How to stop conference being boring

Have a good conference, did you?

I was unable to join you this year but watched much of the proceedings on TV. And to be frank, it was thoroughly tedious. Most of the speeches were read from scripts in a flat monotone. Rarely did any debate come to life. Rarely did anyone enthuse or persuade.

And it occurred that, if an old hack like me can find the conference boring, how much more boring must it seem to a lay audience? Indeed, all of the party conferences have become a tedium-fest, and if Britain’s political parties are trying to accelerate their slow death, they are going the right way about it.

It is unlikely that BBC Parliament’s viewing figures will be troubling the audience ratings during the conference season. The only event that will remain in the average viewer’s memory is UKIP MEP Godfrey Bloom’s altercation with Michael Crick.

I have been going to party conferences regularly since the Liberal Assembly in Llandudno in 1976. There have been some important changes in the intervening 37 years.

First, the action has gradually shifted from debates in the main auditorium to the fringe. Like the Edinburgh Festival, the fringe has outgrown the formal proceedings, so that there is more of interest to be found in fringe meetings and the informal politicking in the cafés, bars and stalls area. Media coverage rarely reflects this development, even though modern lightweight camera equipment makes it easy to do (unlike in the 1970s when TV cameras were huge, immobile things fixed to rostrums in front of the stage).

Second, the art of oratory has died because modern politics no longer calls for this skill. Public meetings were once a regular feature of political campaigning but if you held one now hardly anyone would turn up. At the same time, the huge growth in the number of TV and radio stations means that knowing how to do a broadcast interview is a more important skill. For evidence of the death of oratory, consider Danny Alexander’s lifeless speech at this year’s conference or the way Sarah Teather’s attempts at jokes fell flat at previous ones.

Third, genuine debate has been increasingly edged out by the need to find room on the agenda for set piece speeches and presentations. At least there remains some debate at Liberal Democrat conferences (despite the pressure from the leader’s office). At Labour and Conservative conferences, there is no democratic debate or decision-making at all.

Fourth, the professions of public relations and political advising, which scarcely existed until the 1980s, have grown like Topsy. In the 1970s, each MP’s staff comprised one secretary. Nowadays, backbenchers typically employ four staff while government ministers also have an army of special advisers (‘SpAds’). Such advisers specialise in leaving nothing to chance. The result is a growth in the culture of spin and the soundbite, the dominance of cynical media management, and the death of spontaneity.

And fifth, no conference these days is complete without an accordionist:



What can be done about this? Apart from getting rid of the accordions, obviously.

There is no quick fix but one remedy is to strip out of the formal agenda as much as possible of the non-spontaneous elements. That means getting rid of all the set piece speeches and presentations, apart from the leader’s speech at the end of the conference (and also the occasional guest speeches by visiting foreign liberal leaders).

If any government ministers want to deliver speeches, let them take their chances in the rough and tumble of debate. Or speak at a fringe meeting. Or do a TV interview outside the hall. Anything but clog up the agenda with the sheer tedium of their over-rehearsed speeches.

The belligerent youths in the leader’s office wouldn’t like it, of course. Were the Federal Conference Committee to carry out such a purge, one of these SpAds would doubtless turn up at the next meeting of the committee to demand a retraction of this policy. In which case the committee should respond with a short message about sex and travel.

Oh, and one other thing. A trapdoor should be installed under the speakers’ rostrum, controlled by a big lever next to the session chair. Either that, or wire up the rostrum to the mains.

Postscript: This blog post has won Liberal England’s Phrase of the Day award.

I have a dream

Fifty years ago today, on 28th August 1963, Martin Luther King delivered what is arguably the greatest political speech ever made: “I have a dream”.

The text of the speech (with a link to an MP3 audio file) is here.

You can watch a video of the speech here:



Listen and be reminded that politics is capable of a good deal more than today’s pedestrian offerings.

Tory cocks

Former Tory MP Jerry Hayes is always entertaining on the subject of his former parliamentary colleagues, and his latest two blog posts show an amusing turn of phrase.

On Tim Yeo:

It’s not often that I am shocked to the core, but the Tim Yeo affair has left my gob truly smacked. Did I hear him correctly on tape boasting that he told a business colleague what questions his select committee was going to ask? Forgive me but if that’s not coaching then my cock’s a kipper.

On Patrick Mercer:

One moment you are cock of the walk, the next; just a cock.

Hayes’s refreshing candour is a reminder of just how stilted most politicians sound nowadays. Better his Tourette’s than some spin doctor’s ‘message script’ any day of the week.

The dying art of political oratory

Max Atkinson has written an interesting analysis of the decline of political oratory:

...a major change in the past 25 years has been the replacement of political speeches by broadcast interviews as the main form of political communication in Britain – even though interviews hardly ever result in anything other than bad news about the politicians themselves. As a result, effective political speech-making has become a dying art, in which there appears to be a curious collaboration between the media and politicians to continue relegating the coverage of speeches in favour of the broadcast interview.

