Matt T

Hitchens

A few observations on Peter Hitchen's call for the Tory Party to disband.

It was a curious article, insofar that Hitchens' description of the Tory party's plight is rather good, whereas his prescription to get for new party it is ridiculous, and would see them reduced to third party state if they held together long enough.

Hitchens is frequently accused of wanting to return to the 1950s, but just because he is so frequently accused of it doesn't mean he doesn't, he does. And yet this is the complete opposite of what the Conservative Party needs, for the 1950s and 1960s still loom large in the party's current terrible state.

To see why think back to the aftermath of the 1992 election. It was commonly argued that social and economic change had destroyed the industrial working class, and thus Labour's prospects of ever forming a government. In fact, although Labour did need to adjust to these profound changes (though it is debatable whether actually needed New Labour, or if instead merely destroying the Bennite left would have done), and it did, in many ways they were also positive for the party. The decline of the manual working class went hand-in-hand with the decline of social and economic hierarchy and priviledge. Both of these essentially meant the end of the non-manual lower-middle class as a uniform block, which had been held together voting Tory by deference on one side and a fear of the manual working class on the other.

Now this group of people might not have been 'natural' Labour voters, if the Tories had articulated a view of society less hierarchial, and deferential, ie. Hitchens' 1950s dream. But they did or could not, and probably still can't (witness William Hague's 2001 election campaign).

Thus Thatcher's election victories of the 1980s (which were themselves due in large part to fortuitous, short-term factors) masked the underlying trend, which was massively to the detriment of the Tory party, and came to the fore in Labour's 1997 and 2001 landslides.

To recover from this the Tory party therefore needs the complete opposite of a return to 1950s world. It needs to become much more like a continental European right-wing party. A classic example of the other-worldlyness it inhabits was the opposition in it to the removal of hereditary peers, a position that would not have been contemplated by any other major right-wing party in the world.

posted by Matthew @ 10/06/2003 01:08:00 PM Comments: 0