A few thoughts on @cjbickerton’s long and insightful analysis of why the left has declined: newstatesman.com/world/europe/2… The problem is not just that parties of the left ‘too socially deracinated and isolated to know what it is that people want’. 1/
It is also that class-based politics, and politics grounded in universalist perspectives, have given way to identity-based politics; and that for many people ‘needs and desires’ have become defined by the claims of identity. 2/
The left seems not to know how to deal with the challenge of identity politics except either by surrendering to it, and hence undermining the possibilities more universalist policies and solutions, or by giving up entirely on ideals such as social equality 3/
One expression of this is that the three fundamental roots of any progressive movement – a defence of individual rights; economic policies based on social need; a belief in collective action – have been torn apart. 4/
Those who today rightly bemoan the corrosion of collective movements and community organizations often also want to deny rights to others – such as migrants or gays. Those who take a liberal view on social issues are often happy with a more atomized society. 5/
The challenge, therefore, for any party/movement of the left is to take all three elements of a progressive outlook – a defence of individual rights, economic policies based on social need, and the embrace of collective action – and stitch them into a coherent social movement. 6/
And that, of course, is easier said than done. 7/