At the same time, the politicians are also doing their bit to eliminate much of the passion and liveliness that were once a normal part of political rallies – by speaking in rather strange venues to audiences with little or no interest in politics, and certainly no motivation to applaud or boo anything they might hear.

That is the irony of the communication strategy of leading politicians and their advisers. In their desperation to ‘connect’ with the electorate, they succeed in doing the precise opposite.

I made this point in my criticism (here and here) of the Liberal Democrats’ ‘message script’. That contrived approach to communication sucks the life out of politics. But your average political adviser seems incapable of understanding this point, and so cannot understand why the likes of Nigel Farage or Boris Johnson have more popular appeal than the conformist, over-managed ‘on message’ clones.

Woolwich: Political and media hysteria only aids terrorism

Well said Simon Jenkins in today’s Guardian:

We will not buckle to terrorism said David Cameron after the Woolwich murder on Wednesday. He then buckled. Everyone buckled. The home secretary buckled, the defence secretary buckled, the communities secretary buckled, the mayor of London buckled, the chief of police buckled, the press buckled, the BBC summoned its senior editors and they buckled. Everyone buckled.

The first question in any war – terrorism is allegedly a war – is to ask what the enemy most wants you to do. The Woolwich killers wanted publicity for their crime, available nowadays at the click of a mobile phone. They got it in buckets...

There is little a modern government can do to stem the initial publicity that terrorism craves. But it has considerable control over the subsequent response. When the Metropolitan police commissioner, Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe, pleaded for calm and for London to continue as normal, he was spitting into a hurricane. Terror could not have begged for more sensational attention than was granted it by Britain’s political community and media.

The clue to poor political judgement can be found in the poor political language:

Intoning a response to horror is one of the rituals of modern politics. The adjective mountain grows ever higher, depraved, sickening, horrific, barbaric, unspeakable. Damnation is sanctified by platitude. Unctuous “thoughts for the day” are uttered by religious leaders. If it bleeds it not only leads, it pleads for cliched analysis.

Jenkins advocates restraint:

In taking mundane acts of violence and setting them on a global stage, we not only politicise them, we risk validating the furies that drive them. Closing down the internet to starve terrorist acts of publicity is not feasible, and stifles the debate that should be taking place peacefully. But we do have the option to exercise self-restraint in the aftermath, to control the impulse to hyperbole. We can deny the terrorist the megaphone of exaggeration and hysteria. When Cameron yesterday said we should defy terror by going about our normal business, he was right. Why did he not do so?

It is this echo chamber of horror, set up by the media, public figures and government, that does much of terrorism’s job for it. It converts mere crimes into significant acts. It turns criminals into heroes in the eyes of their admirers. It takes violence and graces it with the terms of a political debate. The danger is that this debate is one the terrorist might sometimes win.

So why do political leaders add to the ‘adjective mountain’? It is because our post-Diana, how-does-it-feel media culture – in which every news item must be turned into a vicarious experience – demands an emotional not a rational response. It is a brave person who risks appearing unfeeling by resisting that sentimental pressure. But such bravery is necessary for leadership instead of followership.

A cool analysis and a rational response? No, let’s tie another teddy bear to the nearest railings.

Postscript: More good sense on this subject from Frank Furedi and Jonathan Calder.

Empty rhetoric – 55 years on

A word of advice for our political leaders and the halfwits they employ to churn out banal slogans along the lines of “centre-ground-one-nation-squeezed-middle-ordinary-struggling-hard-working-families-alarm-clock-Britain”.

Apart from anything else, you are not original. Empty rhetoric is nothing new.

Peter Sellers nailed it in 1958, with two important differences. First, politicians in the 1950s were perfectly capable of making up their own bullshit without the paid assistance of an army of special advisers. And second, no one nowadays would heckle with “What about the workers?”

Clichés 2.0

A war on clichés is being waged across the pond. At the end of the day, clichés have become a hot-button issue in the tightly-knit media community inside the Beltway. Needless to say, in this paradigm shift, American journalism is literally at a crossroads. Is this the new normal? [That’s enough clichés. Ed.]

Warning: This mockery will continue until the ‘On Message’ and ‘Alarm Clock Britain’ merchants emerge from party HQ waving a white flag.

The worst thing about the budget

Regular readers will know that a bugbear of this blog is political jargon, the stock phrases and clichés that litter politicians’ speeches.

Bravo, then, to the Telegraph’s Tom Chivers for spotting the worst thing about George Osborne’s budget speech, a major flaw that eluded other journalists; the grim phrase “aspiration nation”:

It’s hard to imagine a way you could abuse the English language more efficiently. It rhymes, for a start, which makes it sound (as a colleague put it) like the name of a bad instrumental jazz album. It is also simultaneously trying to sound clever (“Aspiration! It’s like hope, except it’s got four syllables”) and patronising us (“OK peons, this should be simple enough for you to remember”). For a two-word phrase, that’s good going.

