THE ROAD FROM DEMOCRACY TO OLIGARCHY IN THE UK - HOW WE ARE BEING BLINDSIDED BY THE FEW - PART ONE

I am interested in what is happening right now in the world of politics. Very interested - and I would like to share my thinking in this series of blogposts I have called: 'The Road from Democracy to Oligarchy'. 

The Greek for 'few' is oligoi'. Government by the few, in their own interests, is therefore called 'oligarchy'. We are more familiar with the term 'democracy' - government in the interests of all, with the consent of all as expressed through the right of all to vote in elections to decide who should govern our state.  

Democracy was never a gift from the few to the many. It was hard-won. My argument in this blogpost is that we are living through a period when democracy may survive by name but the nature of our state is changing as each year passes in such a way that the interests of the few become ever more entrenched. We are witnessing, if we have eyes open wide enough to see, the return of our realm to the state of being an oligarchy. I think that this shift will see Britain become more and more identifiable as a 'failing state', perhaps even a 'failed state'. 

I am an historian by training and qualification; we all need a sense of history. Yet history was only 'more or less bunk' to a capitalist such as Henry Ford whose primary concern was the present pursuit of profit. 

And yet surveys indicate that a third of Americans believe in the literal truth of the book of Genesis in the Christian bible - how do you square believing in Creationism with the rejection of history and the pursuit of profit in the present and future?   

A 'misplaced' grasp of the past is seen as a serious problem for both single-minded ruthless individuals intent on climbing the greasy pole in the here and now and multi-national corporations whose concerns are principally with profits and dividends. If you have knowledge and understanding of the past, in so far as that leads to a sense of how injustices have arisen and been overcome, you have the imagination to see how the world can be made better through stopping the bad actions of such self-centred people and institutions. You then become, in the eyes of the few, a potential 'troublemaker' with a 'misplaced' view of the past - a 'Marxist', even.  

I will be presenting the case that our present coronavirus pandemic is being used by the few who are misgoverning us as a cover for actions that will further advance their move towards oligarchy. 

Thanks to the Guardian cartoonist for this cutting edge piece, pointing the way to oligarchy. 

I will also be saying that their moves must be challenged and resisted. 

Our planet is teetering on the edge of a climate catastrophe. Over the next five years, the leaders of the

nations of the world will either act as they must if we are to avert a global extinction - or not. Do you get much sense of our leaders in the UK having this realization at the forefront of their thinking? I mean leaders of both the Tory government and the Labour opposition.

Politics matters to everyone. We are all political beings. We all have views about society and what it should look like. If you decide that all politicians are the same and call for a curse on all their houses, you are making a strong political statement. You haven't stopped being a political person by opting out of the way the political game is being played. 

I would like to start through charting my own journey as a more active political animal over the last decade. I am edging closer and closer to a personal decision about where my vote and my political energy should go. A vision is beginning to form in my mind. A view of the direction that I think my kind of politics should take. You might like to follow me in that voyage. 

The best way for me to bring you aboard is to share the relevant section from my website, written and published in July 2017, just after the General Election of that year on 8 June when Jeremy Corbyn so nearly became the leader of the country. 

