Key Idea: Is Nostalgia Killing Politics? | Book

TThe pop culture of past generations weighs like a dark cloud over today’s youth. Teenagers may have their own subcultures, but the mainstream is all about nostalgia. A blockbuster film is a sequel, remake, or long-running epic. The most-watched shows on Netflix are 90s sitcoms or odes to the past like Stranger Things. Glastonbury’s main stage is packed with OAPs performing tribute acts to their youth. The top music story of 2024 is the return of Oasis, a band whose songwriters were born during the Wilson administration.

This is all a function of the Internet, where the past is always present in easily accessible form, leaving little space for anything new or innovative. In a slightly more subtle way, it’s doing the same for politics, with more serious consequences than the constant champagne supernova on the radio.

This is most evident in the decline of the Conservative Party, which has essentially become a boomer Facebook group masquerading as a political party. Their leadership battle has already seen calls for the return of grammar schools (most of which close before anyone under 60 can attend them) and as if they were all still there. , the usual attacks on “militant trade union leaders” are being carried out. Most of the public sector workers are not female graduates, but volsier miners. At a party conference, leadership candidate Kemi Badenoch suggested that statutory maternity benefits (introduced in 1987) and the minimum wage (in 1999) are among innovations that impose an unfair burden on businesses.

Above all, there was the veneration of St. Margaret, with leadership candidates falling to one another in a rush to condemn Keir Starmer for moving her portrait from one room of Downing Street to another, and Robert Jenrick succumbing to his daughter’s death. She even revealed that her middle name is Thatcher. It’s not as bad as the 2022 contest, where Liz Truss literally dressed up as a former prime minister and recreated her most famous photoshoot, but it’s not far off.

The most transformative prime ministers moved away from outdated consensus and tried different approaches.

This is not only because of the raucous atmosphere it gives the party, but also because it is tied to supporting a rhetorical agenda that no longer makes sense. Future political challenges center around climate change, AI, and rising costs of public services. The Conservatives are talking about grammar schools, the right to buy and the restoration of state services. As the nostalgic Facebook meme suggests, it feels like we’re only a speech or two away from calling for the return of a “proper bin man.”

Considering all this, it’s surprising that just 13% of people under 50 voted Conservative in this election, compared to 42% of pensioners, according to pollster YouGov. That’s not the point. This age structure is not common; in 2015, people under 50 made up 34% of the party. It is difficult to see how they can recover from this backward politics, but they are not willing to risk alienating the rest of their base who still continue to vote for them because they remember the winter of discontent.

Labor was still not as badly trapped as in the past and fared much better with younger voters (although it did not win a majority of votes in any age group). But they are in danger of making Tony Blair their Thatcher-like totem.

Mr Starmer’s policy agenda has important differences from Mr Blair’s. First, it is more nationalist, as evidenced by the renationalization of rail lines, which have not yet returned to public ownership, and the creation of state-run GB Energy by Ed Miliband. The prime minister’s personal politics are more to the left than his predecessor.

But Mr Starmer ensured he had Mr Blair’s personal blessing at a pre-election conference held by Mr Blair’s think tank and subsequently hired a slew of Blair-era advisers. The de facto number two in Downing Street is Pat McFadden, who was Prime Minister Blair’s political secretary. Matthew Doyle, director of communications, was deputy secretary under Blair. Michael Barber, Prime Minister Blair’s new “adviser on effective delivery”, has made a name for himself by running Blair’s delivery department. A number of new Labor ministers, from Alan Milburn to Jackie Smith, returned as advisers and Lords ministers.

There is logic in placing people who have served some of the most successful elected Labor leaders in an inexperienced team. But like the Conservatives, the challenges today are not the same as they were in 1997.

Perhaps the most telling example so far of the dangers of using old strategies was the decision to rule out major tax increases during the election. This is seen as a key moment in Blair’s success as prime minister. However, strong growth in 1997 enabled us to fund public services without raising taxes. That is no longer true, and the government has found itself in a trap, at least in part, of its own making. It is impossible to avoid tax increases, maintain borrowing rules and avoid another wave of austerity. Something has to give.

Similarly, when it comes to the NHS, we have done a very good job of bringing back people like Mr Milburn and Wes Street adviser Paul Corrigan, who ran New Labour’s reform programme, but they have been very successful in bringing back people like Mr Milburn and Wes Street’s adviser Paul Corrigan, who ran New Labour’s reform programme, but they have been very successful in bringing back people like Mr Milburn and Wes Street adviser Paul Corrigan, who ran New Labour’s reform programme. We did it in a completely different context with increased numbers and more experienced staff. The approach to reform today will necessarily be very different.

The need to do things differently applies not just to policy, but also to how governments communicate. Alastair Campbell revolutionized ‘spin’ in the 1990s. His approach worked in the pre-Internet era, but it’s less effective today. Broadcasting bad news at 7.30pm on Friday nights was a cynical but effective move when newspapers and the BBC Bulletin were the main ways voters were informed, but today it just seems desperate. , it doesn’t make much of a difference in how much coverage the article gets. get. Even phrases used only by politicians, such as “I don’t take lectures” or “the nation’s hardworking families,” seem outdated now.

For better or worse, the most transformative prime ministers are those who break away from outdated consensus and try different approaches. Thatcher and Blair themselves constantly called for a break with past failures, including those for which they were responsible.

If today’s politicians want to address the real challenges we face, they need to stop anxiously evoking and serving the spirits of the past and learn to speak a new language.

Sam Freedman is the author of Failed State: Why Nothing Works and How We Fix It (Macmillan).

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