Osborne is not the only culprit:

Every Budget, every major political speech, has to have its own “Aspiration Nation” moment these days. A worthy subset of the population needs to be defined, its undeserving opposite implicitly criticised; the speaker and their party is thus placed on the side of the angels, the hard-working strivers and the little man crushed between the uncaring cogs of the economic machine. “The squeezed middle”, “Mondeo Man”, “Alarm-clock Britain”. The PR teams and focus groups that form the withered heart of 21st-century government create these labels in the hope that a large enough demographic group hears them, thinks “Yes! I am financially squeezed/drive a mid-range saloon/own an alarm clock! This man/woman has seen into my soul and knows the true me: my hopes, my dreams, my morning routine. He/she can be trusted with stewardship of this country”, and puts a cross in the appropriate box.

Despite the competition, Chivers rates Osborne’s catchphrase the worst of the bunch:

...of all of these stupid, intelligence-insulting little nonsense-phrases, “aspiration nation” is surely the worst. The horrible jargony feel, as if the speaker is about to demand that we action it, going forward; the sheer unoriginality of it, a pointless rewording of all the “hard-working families” and “strivers, not shirkers” that we have heard with such unrelenting tedium for however many years.

Is it too much to hope that the Liberal Democrats will turn their backs on this sort of soulless, hackneyed language? Apparently it is.

From Iraq to the deficit

Q: What do the Iraq war in 2003 and economic policy in 2013 have in common?

A: An illusion of consensus.

As Paul Krugman observes in the New York Times:

The really striking thing, during the run-up to the war, was the illusion of consensus. To this day, pundits who got it wrong excuse themselves on the grounds that “everyone” thought that there was a solid case for war. Of course, they acknowledge, there were war opponents — but they were out of the mainstream.

The trouble with this argument is that it was and is circular: support for the war became part of the definition of what it meant to hold a mainstream opinion. Anyone who dissented, no matter how qualified, was ipso facto labeled as unworthy of consideration. This was true in political circles; it was equally true of much of the press, which effectively took sides and joined the war party.

A similar process is happening today with the policy of fiscal austerity:

...now as then we have the illusion of consensus, an illusion based on a process in which anyone questioning the preferred narrative is immediately marginalized, no matter how strong his or her credentials. And now as then the press often seems to have taken sides. It has been especially striking how often questionable assertions are reported as fact. How many times, for example, have you seen news articles simply asserting that the United States has a “debt crisis,” even though many economists would argue that it faces no such thing?

Krugman concludes:

What we should have learned from the Iraq debacle was that you should always be skeptical and that you should never rely on supposed authority. If you hear that “everyone” supports a policy, whether it’s a war of choice or fiscal austerity, you should ask whether “everyone” has been defined to exclude anyone expressing a different opinion. And policy arguments should be evaluated on the merits, not by who expresses them; remember when Colin Powell assured us about those Iraqi W.M.D.’s?

Whatever the political issue, war or economics, never trust people who begin with “everybody thinks that...” or end with “there is no alternative”.

Please remember to take all your personal belongings with you when leaving this blog

Well said, Norman Baker, for calling on train operators to curb the excessive number of announcements on trains. In criticising the quantity, however, Norman neglected to mention the quality.

On yesterday’s BBC Radio 4 PM programme [zap forward to 48:45], David Marsh of the Guardian’s Mind Your Language blog was interviewed about the bad English used in train announcements. His reply was similar to the blog post he wrote two years ago titled “Railspeak should be terminated”:

Railspeak is a language with a unique syntax and vocabulary – characterised by, for example, the mandatory use of auxiliary verbs (“we do apologise”), the random deployment of redundant adjectives (“station stop”, “personal belongings”) and the selection of inappropriate prepositions (“time into London Paddington is approximately 25 minutes”).

Trains never leave, but “depart”, never reach their destination, but “terminate”, and are frequently delayed by mysterious “incidents”. Rail catering, meanwhile, has been transformed from a music hall joke (British Rail sandwiches) to a surreal world of its own, offering among other treats “teas, coffees, hot chocolates [sic] ...” (Has anyone tested this by asking how many varieties of hot chocolate are, in fact, available? To enjoy, perhaps, while reading the safety information leaflet in braille?)

Like Orwell’s Newspeak, the result of all this is not effective communication but the creation of a gulf between the language used by its speakers and those on the receiving end. Calling people “standard-class customers” serves only to alienate them if the reality is that they feel treated like second-class (or third world) passengers. Hyper-correct, hyper-polite language may be well intended but comes across as patronising and insincere.

Do these people talk like this at home? “This is Julie, your customer host. I do advise Colin that I am now serving a full range of sausages, chips, beans, breads, butters and teas in the at-home kitchen. I do apologise that there is no at-armchair trolley service.” And later: “This is Julie, your customer host. I do wish to inform Colin that due to adverse screaming kids conditions I do not agree to his suggestion of ‘an early night and a bit of a cuddle’. I do apologise for any inconvenience caused.”

Railspeak is not the fault of ordinary railway staff – they are just reading from the script. The blame rests with the illiterate managers who devise and impose this nonsense.

Now will someone please explain to Tim Snowball at Liberal Democrat HQ that his message script (“On Message, In Volume, Over Time”) is the political equivalent of railspeak, and is just as wooden, patronising and alienating.