Rob Donovan - Labour Party Activist

I thought it was about time that I added another persona to my website account of myself. Here it is. Labour Party Activist. And here’s the story of how it happened. As a writer, I had already created ‘Deception’ - my cross-genre fantasy of a secular pilgrim’s journey through the social and political landscape of this country between 2010 and 2015. My socialist beliefs and inspiration were clear enough. My search for understanding after the banking crisis of 2008 squeezed any Blairite ‘Third Way’ thinking out of my head. But I belonged to no political party, having resigned from the Labour Party after the Iraq war. Living in St Ives in Cornwall, Louise and I had a Lib Dem MP, Andrew George, representing us. He had earned a reputation as a backbench rebel against the Coalition government and his own Party’s leadership – and that had appeal. Better him than a Tory. Labour seemed invisible in St Ives. We voted for Andrew George in the 2015 General Election and were shocked when the Tory meme swept through the south-west as it did in much of the country. David Cameron was returned as prime minister with the Tories enjoying an absolute majority. I turned to writing two additional chapters to ‘Deception’ – to update the tale, first with reference to the Tory election victory in 2015, and then to conclude with Jeremy Corbyn’s election as the new leader of the Labour Party. I had been gifted the perfect socialist ending that was, of course, just a beginning. ‘The Road to Corbyn’ by Rob Donovan was born. An advert for 'The Road to Corbyn' (2016) that appeared in the Morning Star in 2018. The book is now available directly from me, via Paypal, at robdonovan@waitrose.com, for £7.99 including p&p.  Shortly after Jeremy was elected leader in September 2015, Louise and I re-joined the Labour Party. My first attendance at a local Labour Party monthly meeting was in January 2016. I was very attentive and respectful and said nothing – there must have been between 40 and 50 people present and there were procedures that needed to be learnt and followed if this was to be a meaningful world to me. The next month I attended and introduced myself as the author of ‘The Road to Corbyn’. By May, the monthly attendance was down to the mid-20s and I had sold a handful of copies of my book to members. It was all a bit of an uphill struggle. When we got to the AGM in June 2016, the attendance more than doubled and I realised that the executive members of my local Labour Party were successfully fighting off a challenge from guys from a group called Momentum who had been formed to ensure that Jeremy Corbyn with his socialist values remained as leader. I was busy researching and writing Jago Stone’s biography and hadn’t yet fully processed what was happening in local Labour Party politics. To be honest, I was getting pissed off with boring meetings. I did note that one Momentum member, Keith Shilson, was elected on to the executive as a vice-chair. Then things began to warm up – boring is not the word to describe what happened next. The New Labour majority in the Parliamentary Labour Party – who also it seemed wielded power in Labour Party Headquarters and in the regional offices – were determined to stick to Tony Blair’s Third Way. Jeremy Corbyn’s socialist beliefs made him and a Party that followed him unelectable. Corbyn had to go. A leadership challenge was hatched and Jeremy targeted for dispatch. Here, in July, an extraordinary meeting was called in Helston to consider motions of no-confidence and confidence in Jeremy as leader. The turnout was massive and the defeat for New Labour crushing – the motions of no-confidence were lost by around 75 to 35 majorities. I watched as nearly all the members of the executive voted against Jeremy as leader. By the by, Keith Shilson has scarcely been elected to the local executive before he was suspended from the Party on the orders of Party HQ in London – a decision that took a good few months to be reversed. I straightaway joined Momentum and began attending their fortnightly meetings as well as the Labour Party monthly meetings. Back in London, Jeremy sailed on seemingly unmoved by the vicious attacks on him from the right-wing press and Tory politicians – and the unease of many of his own MPs. Jeremy Corbyn knew he had been elected and re-elected by a very large majority of a Party whose membership was increasing exponentially because of his leadership and his socialist values. Half a million members, most of them new, nationally. Here, in the St Ives, Penzance, Helston and Isles of Scilly areas, membership had increased from 250 to over 1000 by the end of 2016. Something big was happening and it was so exciting to be part of it. Momentum NHS Day of Action - March through the Streets of Penzance - Saturday, 26 November 2016 - some familiar faces - I'm clutching a bag of leaflets as activists do. The next AGM for the local CLP would provide the opportunity to challenge through the ballot for places on the local executive. That challenge did indeed happen in June 2017, last month – and was successful. Labour Party activists who are also members of Momentum are now reshaping the local CLP with a new emphasis on welcoming new members and including everyone in discussion and debate and activities. We are ‘a broad church’. There is more that unites than divides us. What we could not foresee was that the Tory prime minister would gift us a General Election, also in June, in which a socialist manifesto would necessarily be put before the people. Jeremy’s opponents were rubbing their hands. Now we will see the back of him! Ah! please forgive my shadenfreude – a very useful German word which means that feeling of pleasure at someone else’s misfortune. The Tories are in disarray. New Labour is biting the dust. Yes, something big, something about the transformation of our society and its warped values is underway. People are beginning to matter.

 

Labour Party canvassing in Hayle during the General Election campaign in May/June 2017 

    

This seems a good place to end the first part of this blog series. I was so full of optimism. The General Election had seen the Tories returned to power but the world of the Labour Party had been turned upside down. It seemed that Jeremy was now truly accepted as the leader. We socialists would go from strength to strength. 

Ah! - such ignorance - such naivety. 

'Neither to regret one's follies nor wish to repeat them - no happier lot can be assigned to humankind' - the wisdom of Goethe. I have learned the lesson well. 

Part Two in this series follows in a few days.