of abating. If we go back a bit, it may be the faltering footsteps of an old regime badly in need of modernization and revamping if any sense of government competence, public trust, and global credibility is to be regained.

Matthew Flinders, Founding Director of the Sir Bernard Crick Centre for the Public Understanding of Politics, University of Sheffield

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original.