‘Hitler Was A Liberal’

Believe it or not, an American author called Joseph P. Kamp wrote a book called Hitler Was A Liberal, published in 1949 as part of an ultraconservative propaganda campaign organised and financed by the Texan oil billionaire and multiple bigamist H.L. Hunt.

The astonishing story of Hunt’s ultraconservative activities is part of a fascinating blog by TV documentary maker Adam Curtis, which explores the idea that the abuse of language deprives us of much of the freedom and independence we imagine we have.

Curtis credits Hunt with starting the current trend towards corrosion of objectivity and truth in the media. He tells the story of Hunt to illustrate his thesis:

So much of the language that surrounds us – from things like economics, management theory and the algorithms built into computer systems – appears to be objective and neutral. But in fact it is loaded with powerful, and very debatable, political assumptions about how society should work, and what human beings are really like.

Once again, Adam Curtis has produced a rich and thought-provoking essay, illustrated with some extraordinary video footage. Far superior to the trivia that passes for most political comment these days, it reminds us of the serious themes that politics is really about.

Politics and the English Language

Everyone involved in politics should read George Orwell’s essay Politics and English Language (see Wikipedia’s summary and the full original text). It was written in 1946, in an era when fascists and communists had abused language with somewhat more serious consequences than the efforts of today’s spin doctors. But it remains just as relevant.

The essay articulates Orwell’s philosophy of good writing. His enemy was unclear prose, which hides the truth rather than expresses it. He argued that, when language is not clear, it usually indicates there is no clear thought behind it. He advocated using plain English and set out six rules to avoid poor writing. Print these rules and stick them next to your computer screen.

Having read Orwell’s essay, do listen to this morning’s edition of BBC Radio 4’s Start the Week (part of a series of special programmes on Radio 4 commemorating Orwell). It was a thoroughly entertaining and intelligent debate about political writing and the legacy of Orwell’s essay. Amongst other things, we learned why today’s politicians feel compelled to use hackneyed phrases that would make Orwell shudder, such as ‘squeezed middle’ and ‘hard-working families’.

Corporate bullshit

Imagine a world without clichés. Politicians would be forced to say what they really mean, in plain English.

Politicians who talk in clichés probably think in clichés. Their hand-me-down phrases and worn-out metaphors are a symptom of a deeper malaise, the hollowing-out of politics, where substance (distinctive values and a clear vision) has been replaced by the superficial (managerialism and spin). The resulting insincere language is a major reason why politicians have lost public respect.

Waging war on clichés is good for a laugh but there’s a more important purpose. Taking apart empty language is a form of reverse engineering, which exposes the absence of thought behind it.

The same applies in the world of business. In today’s Financial Times, Lucy Kellaway presents her annual ‘Golden Flannel Awards’ [registration (free) required; to bypass this, go to Google News and enter “The first word in mangled meanings” in the search box].

“2012 turned out to be yet another bumper year for guff, cliché, euphemism and verbal stupidity,” says Kellaway. Her discoveries include a company called Record, which actually makes folding aluminium doors but describes itself as a supplier of “entrance solutions”. She also exposes Citibank, which tried to hide the fact that it was axing 1,100 employees in a press release that talked of “optimizing the customer footprint across geographies”.

I am sorry to report that the clichés used in today’s coalition relaunch are nowhere near as bad as that, though David Cameron made a half-hearted attempt with “full steam ahead”, while Nick Clegg responded with “hard-working families”.

A word of advice to our coalition leaders. If you are going to use bullshit, do it properly or not at all.

Laws to write manifesto?

“Sources in Westminster” (as they say in the proper newspapers) have informed Liberator of a strong rumour that David Laws is about to be given the job of writing the Liberal Democrats’ 2015 general election manifesto.

Is this what Nick Clegg means by getting his message across? The symbolism of appointing Laws would not be lost on Clegg, given Laws’s notoriety for holding views on economics well to the right of most party members.

The party’s 2011 policy document Facing the Future suggested that the next manifesto was likely to be a rather timid affair (which is why David Boyle and I wrote a more robust alternative). That prospect now seems attractive compared with a document written by Laws.

Meanwhile, it seems that the party is trying to take the credit for Liberator’s leak of the ‘message script’. In today’s edition of the ‘Letter from the Leader’ e-mailed to party members, Nick Clegg writes “We also got a bit of attention after the party’s central message for spokespeople was featured on the BBC.” Is this what they mean by ‘damage limitation’?

Clegg goes on to argue:

There’s nothing unusual about political parties wanting to ensure they get their message across, and our key argument – that the Liberal Democrats are building a stronger economy in a fairer society, enabling every person to get on in life – is one that I hope some of you are already starting to recognise.

A good test for the validity of any argument is to ask whether anyone would seriously propose the opposite: “We are building a weaker economy in an unfairer society, preventing every person from getting on in life.” I don’t think so.

POSTSCRIPT: Update here.

Why Ed Balls is a complete arse

The previous post mentioned the Labour Party’s problem with messaging and unthinking mantras. It also quoted the Power Inquiry’s criticism of the political strategy of ‘triangulation’, “a mathematical equation that secures power but in the end drives down people’s desire to be politically engaged.”

