The right have differences of opinion too, but are much better at coming together when it matters
Post-election, we’ve seen the inevitable flurry of analysis from left-leaning political pundits, politicians and commentators about why the Labour Party drastically failed to win a majority.
What went wrong, why the party failed to engage voters, and vague suggestions of what to do about it, mainly centred on the need for reflection and new leadership.
Electing the right opposition leader to present a real challenge to the Tories is certainly a priority. But what of civil society?
The community groups, trade associations, charities, NGOs, social enterprises, think tanks, and individuals who don’t agree with Tory cuts that are increasing poverty in the UK, who marched against austerity last weekend to demand an alternative, who want to see a fairer society for all.
What are they doing to improve the chances of power being in the hands of a more progressive government? Unsurprisingly, there are lots of individuals and groups calling for change and action, as well as some actually doing something about it, but not in a joined up way. And herein lies the problem.
Journalist Sunny Hundal published a piece on Labour List last week called, ‘Why the left keeps crashing and burning, and what to do about it‘, claiming that activists on the left tend to lose momentum and let their campaigns fizzle out because of a lack of strategy and planning beyond protests, leading to in-fighting, poor timing and weak implementation.
Hundal makes three simple suggestions for what to do:
1. Build infrastructure and fundraise
2. Avoid clichéd and lazy messaging (a la UKIP) that alienates potential supporters
3. Get young people voting
All good suggestions. So how do we get there? When I tweeted Sunny to ask when he was organising an event or discussion to decide how to put his words into action, he half- jokingly suggested someone else should do the work. But who?
Though Twitter is alive with debate, I haven’t seen a show of hands to take this forward.
Beyond protests – which certainly have their value – we need someone to grab activists by the scruff of the neck, sit them down and facilitate a structured and clear conversation designed to generate a broad agreement on why the movement is failing, what can be done about it, who can do it, and how.
Many of us are familiar with this process when mobilising campaigns and movements, so it seems crazy that we can’t get it together for ‘the left’ as a whole.
From what I’ve gathered, the main problem is that no one is really sure who exactly the ‘left’ is or should be, and don’t feel they have the energy, money or time to tackle the differences that have divided people in the past.
But I think this is where the ‘right’ have always had us. They know the left is divided, poorly funded and thus badly organised. They feed off it.
They also have differences of opinion, as we can clearly see amongst front and backbenchers of the Conservatives and with the rise of UKIP, but when it comes to crunch time i.e. an election, they pool together and unify their messages, presenting a stronger face to the voters.
We cannot let this go on. Mass mobilisation isn’t easy, but with so many savvy digitalists, campaigners, thinkers and organisers around, it shouldn’t be impossible. We just need to take the first step. A discussion: a room, some tables, pens and paper, the internet and a few laptops.
I’m in, and willing to help organise. Who’s with me?
Natasha Dyer is head of the London office, DHA Communications. Follow her on Twitter
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29 Responses to “Why can’t the left get unified?”
wj
Labour, it’s in the title – where in this article, apart from the mention of “individuals” is there any mention of manual workers; these are the people who have been hit the hardest by both parties’ policies.
To the person on the street NGOs, think tanks, charities, and other enterprises have become anathemas – in our cities we see different bodies setting themselves up and awarding each other hard-needed funds to produce services that only exist in their own hive-like minds.
It has been suggested quite a lot recently that Labour should drop its name and become a Social Democratic/Progressive party – I agree with that as it will release the Labour banner to be taken up, once more, by the C2s and Ds that have been trodden underfoot.
Keith M
The problem is factionalism, instead of fighting each other we need to fight the common enemy and show discipline and a United front.
Bret R
You make it sound so simple but how can we do that when we don’t agree on how broad a definition of “enemy” we should use and what sort of changes we might want to make?
Are Bankers the enemy? Are “bad” business people the enemy? Are our bosses the enemy? Are the Tory backbenchers the enemy? Are Tories, in general, the enemy? Are right wing politicians of all hues the enemy? Is the BBC the enemy? Is Parliament the enemy? Are Capitalists the enemy? Are unreconstructed non-Feminists, who aren’t comitted to ending patriarchy the enemy? Are Union bosses the enemy? Are the big unions the enemy? Are Political parties fullstop the enemy? Are the Tory voting middle-class the enemy? Are people who don’t devote themselves to the liberation of LGBTQ people the enemy? Are people who don’t fight for the disabled the enemy? Are people who don’t recognise white privilege in every single institution the enemy? Are people who don’t embrace full-on environmentalism the enemy?
Ask ten lefties, get ten different answers. It doesn’t help our cause to underplay the sheer scale of difference that exists.
When Labour people stand shoulder to shoulder with, say, Feminist-Environmentalists the level of agreement is going to be slim. the two can work together but only ever to a limited degree.
You can waste a lot of time trying to solve this problem but the simple fact is the left are a very broad church. The right wingers are defending a very specific thing. This state of affairs. Left-wingers are fighting for something quite different, the entire rainbow of possible other worlds. Its no wonder we seem fractured and disunited. We are.
Bret R
So people who don’t agree with your politics have a righteous mentality? Would you accept that from a frustarted Liberal Democrat who couldn’t understand why people like yourself didn’t just swallow your pride and vote for them? Because obviously to this Liberal Democrat “we all want the same thing” and “the Liberal Democrats best understand how to make that happen”.
Of course you wouldn’t. We all have our own anaylsis of society and the problems therein. This leads us inevitably to what sort of struggle we think we should be committed too.The fact is the difference between a centrist Labourite and someone on the hard-left in say, for example, the SWP is going to have a very different sense of what society is, what the problems are and what solutions would fix those problems.
Its got nothing to do with righteosness or petulancea or immaturity.
We disagree. Thats the reality.
swat
I can understand why Lib Dems feel frustrated: it must be pretty frustrating to face both ways. And Lib Dems have my full sympathy for not being appreciated by the electorate for the splendid work they did in Coalition and then the Tories go and deliberately shaft them, and take all their seats away from them. There was no ‘common understanding’ And you need ‘understanding’ to make a coalition work We agree to disagree. If only the splinter groups of they Left would adopt that approach, then there might well be more Lefty Govts in future, or even Left Centre Coalitions with the Lib Dems. But take it from me, Lib Dems are demonised by both Left and Right Parties generally, and I’m not quite sure why.