Right on cue, Ed Balls has launched a race to the bottom with the Conservatives to see who can be the most ‘tough’ with long-term unemployed people.

A genuinely radical party of the left would be articulating a real alternative to the failed economic orthodoxy that has caused high unemployment. Labour is not that party. Instead, it is competing with the Conservatives and Nick Clegg for an illusory ‘centre ground’, or what Balls calls “a one nation approach,” as if this empty slogan somehow distinguishes Labour from the coalition parties.

Anyone who thought ‘New Labour’ had died with Tony Blair is sadly mistaken. Ed Balls remains a true disciple. His politics is politics reduced to public relations. Millions of innocent people will suffer because of day-to-day tactical considerations about how to respond to the opinion polls and how to impress the right-wing tabloids.

Well it might win a temporary boost in the polls, but do you want this sort of cynic running the country? I don’t.

Why politicians seem abnormal

Last Friday’s post that leaked the Liberal Democrats’ ‘message script’ caused a bit of a stir. There were a few attempts to defend the script (in the comments both on that post and elsewhere). These responses had one thing in common; an inability to imagine any other course of action. The need for everyone to stay ‘on message’ seemed to go without saying; if you don’t like the messages, what alternative ones would you prefer? The possibility never occurred that this sort of prescriptive messaging might actually be part of the problem.

It is a problem not unique to the Liberal Democrats. My thanks to Nick Barlow, who recommends a recent blog post by Jon Worth titled “Behaving in politics as if we were normal people”, and to Jon Worth in turn for recommending a post by Mary Kaldor on the ‘subterranean politics’ of various new grassroots movements throughout Europe.

Jon Worth considers why we don’t behave in politics like we do in real life. He gives the example of the Labour Party adopting the ‘one nation’ message last year and how it rapidly became an unthinking mantra:

I have no idea how the mantra came into being. But now everyone follows it, shadow cabinet members and think tank wonks repeat it, and it has become party line. That process is not normal, it is not healthy. It is not practicing the kind of politics the participants imagine. Try changing the mission statement of a large corporation so abruptly and there would be harsh counter-reactions among the employees. In Labour there is slavish, flaccid loyalty among the devotees (at least in public), and a shrug from the 99.5% of the UK population that are not party members.

The problem is that being in a party for a decade squeezes the life, the straightforward honesty, the originality out of people. It is not that party people become dishonest per se, but more that the spontaneity, the vitality is drained from them. They will Google themselves compulsively to check how they are being perceived, rather than using the net to really make political change happen. They will use social networks to repeat the leadership’s line and show how diligent they are on #LabourDoorstep, rather than building networks beyond the party.

Mary Kaldor, meanwhile, points out how participants in the current wave of street protests throughout Europe “cite concern with the failures of democracy as the reason for engagement and protest rather than austerity per se”. Behind these protests is a widespread frustration with political elites and the lack of participation.

What is turning people off conventional politics? In 2006, the Rowntree-funded Power Inquiry (full report here and executive summary here) investigated popular disengagement from formal democratic politics in Britain. Two of the most important reasons for disengagement are that “citizens do not feel that the processes of formal democracy offer them enough influence over political decisions – this includes party members who feel they have no say in policy-making and are increasingly disaffected”; and that “the main political parties are widely perceived to be too similar and lacking in principle”.

Underlying these factors is the shift from an industrial to a post-industrial economy, which has created “a large section of British society which is now better educated, more affluent, expects greater control and choice over many aspects of life, feels no deference towards those in positions of authority, and is not as bound by the traditional bonds of place, class and institution that developed during the industrial era.”

The Power Inquiry concluded that political parties have failed to adapt to this profound social change:

The response of the political system to post-industrialism and to political disengagement has been either technocratic or self-interested in the sense that the parties have adapted their policies and campaigning simply to win elections. The political strategy of “triangulation”, for example, is democracy by numbers. It is a mathematical equation that secures power but in the end drives down people’s desire to be politically engaged. It hollows out democracy because it inevitably means by-passing party members who want debate and neglects the democratic channels of engagement which might get in the way of the strategy.

The people responsible for the Liberal Democrats’ ‘message script’ appear to have ignored these lessons entirely. The problem with their script is not merely the empty rhetoric of the messages themselves but also the underlying premise that voters will be impressed by a Leninist-style party line. The insistence on party mantras is intended to convey a sense of coherence but it is counter-productive because it serves only to confirm the sceptical views of people who feel alienated by the whole political process. Even if some of the messages had any merit, it would be immaterial; the whole tone puts people off because it sounds insincere and makes politicians who talk in this contrived manner seem abnormal.

As the Power Inquiry pointed out, increasing numbers of people feel no deference towards those in positions of authority. But the repetition of mantras makes this worse. It makes politicians sound slavishly loyal, calculating and synthetic, and creates the impression that political parties do not tolerate debate or dissent.

As Power also pointed out, “the main political parties are widely perceived to be too similar and lacking in principle”. Yet mantras fail to differentiate the parties but make them sound the same. Just as most modern cars look the same because rival manufacturers’ wind tunnels produce the same results, so the mainstream parties produce similar messages because they get similar results from their opinion research.

The political system looks dysfunctional to most people because the political elites don’t seem like normal people. Speaking in robotic slogans can only make that worse.

Pragmatism is not all it’s cracked up to be

One thing that unites our political leaders is a belief in pragmatism. It conveys a positive buzz, which is why politicians like to associate with the concept. But as Alex Worsnip explains on Prospect magazine’s blog, “it allows politicians to subtly stifle dissent, and causes us to neglect the most fundamental questions about what our society ought to look like”:

Tony Blair told us on his election in 1997 that what counts is not “outdated ideology” but “what works.” David Cameron famously wrote that he doesn’t “believe in ‘isms’” because “words like communism, socialism, capitalism and republicanism all conjure up one image in [his] mind: extremism.” Earlier this year, Nick Clegg eagerly urged a group of business leaders that the Liberal Democrats would be “sensible and centrist; pragmatic – not dogmatic – at all times.”

These claims to some sort of down-to-earth, no-nonsense practicality do not stand up to close scrutiny:

Talk of “pragmatism,” especially in Britain, is a part of a narrative that proclaims that we have reached an era of post-ideological politics. But the term is extremely slippery, and the first problem with this cult of pragmatism is that no one seems willing to pin down exactly what they mean by “pragmatic.”

Worsnip considers various possible meanings and concludes that what politicians mean by ‘pragmatic’ is a Baldwinesque “what matters is what works”. But this remains highly problematic:

The notion of “what works” is amorphous and vague. One can only assess whether something is working against some kind of a standard for what a well-functioning society looks like; for what it is that you want to work and how. As an economist might put the point, you have to have a utility function to maximise; you can’t just maximise.

Is a society “working” if GDP rises steadily but citizens are drastically unequal? What about if people of different races and religions have different access to opportunities and goods? These questions are ineliminably moral, and must be answered in detail before we can have a useable notion of “what works.” The attempt to find some value-neutral standpoint from which to assess what works – the aspiration for an escape from ideology altogether – is an impossible one. Deciding how to weigh up different social benefits and harms is hard; it goes to the core of what we want our society to be like. But these questions are just made harder by reducing a vast swathe of distinct and often competing considerations to a single, sweeping judgement of “what works.”

The error here is not just a philosophical one. When politicians talk about what works, they make tacit assumptions about various moral questions concerning the proper aims of public policy. But by presenting themselves as “non-ideological pragmatists,” they get away with leaving these assumptions unarticulated and undefended. And so we get a particular value-laden agenda – often, though not always, that of the ruling class – smuggled in, under the banner of anodyne pronouncements about the need to sometimes make compromises or to be sensitive to empirical evidence.

At its worst, this can amount to making a set of value-assumptions seem like incontestable and ineradicable features of the world; to what the sociologist Max Weber called the “routinisation” of value. Those who oppose a particular agenda are characterised as “living in the past’ or as failing to recognise the facts of the modern world. Likewise, talk of “possibility” is frequently used to delimit the range of political options, without it being made clear in what sense and why a particular course of action is supposedly “impossible.”

Worsnip points out that the claim to be non-ideological is often deployed in the service of an ideological agenda, which can be conservative or radical. Politicians who make this claim are trying to convince us that there is no space from which to oppose them:

Cameron, Osborne, and to some extent Clegg have elided questions about the burdens of austerity measures, and how they have been distributed across different social classes, by implicitly characterising their opponents as head-in-the-sand, “unrealistic” idealists failing to acknowledge that something needed to be done about the deficit. Yet that is simply not the question in play when intelligent critics wonder if the burden of austerity measures could not have fallen more squarely on the rich. Clegg [in a speech last October] again provides a striking example, proclaiming – as if it were some sort of heroically straight-talking admission of what no one else will say – that “bluntly, with the economy still fragile, this is not the time for dogma.” In this way, the vague language of “pragmatism” attempts to justify the status quo without providing any kind of substantive argument.

Whereas the old “ideologues” were at least honest about their agenda, the new “pragmatists” do not even tell us what theirs is. The language of pragmatism is thus a far cry from “straight-talking”; rather, it is a way of depriving citizens of the language in which to voice dissent.

So politicians need a coherent vision and clear values – and an honest agenda – before they can talk meaningfully about acting pragmatically. Pragmatism cannot exist outside that context, unless it is a dishonest attempt to disguise one’s agenda or obstruct opponents.

Before Nick Clegg became an MP, he was a member of the Liberal Democrats’ working group that in 2002 produced the party’s vision and values document Freedom, Liberty and Fairness. He would do well to revisit Alan Beith’s foreword to that document:

The Parliamentary Question in February 2002 which left Tony Blair uncharacteristically lost for words was not about adverse health statistics, ministerial failures or foreign policy: it was a modest request from his own side that he should give the House of Commons a brief characterisation of the political philosophy and beliefs which underpin his policies. His inability to do so, and his hasty retreat into health service investment figures, spoke volumes. If you want to know whether to vote for a political party – even more if you want to join one – it is more important to know something about its underlying beliefs than to know about its policies for this year or next. The policies will almost certainly change, and if there is no underlying framework of belief or philosophy, the direction in which they may change is unpredictable. That has been many Labour voters’ unhappy experience of New Labour in government.

If Nick Clegg succeeds in making a similarly vacuous ‘pragmatism’ the core of the Liberal Democrat offer, our voters can expect a similarly unhappy experience.

Cliché of the Year

As we reach the end of 2012, Liberator’s judges have been deliberating over a heavily contested field for the coveted title of ‘Cliché of the Year’.

Last year’s winner was The mess left by Labour, which fought off a stiff challenge by the ever-popular Elephant in the room and It’s a big ask. However, the awards were mired in controversy because of the judges’ decision to disqualify Alarm Clock Britain. This phrase had all the makings of a cliché but failed to become one because the only person who used it was Nick Clegg. Banality is not enough; a true cliché needs an excess of wear and tear.

Sadly, the Liberal Democrats did not learn their lesson and attempted to rig the competition again this year by producing a long list of ‘messages’. The party must learn that the best clichés are born, not made.

At least the Liberal Democrats did not perform as badly as the Conservatives or Labour. Chillax was well on the way to becoming a cliché until David Cameron used it and instantly killed it off. Meanwhile, Ed Miliband’s attempt to enter the field by reviving that old chestnut one nation did not even get off the starting blocks.

And so to the winners for 2012.

Sixth place is awarded to omnishambles. This was a brilliant creation when originally coined for the TV sitcom The Thick Of It. Subsequent overuse ensured that, by the end of the year, it was completely worn out.

Fifth place is taken by the claim of politicians to send a strong message. The judges were impressed by the combination of earnestness and meaninglessness. Users’ desire to send a strong message is matched only by their inability to send one.

In fourth place is iconic. Anything that is vaguely traditional, famous or popular has been elevated to the status of the Taj Mahal (the original, not your local curry house). Here’s a clue: If you have to describe or explain something, it is not iconic.

And now to the medal positions (and one must be careful here not to resort to the year’s new Olympic verb, to medal).

Third place goes to festive, used indiscriminately as an all-purpose adjective applied to anything remotely to do with Christmas. A special mention must go to Transport for London, whose e-mail circular earlier this month about disruptions to public transport during the holiday began, “I am writing to advise you about getting around London during the festive period.”

Second place is awarded to the word passionate for its ubiquity in TV cookery programmes. No contestant in any of the variants of Masterchef can hope to progress to the next round of the competition without claiming to be ‘passionate’ about food or cooking. Mere interest, ambition or enthusiasm won’t do. The hosts of every other TV cookery show are just as bad. It is not enough to like turnips; one must be ‘passionate’ about them.

There is a useful linguistic rule when it comes to expressing emotions: show, don’t tell. If anyone were genuinely passionate, it would be self-evident and should not need spelling out. But when anybody claims “I am passionate,” one doubts their word.

And finally, this year’s winner is [drum roll...] all of the clichés used by Nick Clegg in his recent speech to CentreForum. It was a truly bravura performance, and the judges could find no better example of what George Orwell called “staleness of imagery”. In the space of a few minutes, we were treated to “modern Britain”, “the centre ground”, “we’ve embraced the challenge”, “we’ve been on a journey”, all rounded off with the three-in-one genius of “there are no easy answers, no silver bullets, only tough choices”. Ambassador, with these clichés, you are really spoiling us.

What are the prizes for the winners? Ideally, each cliché should be permanently retired. As should the third-rate marketing and media hacks who perpetuate them.

If you fancy winning next year’s prize, do make copious use of these banned words and phrases.

Stay “on message” or be EXTERMINATED!

This morning, Liberal Democrat HQ sent an e-mail to parliamentarians, PPCs, council group leaders and various other office holders about the party’s new ‘message script’.

This e-mail is highly instructive, though not in the way party HQ intended. It reveals much about what is wrong with the way the Liberal Democrats are being run and the state of British politics in general.

Here is the full unexpurgated text (the italics, underlining and emboldening are as in the original):

I hope you’ve had a very enjoyable Christmas.

Today Nick Clegg will release his New Year message to the media. You can see it here now.

This broadcast is the first full external use of our new Party message script – the product of Ryan Coetzee’s research into what works with our electoral market and also an extensive consultation with many Party stakeholders.

The full message script is below.

If you’re at a post-Christmas, pre-New Year lull over the next couple of days – please take a look at this script – read it, learn it, work out how to use it.

In communications terms, we know that if we as a Party don’t collectively communicate one message clearly, the public end up hearing nothing.

It is therefore absolutely critical that we all focus on this message in the New Year and make it the basis for every communication we make – whether it is in the media, online, in leaflets or when speaking to an internal or external audience.

If we all stick to and get some volume behind this script, by this time next year our voters will know that the Liberal Democrats are building a stronger economy in a fairer society, enabling every person to get on in life. That Labour can’t be trusted with their money, and the Tories can’t be trusted to build a fair society. And also just a few of the things we have achieved in government.

So, if you make one New Year resolution this year, please make it to help us be “On Message, In Volume, Over Time” and communicate from this script at every opportunity.

Many thanks,

Tim Snowball

Director of Communications (LDHQ)

MESSAGE SCRIPT:

Building a Stronger Economy in a Fairer Society

The Liberal Democrats are building a stronger economy in a fairer society, enabling every person to get on in life.

That’s why we have:

1. Fixed the mess left by Labour. We have reduced the deficit by a quarter, kept interest rates down and created over a million private sector jobs.

2. Ensured that 24 million people will not pay any income tax on the first £9,440 of earnings, putting £600 back into their pockets from April 2013.

3. Put an extra £2.5 billion into schools targeted at the least well-off pupils, raising standards for everyone.

4. Created a Green Investment Bank that will unlock billions of pounds of private investment in renewable energy and create thousands more jobs in the green economy.

5. Got young people off the dole and into work through apprenticeships, work placement or training with our £1 billion Youth Contract.

6. Delivered the biggest ever cash rise in the state pension.

The Labour Party can’t be trusted to manage the economy. Labour borrowed and borrowed and nearly bankrupted Britain. In power they cared more about bankers, media bosses and union barons than they did about ordinary, working people.

The Conservatives can’t be trusted to build a fair society. Until the Lib Dems got into government, no one could stop the Tories from looking after the super rich who fund their party, while ignoring the needs of normal people who struggle to make ends meet. That’s why we have blocked Tory plans to:

1. Allow bosses to fire staff at will.

2. Let local schools be run for profit.

3. Cut inheritance tax for millionaires.

4. Introduce lower rates of pay for public sector workers outside of the South East.

Now, with your support, we want to keep building a stronger economy in a fairer society. Over the next two years we will:

1. Increase our tax cut for low and middle earners to £700 for 24 million people.

2. Dramatically increase parents’ access to child care so that it’s easier for parents to get back into jobs.

3. Reform the welfare system to get people off benefits and into work.

4. Create tens of thousands of jobs across Britain in the new, green economy.

Let’s never go back to the way things were, because Labour can’t be trusted with your money, and the Tories can’t be trusted to build a fair society.

Only the Lib Dems can be trusted to build a stronger economy and a fairer society, enabling every person to get on in life.

STRONGER ECONOMY. FAIRER SOCIETY.

[ENDS]

Where to begin? Alarm bells start ringing in Tim Snowball’s introduction, which is littered with dreadful PR-speak (“electoral market”, “stakeholders”, “get some volume behind this script”, “on message”). The recipients of this e-mail are not political novices, yet they are treated like idiots by both the general tone and the didactic politics-by-numbers approach (“If you’re at a post-Christmas, pre-New Year lull over the next couple of days – please take a look at this script – read it, learn it, work out how to use it.”).

More fundamentally, there is the idea that we should all speak according to a ‘message script’ (moreover, a script that fails on its own terms because it contains far too many messages to achieve any focus or discipline, even if bits of it are written in bold type). For all “Ryan Coetzee’s research”, this sort of wooden language is precisely the thing that turns people off because it makes politicians sound rehearsed, false and insincere. It sounds scripted because it is scripted. Indeed, scripting isn’t a solution – it’s part of the problem because it makes politicians sound more like Daleks than human beings.

More fundamentally still, this set of instructions is the voice of a party in denial. The coalition government’s economic policy – the overarching policy of austerity that dwarfs everything else – is not working, for the reason the Liberal Democrats’ own 2010 manifesto said it wouldn’t. (More detailed explanation here). Because of a failed economic dogma, the economy isn’t getting stronger and the deficit isn’t being reduced. And this dogma means that the poorest people are paying the highest price for economic failure, so society isn’t getting fairer. All the Liberal Democrats have been able to do in government is ameliorate the situation – a valuable role but one that should not be oversold.

What we have here is an object lesson in how politics has been hollowed out and reduced to a matter of managerialism and public relations. It seems no-one at the top of the party has any intellectual grasp of the gravity of the situation. The global economy is in deep crisis and the problem cannot be reduced to facile slogans about “the mess left by Labour”. We are at an historical turning point where the global economy will undergo a fundamental transformation (as it has before in the 1880s-90s, 1930s-40s and 1970s-80s). This situation requires radical thinking and radical responses. Yet all the British political establishment can do is fret about staying “on message”.

And then politicians wonder why they continue to lose popular trust and support.

POSTSCRIPT (1): A perceptive response on Nick Barlow’s blog and an unbiased report by BBC News.

POSTSCRIPT (2): See the subsequent post on this topic.

POSTSCRIPT (3): The party has responded by trying to claim the credit for the media coverage of the leak.

Old Political Sayings No.643: You can’t polish a turd

You know what they say. You cannot polish a turd – or can you?

This proposition has finally been put to the test. The MythBusters applied rigorous scientific methods and have definitively answered this age-old question:



Please, whatever you do, don’t tell Nigel Farage.

Next week: You can’t put lipstick on a pig.